Learn SEO and AI search from our own data
33 how-to posts on SEO and AI search in 7 topics, each checked against data from the sites we run.
We run three content sites (manhwa and anime guides, game news, trading card game guides) as well as elmrank.com. The posts use their Search Console data, our server logs and URL Inspection results, and each one lists its sources with the date we read them. Posts on pricing and hiring an agency stay on the blog; this page lists the ones about doing the work yourself.
Search Console and GA4
How to read clicks, CTR, position and sessions in Search Console and GA4, and why the two tools disagree.
Start with the guideHow to Use Google Search Console for SEO, From Our DataHow to use Google Search Console for SEO: the four reports we read on our sites, in order, what each one showed us, and the limits that trip people up.
Average Position in Search Console, Explained With Our Data
Average position in Search Console is your site's topmost spot per search, averaged over impressions. On our three sites: 6.3 to 7.6. How we read it.
7 min read
What Is a Good CTR in Search Console? Our Data by Position
What is a good CTR in Google Search Console? Our three sites: 1.6% to 2.2% overall, and position 1 at 3.4%, below positions 2 and 3. How to judge yours.
7 min read
Search Console vs GA4: Why Clicks and Sessions Don't Match
Search Console vs GA4 on our three sites: within 6% until Consent Mode went live, then GA4 recorded 15% to 22% of EEA, UK and Swiss clicks on two.
7 min read
Website Traffic Dropped Suddenly? A 30-Minute Diagnosis
Work out why Google traffic dropped in 30 minutes with Search Console: the checks in order, what each pattern means, and two real drops on sites we run.
5 min read
What an SEO Monthly Report Should Include (Real Example)
Five sections every monthly SEO report needs, shown on a real month from a site we run: clicks down 12% while impressions rose 10%, and how to read it.
4 min read
Technical SEO
How Google crawls and indexes pages, checked in our server logs and URL Inspection results.
Do You Need a Sitemap? What Google Did With Ours
Do you need a sitemap? Google says small, well-linked sites may not. What URL Inspection showed for 1,930 sitemap URLs on our four sites, and what we'd do.
7 min read
How Often Does Google Crawl a Site? 14 Days of Our Logs
How often does Google crawl a site? On our three sites, Googlebot came back to a page every 1.8 to 4 days and skipped 7% to 36% of pages for two weeks.
8 min read
Does IndexNow Work? What Bing Did With Our 58 URLs
Does IndexNow work? Bing checked our key within a second, then fetched 1 of 51 pages we sent, via a tagged link, in 24 hours. Our server log and the docs.
7 min read
Discovered - Currently Not Indexed? 26 Pages We Checked
Discovered - currently not indexed means Google knows a URL but hasn't crawled it. What 26 such pages on our sites had in common, and what we'd do first.
8 min read
Crawled - Currently Not Indexed? What We Found on 3 Sites
Crawled - currently not indexed means Google fetched the page and left it out. What 17 such pages on our sites had in common, and what we'd fix first.
6 min read
How Long Does It Take Google to Index a New Page?
Google says indexing typically takes a day or so. On our new domain, Googlebot fetched 22 of 25 launch posts within 8 hours. Our logs, and what sped it up.
7 min read
Technical SEO Audit Checklist: 12 Checks, Run on Our Site
A technical SEO audit checklist in 12 checks, built on Google's own rules, and what it found on our site five days after launch: 52 of 56 pages indexed.
4 min read
Why Is My Website Not Showing on Google? 6 Causes
Not on Google yet? Check time, noindex, robots.txt, canonicals, access errors and content quality, with Google's own wording for each Search Console status.
5 min read
AI search and GEO
How ChatGPT, Perplexity and Google AI Overviews pick the pages they cite, and what AI crawlers do on our server.
Start with the guideWhat Is Generative Engine Optimization? What Our Logs ShowWhat is generative engine optimization? Where the term came from, what Google and OpenAI say it takes, and how many visits AI assistants sent our sites.
AI Crawler User Agents: The List, Checked in Our Logs
AI crawler user agents from OpenAI, Anthropic, Perplexity, Meta, Google, Apple and Amazon: what each is for, if it reads robots.txt, and what our log saw.
9 min read
Should You Block AI Crawlers? What They Took and Sent Back
Should you block AI crawlers? Requests under Meta's crawler names hit our sites 156,075 times in 13 days; Meta AI sent 4 visits. What we'd block or keep.
9 min read
Does llms.txt Work? 14 Days of Our Server Logs
OpenAI, Anthropic, Perplexity and Google crawlers made 126,310 requests to our sites in 14 days and never asked for llms.txt. Who did, and when to bother.
7 min read
How to Get Cited by Perplexity: Its Rules and Our Data
How to get cited by Perplexity: what its crawlers need, where its citations come from, and where GA4 filed the 46 Perplexity visits to our three sites.
6 min read
How to Track ChatGPT Traffic in Google Analytics 4
Where GA4 shows ChatGPT visits, what it needs to label them, and what we think happened when our ChatGPT sessions fell from 28 a day to 4.5 for six days.
6 min read
How to Rank in Google AI Overviews: What We Can Verify
In Ahrefs' 2026 data, 38% of AI Overview citations also rank in Google's top 10. What Google says gets a page cited, what blocks it, and how to measure it.
6 min read
How to Get Mentioned in ChatGPT: What's Documented
Where ChatGPT finds businesses to name: its crawler, search partners, listings, product feeds. What OpenAI, Google and Bing publish, and what studies found.
7 min read
ChatGPT Not Citing Your Website? What OpenAI Says
Why ChatGPT may not cite your site: blocked crawlers, CDN rules, weak pages. What OpenAI's own docs say, five checks you can run today, and what we track.
4 min read
SEO vs GEO: What Should a Small Business Pay For?
Google says AI Overviews need no special optimization beyond SEO. What that means for your budget, what to measure, and where GEO money gets wasted.
4 min read
Content optimization
What to write and how much of it, checked against Search Console clicks on the sites we run.
Does AI Content Hurt SEO? Google's Words and Our Data
Google says AI content gets no penalty and no bonus, but scaled content abuse does. Its exact wording, our review process, and a drop on our own site.
5 min read
How Many Articles Per Month for SEO? Data From 1,617 Posts
We compared monthly publishing with Google clicks on three sites we run. Clicks followed the early burst, not later volume. What that means for your budget.
6 min read
Keyword research
Choosing what to write from free data: Search Console queries, Google autocomplete and the results page.
Long-Tail Keywords in SEO: What 28 Days of Our Data Show
Long-tail keywords are searches few people make. On three sites we run, 57% to 83% of clicks came from searches so rare Search Console won't name them.
5 min read
Keyword Cannibalization: What Our Search Console Data Shows
How to find keyword cannibalization in Search Console, and when it matters. On our sites one page got 90% of the clicks in 219 of 254 shared queries.
8 min read
Site structure and internal links
How pages link to each other, and which of them Google indexed on our sites.
How Many Internal Links per Page? What 2,668 Pages Show
How many internal links per page? Google sets no number. Our pages carry about 20 in the body; for older articles, more links in didn't change indexing.
7 min read
SEO for a new website
A new site's first months on Google, from sites we started with no traffic.
Is the Google Sandbox Real? What Four New Domains Show
Is the Google sandbox real? Two of our sites averaged a top-10 position in their first week on brand-new domains. What four new domains showed us.
6 min read
SEO for Content Sites: What Three Sites We Run Show
SEO for content, niche and affiliate sites, with Search Console data from three content sites we run: what grew, what fell, and how we'd run yours.
5 min read
How Long Does SEO Take? Day-by-Day Data From Three Sites
Agencies say 6 to 12 months. Three sites we run hit their first 100-click day between day 5 and day 36, then two of them peaked and fell. The full timeline.
4 min read
Website Not Getting Traffic After 6 Months? Check These 4
Six months of slow growth can be normal; six months with nothing indexed isn't. What Search Console shows, and how fast three of our sites got clicks.
4 min read
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