What is SEO Forecasting and its Benefits
Several enterprise-level agencies think that Search Engine Optimization is like throwing darts in the dark. However, it is partially true. SEO is all about making a few changes to your website and waiting for the quality traffic to follow in layman’s terms. But, experts say that it is pretty predictable to target the performance of your SEO strategies with a big pool of data.
Analyzing the trends from a significant volume of data allows you to predict the results of your SEO strategies and alter the same for better performance, resulting in increased quality traffic, brand awareness, and brand visibility over the SERPs.
Here we are going to learn about what is SEO forecasting and why is it crucial for your business.
So, let’s begin.
What is SEO Forecasting?
SEO forecasting is taking the data from analytics into consideration to determine specific repetitive patterns or trends. Organic search forecasting helps you forecast avenues for future gains and areas that need to be improved to achieve optimum results.
SEO forecasting can benefit both enterprise-level and small business owners with the means to determine the ways to make competitive strategies its execution plan and enjoy the perks that come with improved brand awareness and visibility.
Digital marketers need to implement some SEO forecasting in competitive SEO strategies. It helps decide which goals are practically attainable and which and employ the available resources to achieve the brand goals.
SEO forecasting is crucial for your brand as it employs your existing website traffic data and churns it into valuable and actionable information with additional clarity, context, and reasoning.
What are the benefits of SEO forecasting
After knowing what SEO forecasting is, you must be willing to learn more about how it can help your brand grow and fetch you excellent results.
In order to understand the importance or benefits of SEO forecasting for your brand, it’s essential first to understand the two primary data types.
1- First-Party Data
The first-party data allows you to draw insights about what is working in favor of your website and what is not. This data is based on growth rate and optimization efficiency. You can have your hands on the first-party data in real-time using SEO forecasting tools like Google Analytics, Moz Pro, or SEMrush.
2- Third-Party Data
The third-party data allows you to extensively analyze your competitor’s data, understanding what strategies they are employing and how they are achieving similar brand goals. Having insights into your competitor’s movements allows you to learn from others’ mistakes and offers a competitive upper edge.
With both first-party and third-party data, you can have a complete picture clear in front of you, clearly understanding your current position and desired future position and staying ahead of your competitors in contrast.
How to Use SEO Forecast to Meet Your Predetermined Brand Goals?
The process of employing the collected data to forecast accurate trends and patterns differs based on the niche and needs of your brand. If you follow a systematic approach, you’ll get hands-on with the expected trends based on real-time data.
Here are a few steps that you need to follow.
1- Gather Your Data
The foremost step in SEO forecasting is to gather data related to the traffic on your website, both in the past and in the present. You can leverage any data-extracting tool such as Google Analytics or any other tool that can offer you accurate and real-time data. To get the best and the most accurate results, you must gather data from the long past as it helps you identify seasonal patterns that may affect the results over time.
It is essential to note that you are trying to get a high-level view of past traffic trends at this step of organic search forecasting.
2- Consider The Outside Factors
After having all your previous traffic data to your site gathered, it’s now time to consider the impacts of any outside factor that may affect the trends or patterns. These outside factors include
- Changes in Google’s algorithms affect the traffic at any given point.
- Sessions that might indicate that the visitor is interested in looking at the content rather than spending time on products or service page
- Any form of the native advertising campaign that increases traffic than usual in a given time frame
- For eCommerce brands, the traffic might increase during ongoing sales. For instance, during black Friday.
At this step, you can leverage any third-party tool to seek information about your competitors, as it can help you identify industry downtrends that aren’t based on your efforts.
3- Leverage The Power of a Forecasting Tool
SEO forecasting tools allow you to draw insights based on the gathered data on various parameters. Plus, if you use multiple tools at once, you can have varied information, depicting an individually wholesome point. Some organic search forecasting tools offer similar insights on some parameters, but sometimes they could be far-fetched. In such situations, you’ll have to draw the most practical conclusion based on your understanding of your business and the factor affecting it.
4- Analyze Your Data
It’s now time to analyze your data to draw conclusive ideas about probable trends or existing patterns. It is crucial to determine the sustainability of the emerging trends, offering you an idea about whether the trends are here to stay or will vanish after a short period. Insights about the longevity and sustainability of trends and patterns will allow you to determine various SEO strategies, allocate budget and tasks, and prepare the timeline by which you should be getting your results.
It also helps identify any brand weakness and eliminate possible threats while executing strategic moves to improve your brand sustainability, awareness, and visibility.
Which SEO Forecasting Tools Should You Use?
There are plenty of SEO forecasting tools available in the market. The ball is in your court to determine the best one depending on your needs, the nature of your business, and your ultimate goals.
Here are some famous SEO forecasting tools that you can leverage.
1- Google Data Studio
Boiling down to Search Engine Optimization, considering the tools offered by the respective search engine is a wise thing to do. Google Data Studio is an entirely free-to-use organic search forecasting tool that allows you to spot trends based on past data related to traffic on your site. The tool connects with primary data sources like Google Analytics, Moz, SEMrush, and similar software to fetch the most comprehensive and real-time information possible.
2- Ahref’s Traffic Site Forecast
Ahref is an end-to-end tool used to meet all your on-page optimization needs. In addition to that, it offers extensive features like competitor analysis, backlink checker, keyword generator, and whatnot. The traffic site forecast tool of Ahref allows you to fetch data from primary sources and generate graphs and charts predicting the organic traffic forecast shortly. It is one of the best investments you can ever make.
3- SEMrush
SEMrush allows you to forecast the CTR of your site listing on the SERPs. After following a systematic process and implementing a mathematical formula, you can effortlessly generate the probability of your target audience clicking on your listings. In addition to that, SEMrush is a one-stop destination to meet all your SEO and paid marketing needs.
Also read: what is omnichannel marketing
Conclusion
Having insights about your traffic and forecasting trends or patterns is crucial and challenging. It helps you frame competitive optimization strategies and offers detailed insights into the factors that might affect the traffic volume to your site in any given timeframe. With accurate SEO forecasting methods, you can increase the volume of quality traffic and increase overall conversions, resulting in improved returns on investments.
