Categories: General SEOLink Building

What is Rank Tracking & Why It’s Crutial for SEO in 2024?

SEO is huge, and there’s plenty of factors that come into action if you want to rank a web page in search engines like Google.

But most of the time, SEO gurus only talk about keyword research, link building, and content creation.

While these are indeed a crucial part of SEO, these three things alone won’t be able to give you crazy results in this competitive SEO game.

You have to step ahead and try few new strategies to beat your competitors on the search engine ranking.

It doesn’t matter what strategies you use. Keeping track of your SEO results and tracking your keyword rankings will always be an essential part of SEO.

Even though rank tracking is super important but still most people are not talking about it.

But in this post, we’re going to uncover:

What is rank tracking?
Why it’s crucial for SEO?
And how you can use it to level up your SEO game and stay ahead of your competitors.

And by the end of this, I’m pretty sure you’ll know almost everything about keyword rank tracking and how you can utilize it on your own SEO strategy.

So without wasting any further time, let’s jump in right in…

What is Rank Tracking?

Rank tracking is a process of tracking search engine rankings of any website for some particular keywords.

In simple words:

It’s nothing but just analyzing your current and historical keyword ranking data.

It always doesn’t have to be your own website. You can even track your competitor’s website rankings 5to see the progress of their SEO strategy.

Generally, rank tracking is an untapped part of SEO, and most people still don’t care about it that much.

But if you look at all of the successful websites that are doing pretty well in SEO, I’m 100% confident that most of them are regularly tracking and monitoring their keywords.

Why is Tracking Keyword Ranking Crucial For SEO?

SEO is a long-term process.

If anything tells you that they can rank a website on Google within a month for any competitive keyword, they’re just scamming you.

There’s no full-proof formula or magic trick available that will take your website from the dead pages of Google to the first position.

However, one thing is clear – SEO takes a hell of a lot of time to show the results.

And it will take even double the amount of time if you don’t track your SEO keyword progress.

There’s a famous saying in business: If you can’t measure, you can’t improve it.

The same thing applies to SEO as well.

If you don’t track your SEO progress and results, you’ll end up nowhere.

And most importantly, creating a great SEO strategy becomes even more challenging without measuring the progress of your website SEO.

In short:

Whether you want to track your results or create your SEO strategy, rank tracking will always play a crucial part in that.

And if you consider keyword ranking as your most important KPI for SEO (that most SEO’s do), rank tracking will play a substantial role for you.

That’s being said, keyword ranking is not the only thing you should focus on if you want better SEO results.

Blending rank tracking with backlinks, high-quality content, great website structure, quick website loading speed will give you the desired SEO result that you want.

Why Mobile & Desktop Keyword Rankings Varies a Lot?

Keyword ranking varies a lot depending on the device the user is using.

For example, sometimes, you might have noticed that a keyword is ranking in the first position of Google on a desktop device.

While, if you search the same keyword on a mobile device, the ranking of that website would most probably be different.

In fact, SEMRush had done a detailed study on this matter, and they have found out that only 11% of the websites maintain the same ranking on both desktop and mobile devices while the rest of the web page rankings varies a lot depending upon the device.

No one really knows why this happens except Google itself.

But we can assume that Google is trying to provide the best user experience to the users based on the device the user is using.

Whatever the reason might be, you have to be on the safe side.

And to be on the safe side, you have to track your keyword rankings for both mobile and desktop devices.

While it’s almost impossible to do that manually, you can use the Zutrix rank tracker to monitor your keyword rankings for both mobile and desktop devices separately.

Is It Possible to Track Local Keywords?

If you’re running a local business or if your business heavily depends upon local keywords, you can easily track your keywords.

Yes, that’s possible.

I don’t know if you can do that manually but using a rank tracking tool, you can track your local keywords pretty effortlessly.

But keep in mind, not all rank tracking software has the local rank tracking feature.

Luckily, Zutrix has that one.

On Zutrix, you can smoothly track your local keywords and measure the performance of your web pages over time.

How to Track Your Keyword Rankings For SEO

Now that you know what rank tracking is and why it’s essential, let’s quickly look at how you can track and measure your keyword performance for better search engine ranking.

Currently, there are two ways that you can use to track your SEO keyword rankings:

By using Google search console (Free)
By using a rank tracking tool (Free/paid)

Google search console obviously doesn’t come with plenty of features and a great reporting system.

But if you’re just starting out…..it should be enough for you.

While on the other hand, if you’re running SEO campaigns for mid-level or large websites, a rank tracking tool would be a much better option for you.

That’s being said, there are plenty of rank tracking tools available on the market.

So which one should you choose?

It depends upon you.

But whenever you choose any rank tracking tool, you have to look if that tool meets these three critical criteria:

The tool should provide accurate and reliable ranking data
It should have helpful features that make rank tracking easier for the users
It should have a great reporting system.

If any tool meets these three criteria, you can use that tool without any doubt.

We can’t say about other tools, but at Zutrix, the main focus of our product is built around these three crucial aspects.

So instead of talking about some other tools, we’re going to show you how you can use Zutrix to track your keyword effortlessly.

And at the same, we will also show you how a complete beginner can use Google search console to track their keyword rankings.

Use Google Search Console to Track Keywords

As I have said earlier, if you’re just starting out, you can use the Google search console to track your keyword rankings from time to time.

And the best part is…you don’t have to pay a penny for that.

Using the Google search console, you can not only monitor the search engine ranking position of your keywords, but it will also show the number of clicks, impressions, and CTR (Click through rate) your webpages are getting.

Let me show you in real action how you can use GSC to track your keyword rankings.

To track your keyword rankings, head over to the Google search console and click on “performance.”

And then click on “average position” and scroll down.

Now you’ll be able to see all of your website’s ranking keywords along with the ranking position, clicks, and impression each keyword is getting.

You can filter out this result by last seven days to get the most accurate keyword ranking data.

However, keep in mind, this tool is going to help you until a particular stage.

And once your website starts getting more extensive, you would need an automated rank tracking tool for tracking and monitoring your SEO keyword movements.

It’s a good tool to start off your SEO journey, but since it lacks in so many aspects and features, it won’t help you that much.

Use Zutrix Keyword Rank Tracker to Monitor Your Keyword Movements

Zutrix is one of the major players in the rank tracking software space.

It provides laser shape accurate keyword ranking data with the help of AI (Artificial intelligence) and some complex sets of algorithms.

And on top of that, it also comes with plenty of outstanding features that make rank tracking a complete cakewalk.

The interface of Zutrix is pretty easy to use, and almost everyone can use this tool without any problem.

But how to actually use this tool?

Let me show you.

Head over to Zutrix and click on “Add domain.”

Then enter your domain name, select the country, search for any specific location (for local keywords), and click on “Domain + keywords”.

On the next step, enter the keywords that you want to track (you can even pull out keywords directly from your Google search console), select the device for which you want to track the keywords, and finally click on “Add keywords.”

That’s it!

Now you can see all of your keyword movement reports and monitor your keyword rankings from the dashboard itself.

You can also refresh the keyword ranking data in real-time, but it would cost you refresh credits that you get with your plans.

Other than that, you can set up a notification on this tool, and it will send you a notification directly in your slake, email, or telegram for any significant ranking changes.

And the best part of this tool is that you can automate your keyword ranking reports, and Zutrix will automatically send you the reports right inside your email inbox.

Overall, it’s an excellent, easy-to-use, and efficient tool that will help you to track down your keywords like a pro without spending hours of your time.