Google Webmaster Central Blog - Official news on crawling and indexing sites for the Google index

Using Webmaster Tools like an SEO

Wednesday, January 26, 2011 at 2:49 PM

Webmaster Level: Beginner to Intermediate

We on the Webmaster Central team aren’t SEOs, but that doesn’t stop me from pretending to be one! In our latest video, I’ll talk about utilizing some features in Webmaster Tools as though I were the SEO for www.googlestore.com.


Just as a grandparent raves about their grandchild, I could have gone on for hours about (my baby!) Webmaster Tools. Thankfully I stopped myself -- but if you have tips to share or questions to ask, please comment below.

The comments you read here belong only to the person who posted them. We do, however, reserve the right to remove off-topic comments.

63 comments:

HawkEye said...

Valuable info, nice presentation.
Thanks, Maile !

Brian Ussery said...

Great video, information and presentation for SEOs using Google Webmaster Tools. This video might even go a long way towards helping someone out there sell lots of shiny new Google t-shirts! :)

hıristiyanlık hristiyanlık said...

Thank you for this helpful video. I have been looking for information like this

Lars Vogel said...

Thanks. Surprising to me this was very informative. :-)

Redcort Software said...

Well done! I was a bit surprised how practical and useful the video was even after using Webmaster tools weekly for well over a year. I'd strongly encourage additional videos explaining other features

As an online software publisher relying on Google for our revenue, I'd very much like to see similar videos for Analytics and Adwords. Thank you!

Keith DeLong
Redcort Software

nooozeguy said...

Is this Google's fullest validation and explanation of SEO yet?

Antonio Ooi said...

Maile, how did you get that Starred tab anyway? I have 4 starred queries but I can't see the Starred tab appearing on my WMT...

Bala said...

Thanks for the useful information..

Nicola said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Nicola said...

I would say you could be a good SEO ;-) Thank you for the useful info but I cannot find the starred queries in search queries.

Binyamin said...

Are Google Webmaster Tools planning to develop JSON Sitemap?

Jagadeesh M said...

Nice video Maile. Seems like Googlers are Good SEO trainers :D

-Jag

Miles said...

Maile I really enjoyed this presentation - it is probably the best one yet. Well done!

Soeren Sprogoe said...

@Antonio: I don't have the starred tab either. Instead you should have a "Filter" button. Click it, and there should be a "Starred queries only" option.

smsinhindi.com said...

Thank you for reminding these features. We daily used to see webmaster tool , but never care so seriously. Now its time to give some more time to GWT.

Thank you

ges said...

Very usefull for me, great info, thank you !

Rebecca Gill said...

Great video Google Webmaster Central!

As an SEO who uses this tool daily, I found most of it to be geared towards the beginner. However, the description of "average position" in search rank was priceless. It helped validate my assumptions and confirmed that what I believed to be true was actually the case.

As always, greatly appreciate the transparency in your policies!

indiadesign said...

Indeed a valuable read for beginners and intermediates as well. I always depend on GWT to fix all my site's SEO and crawl errors.

Muzaffar Sangre said...

Thanks for the Useful Information on Webmaster Tools. Especially the way of presentation using Google Store. Thanks again :)
Muzaffar

Beben said...

webmaster is where it all...hihihi
thanks thanks

Piyush said...

Fantastic Video, thanks for making us aware about some more facts.

whatsthebigidea said...

Thanks for a concise tutorial!

Marjory said...

This was great. Thanks so much. I can hardly wait for the sequel.

PlanetNim Caretaker said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Jody said...

Hi Maile,

Excellent post. I already use these features but this is a great resource for educating some of my team members on using GWT.

Thank you for taking the time to share this.

Jody said...

Oh my life, why have I never seen parameter handling before! Thank you for this excellent video, I am a numpty :)

Jody said...

two jodys in a row, what are the chances :)

rohan said...

Very exact & user friendly knowledge has been described. Webmaster tool is so useful these days else you need nothing.

Snoqualmie Raging Falls Farm said...

This presentation is very well laid out, and easier to understand. I noticed you are proud of this, and you have every right to be. Excellent. Your enthusiasm shows through, and now I am going to go back and forth, hoping to go along on my analytics page.

Excellent! Two Paws Up!

Azunga Web Development said...

Thanks for the great presentation. I really enjoyed the valuable information.

I do have a problem with WMT though. I had crawl errors on my site which have now be fixed with the appropriate 301's and 302's. Many weeks after fixing these errors they are still showing as errors. Even though I use the "Fetch as Googlebot" feature which tells me the pages are fine the pages still come up as errors. It's been over 4 weeks that these errors have been reported and fixed but they are still showing up in the crawl errors.

Would it be possible to make the "fetch as googlebot" feature to clear out the errors found in the crawl errors when you fetch the exact same page?

Destination Infinity said...

Excellent, I never knew that webmaster tools have so many tracking and suggestion features! I will keep an eye on them from now on :)

Destination Infinity

IfindI said...

Thanking Wonder Masters and Maile. It could not be without appreciatins for Grand Parent Spirit of Maile. Is it possible for a printed version ? Thanking You Google Wonder Masters again with Regards and Best Wishes. P.s. Is it proper place to express that I am searching for a New Version of Travel Template I am using ?

Hari Krishna Devanabowina said...

Excellent. Though as an SEO, We use some of these features sometimes, It's great gain to know about all the main features of Google webmaster central.

Thanks for the helpful video

TDI International India Limited said...

Thanks for all your hard work. I always enjoy seeing who is picked and enjoy reading that post.

webmaster said...

thanks for this video really helpful for seo point of view and nature of the websites

Seo Queen said...

I really like the points which you have mentioned in your post, which will definitely helpful to make an internet marketing and SEO campaign better

Partha S said...

thnx for the tips.. i now must take this tool more seriouly and try to follow the guidelines more frequently. :)

Jurgen Estanislao said...

Bravo! Great straightforward information :D

AK Works said...

Pretty good. Already did several of these things, but glad to see GOOG team pointing that out as the usage for these tools.

Ezone said...

Very nice presentation and it gave a more insight into Webmaster Tools. I have been using Webmaster Tools for sometime but will take it more seriously now. Spotless Presentation just like your smile and face !!! :)

True Web Success said...

It is a proven fact that he SEO services and the link building services provided by a professional SEO is always better for you as these are done by the SEO experts who already posses good deal of experience in this field.

Neetu Sharma said...

Very useful information ..

Mike Bosch said...

Thanks for the useful information.

Peter said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
wmanchester.blogspot.com said...

Thank you for this helpful video

TRIBBAL TATTOO said...

what is meant by seo

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VoIP said...

This is a great documentary, very informative

Roy Sencio said...

Excellent video.. I did not get why having unique page titles and meta descriptions would dilute page rank.

Is it because dup pages will not get indexed and thus not have any value that it can pass over to the other pages that it links to?

Llanasa said...

OMG that was great, i did not know how awesome the webmaster tools could be, i have learnt lots
Thanks!

Galina said...

It was helpful presentation not just for me, as web designer, but for my customers. No need to explain my self how it works. Thank you.

bswopes said...

I've been using webmaster tools for around 8 months now... in 3 minutes of watching this video, I've had two things make me go "oh wow, I had no idea that was there".

WSzP said...

Great post and nice presentation. I wish there would be more SEO related articles or videos created by Google.

Anders said...

Thank you for an very informative video! It helped me a lot, but I don't have the Fetch as Googlebot option. How come?

JAFAR said...

Thanks for your videos. It's really helpful...

JAFAR said...

Very nice informative article

SEO Professional said...

I admire the valuable information you offer in your articles. I will bookmark your blog and have my children check up here often. I am quite sure they will learn lots of new stuff here than anybody else!

Beage said...

Thanks,
That was a great video, I found it interesting & I learned a lot from it. Any video that you can learn from are great videos. We need more videos like these, that way people will put up good quality sites instead of all the crap out there. I also like how you broke the steps down at the end.

crisismaven said...

Great wrap-up thanks! And, unlike other videos, you dwell on each subject just for the right length of time so that one doesn't feel like it's a waste as against reading; an accomplishment in itself!

Sharepoint Consulting said...

Very informative and helpful video. Thanks for this valuable video.

Found SEO said...

You can now integrated this data into the new analytics - makes it even more useful for SEO.

nimrod said...

I love Webmaster Tools. It's so valuable when it comes down to identifying issues with your sites.

ravi said...

very good video