How to Track Your Progress In SEO - Episode 110

Summary

Podcast Summary: Grumpy SEO Guy – How to Track Your Progress In SEO (Episode 110)

Host: Grumpy SEO Guy
Release Date: May 28, 2025
Duration: ~10 minutes

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Introduction

In Episode 110 of the Grumpy SEO Guy podcast, the host delves into the critical topic of tracking progress in Search Engine Optimization (SEO). Drawing from his 14 years of experience running an SEO agency, Grumpy SEO Guy provides actionable insights and strategies to help listeners effectively monitor and enhance their SEO efforts.

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Understanding the Purpose of SEO

Grumpy SEO Guy begins by emphasizing the fundamental objective of SEO: “The purpose of SEO is to get to the top of the search engines” (04:16). To elucidate this, he employs analogies from other disciplines:

• Powerlifting: Just as powerlifters track the weights they lift to measure progress, SEO practitioners should monitor their website rankings.

  “How do you track your progress in powerlifting? You track your progress in powerlifting by noting all of your workouts and the weight that you used and so on.” (03:30)

• Running: Runners track their race times to gauge improvement.

  “How do you know if you're improving? You know if you're improving from recording your times and seeing if they are decreasing.” (03:55)

These analogies underscore the importance of systematic tracking to achieve and measure success in SEO.

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The Importance of Tracking SEO Progress

Without proper tracking, SEO efforts are akin to navigating without a map. Grumpy SEO Guy highlights that tracking progress is essential to understand what strategies are working and where adjustments are needed.

“The purpose of SEO is to get to the top of the search engines. The purpose of SEO is to get to the top of the search engines.” (04:16)

By tracking, SEO professionals can visualize their journey towards achieving top rankings, much like athletes monitor their performance metrics.

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Using SERP Tracking Tools

Central to tracking SEO progress is the use of SERP (Search Engine Results Page) tracking tools. Grumpy SEO Guy explains:

“You track your progress in SEO by using a SERP tracking tool.” (04:28)

A SERP tracking tool generates a SERP chart, which visually represents your website's ranking positions over time, similar to how a stock chart displays stock prices.

“A SERP chart is a chart that shows you what position you're in and what position you used to be in. It's kind of like a stock chart.” (04:59)

This visualization allows SEO professionals to quickly assess whether their rankings are improving or declining.

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Recommendations: Choosing the Right SERP Tracking Tool

Grumpy SEO Guy shares his preferred tool:

“The SERP tracking tool that we use is called serp fox serp s e r p fox f o x serpfox.com we've been using them for a long time. I don't get paid to promote SERP Fox, but we've been using them for a long time and they are very good.” (05:38)

Serp Fox stands out for its reliability and accuracy. He contrasts it with other SERP tracking tools, pointing out that some either provide inaccurate rankings or are prohibitively expensive.

“One of them gave bad positions. So it would make a SERP chart, but the SERP chart was incorrect and it didn't actually show you where you were.” (06:51)

Choosing a trustworthy tool is crucial to ensure that the data reflects true performance.

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Essential Features of a Good SERP Tracking Tool

Grumpy SEO Guy outlines three critical features to look for in a SERP tracking tool:

1. Daily Ranking Updates

   “You need daily ranking. And I say this because some SERP tracking tools give monthly ranking or weekly ranking, but you need daily ranking.” (08:20)

   Daily updates provide timely insights, allowing for swift adjustments to SEO strategies.

2. Keyword Flexibility

   “You need to be able to put your keywords into the SERP tracking tool and see SERP charts for those keywords.” (09:18)

   The ability to input specific keywords ensures that SEO efforts are aligned with targeted search terms.

3. Individual Keyword Charts

   “You need individual charts for each keyword. So you should log into the SERP tracking tool. It should have a list of your keywords. You should click on the keyword and it should show you a chart for that individual keyword.” (09:37)

   This feature allows for granular analysis, making it easier to identify which keywords are performing well and which need improvement.

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Common Pitfalls to Avoid

Grumpy SEO Guy warns against relying on SERP tracking tools that:

• Provide Average Positions: Aggregating rankings can obscure performance details.

  “That doesn't provide any value to you. So you need individual charts for each keyword.” (10:08)

• Lack Daily Updates: Infrequent updates can delay response to ranking fluctuations.

• Exclude Specific Keywords: Missing out on targeted keywords can lead to incomplete analysis.

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Advanced Use: Identifying Penalties

Beyond tracking rankings, SERP charts can help identify potential search engine penalties. Grumpy SEO Guy mentions:

“You can sometimes tell if you have a penalty from a SERP chart, okay? Because as I have mentioned, there is a specific pattern that appears on a SERP chart when you get a penalty.” (07:25)

Recognizing these patterns allows SEO professionals to take corrective actions promptly.

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Conclusion

Grumpy SEO Guy emphasizes the necessity of using robust SERP tracking tools to monitor SEO progress effectively. By selecting tools that offer daily updates, keyword flexibility, and individual keyword charts, SEO practitioners can gain clear, actionable insights into their performance. This episode serves as a practical guide for both novices and seasoned professionals aiming to refine their SEO tracking methods.

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Notable Quotes with Timestamps:

• “The purpose of SEO is to get to the top of the search engines.” – 04:16
• “A SERP chart is a chart that shows you what position you're in and what position you used to be in. It's kind of like a stock chart.” – 04:59
• “You need daily ranking. And I say this because some SERP tracking tools give monthly ranking or weekly ranking, but you need daily ranking.” – 08:20
• “You need individual charts for each keyword. So you should log into the SERP tracking tool. It should have a list of your keywords.” – 09:37

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Resources Mentioned:

• Serp Fox: serpfox.com

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Stay Connected:

For more insights and discussions, join the Grumpy SEO Guy subreddit or email [e-mail].

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This summary captures the essential strategies and recommendations shared by Grumpy SEO Guy on tracking SEO progress, providing listeners with a comprehensive understanding of effective SEO monitoring practices.

Transcript

[Grumpy SEO Guy]

This is Grumpy SEO Guy. Episode 110, how to track your progress in SEO. You're listening to Grumpy SEO Guy, the SEO podcast that doesn't waste your time with nonsense that doesn't work. I'm the grumpy SEO Guy and I'm sharing with you the strategies that have helped me successfully run my SEO agency for the last 14 years. In this podcast, I'll be sharing my knowledge and experience, discussing tips and strategies, and trying to help you cut through the confusion that permeates this industry. If you listen to this podcast, you will know more about SEO than 99% of people on the planet. Ready? Let's get started. I'm the grumpy SEO guy. Let me tell you why I'm grumpy today. I'm grumpy today because people are confused about how to track their progress in SEO. So today, that's what we're gonna talk about. But before we do that, I have a few reminders and an announcement. So the reminders, new episodes come out on Wednesday, 9am Central Standard. That's for the podcast. If you're listening to this on YouTube, it's going to be a little bit after that. If you leave a comment on YouTube, I try to reply on Wednesday, but sometimes it's not until Thursday. If you like the podcast enough to leave a comment, please subscribe. It tells me who subscribes, and a lot of people ask questions and have discussions, but they don't subscribe. Please subscribe. I'm trying to get 3,000 subscribers and I'm very close, so please subscribe. Okay. If you want to help support the podcast and help keep it free, you, you can do so on [e-mail] grumpyseoguy so I have an announcement. Here's the announcement. As you know, we have the Grumpy SEO Guy subreddit, okay, where we talk about the podcast and we talk about SEO. However, due to some security concerns on Reddit that were pointed out to me by some listeners and that we found ourselves, we are going to be making a private Grumpy SEO Guy community. So. So I have a question for you. Would you rather have the private Grumpy SEO guy community be on Discord or on a forum? I've been on the Internet for quite some time. I like forums, but people are telling me that it should be on Discord. So leave a comment and tell me if you want it on Discord or on a forum. Or you can email [e-mail] and tell me if you would rather have it be on a forum or on Discord. Okay, we wanna do what is easiest for you. The private, grumpy SEO guy community is going to discuss all things related to SEO. It's going to be very cool. So let me know which you want. Now let's get on to the topic. But before we do that, my lawyer tells me that I have to say this right now. A quick disclaimer before we get started. Everything I say here is based on my experience and opinion from 14 years in the industry. I don't officially know how Google or any other search engines work. Everything I say here is hypothetical and based on my experience, this podcast does not constitute advice or services. What worked for me may or may not work for you. Okay, back to the show. Tracking your progress in SEO. So before we do, let me ask you a question. And don't worry, I'm gonna give you the answer, but I'm gonna ask you this question. What is the purpose of SEO? What is the purpose of SEO? Why are you even doing SEO in the first place? Okay, I'm gonna answer that question. But first I'm gonna ask you another question. What is the purpose of powerlifting? What is the purpose of powerlifting? The purpose of powerlifting is to lift as much weight as possible.

[Listener]

Okay.

[Grumpy SEO Guy]

How do you track your progress in powerlifting? You track your progress in powerlifting by noting all of your workouts and the weight that you used and so on. And if your weights are improving, it means you are making progress. Okay, let me ask you another question. What is the purpose of running? Maybe you're in a race.

[Listener]

Okay?

[Grumpy SEO Guy]

Maybe to win the race, you have to get the best time.

[Listener]

Okay?

[Grumpy SEO Guy]

How do you know if you're improving? You know if you're improving from recording your times and seeing if they are decreasing.

[Listener]

Okay.

[Grumpy SEO Guy]

If your times are improving, it means you are making progress. So what is the purpose of SEO? The purpose of SEO is to get to the top of the search engines.

[Listener]

Okay?

[Grumpy SEO Guy]

The purpose of SEO is to get to the top of the search engines.

[Listener]

Okay?

[Grumpy SEO Guy]

How do you track your progress in SEO? You track your progress in SEO by using a SERP tracking tool.

[Listener]

Okay?

[Grumpy SEO Guy]

A SERP tracking tool produces a SERP chart. Now, you should know this word. Serp. S, E, R, P Search engine results pages. It just means what rank are you? What position are you in for your keywords?

[Listener]

Okay?

[Grumpy SEO Guy]

What rank are you? That's all it means. So a SERP tracking tool makes a SERP chart. A SERP chart is a chart that shows you what position you're in and what position you used to be in.

[Listener]

Okay.

[Grumpy SEO Guy]

It's kind of like a stock chart.

[Listener]

Okay.

[Grumpy SEO Guy]

A stock chart shows you the price of a stock and it also shows you the previous prices of that stock. So you can look at a stock chart and see is the price going up or down.

[Listener]

Okay.

[Grumpy SEO Guy]

A SERP chart is the same thing. You can look at a SERP chart and see is my position going up or down.

[Listener]

Okay.

[Grumpy SEO Guy]

So I'm going to tell you which SERP tracking tool we use and I'm going to tell you something else that you can do with a SERP chart. And, and I'm going to tell you three things that you need to watch out for, because not every SERP tracking tool is useful.

[Listener]

Okay?

[Grumpy SEO Guy]

So the SERP tracking tool that we use is called serp fox serp s e r p fox f o x serpfox.com we've been using them for a long time. I don't get paid to promote SERP Fox, but we've been using them for a long time and they are very good. So you should look into them if you need a SERP tracking tool. Let me tell you how it worked when we didn't have a SERP tracking tool.

[Listener]

Okay?

[Grumpy SEO Guy]

So what we would do is we would have to search for the keyword in the search engine scroll until we find what page it's on, take a screenshot of that, do the SEO search for it again. Hopefully it's on a better page. Take a screenshot of that and then send those to the client. Hey, you were here when we started, but now you're here on this other page.

[Listener]

Okay?

[Grumpy SEO Guy]

That was a time consuming process. But a SERP tracking tool and a SERP chart takes all that away. It just literally shows you here's where you were, here's where you are now, and you can see progress immediately. It's excellent. So you should be using a SERP tracking tool. Here's the reason we use SERP fox.

[Listener]

Okay?

[Grumpy SEO Guy]

When we first learned about SERP tracking tools, there were only three.

[Listener]

Okay.

[Grumpy SEO Guy]

There were two other ones and then there was serpvox.

[Listener]

Okay.

[Grumpy SEO Guy]

One of them gave bad positions.

[Listener]

Okay.

[Grumpy SEO Guy]

So it would make a SERP chart, but the SERP chart was incorrect and it didn't actually show you where you were, so we didn't want to use that one. The other one cost a lot of money, so we didn't want to use that one. So we used SERP fox. There are many SERP Tracking tools, you can use whatever one you want.

[Listener]

Okay?

[Grumpy SEO Guy]

Now let me tell you something else you can do with a SERP tracking tool. Obviously, you can see your position. Is it going up or down?

[Listener]

Okay?

[Grumpy SEO Guy]

But. And we've talked about this on another episode, so I'm not going to spend a lot of time talking about it now. Still, you can sometimes tell if you have a penalty from a SERP chart, okay? Because as I have mentioned, there is a specific pattern that appears on a SERP chart when you get a penalty. And so if you see that, you know that you have a penalty, and you've listened to the Grumpy SEO guy episode that talks about the different kinds of penalties and what they are and how to find them and how to fix them. So you know how to go about fixing the problem. We're not going to talk about that too much here because there are other episodes that cover that. But that is another thing that you can do when you have a SERP chart. So now I'm going to tell you what a good SERP chart does, okay? There's three things that you need to watch for, okay? I'm actually very serious about this. Do not use a SERP tracking tool that does not do these three things, okay? One, you need daily ranking.

[Listener]

Okay?

[Grumpy SEO Guy]

You need daily ranking. And I say this because some SERP tracking tools give monthly ranking or weekly ranking, but you need daily ranking, okay? Monthly and weekly are not what you want. You need daily ranking, okay? Monthly and weekly are not going to give you any useful information. You need daily daily ranking. Two, you need to be able to use your keywords. You need to be able to put your keywords into the SERP tracking tool and see SERP charts for those keywords. I say this because some SERP charts will say these are the keywords that you rank for, and then they give you a list of keywords and a list of charts, and that's fine, but you need your keywords. So if you want to rank for a certain keyword and it's not in there, that's not going to help you, is it? So you need a tool where you can enter your keywords in into the SERP tracking tool and see SERP charts for your website for those keywords.

[Listener]

Okay?

[Grumpy SEO Guy]

Three, you need charts for each individual keyword, okay? So you should log into the SERP tracking tool. It should have a list of your keywords. You should click on the keyword and it should show you a chart for that individual keyword.

[Listener]

Okay?

[Grumpy SEO Guy]

I say this because some SERP tracking tools will tell you your average position. So for example, if you have two keywords and one of them is in position one and one of them is in position 27, okay, it's gonna tell you that your average position is 14. That's not what you want. You don't care about your average position. That means nothing because one of your keywords would be in position one and one of your keywords would be in position 27. That doesn't help you.

[Listener]

Okay?

[Grumpy SEO Guy]

That doesn't provide any value to you. So you need individual charts for each keyword.

[Listener]

Okay?

[Grumpy SEO Guy]

I hope this was a good episode and I hope that you were able to learn a lot from everything provided. Thanks for listening. Don't forget to subscribe and if you enjoy this podcast, please leave a review. It would really help the show out. I hope this episode was helpful. If you have any questions or want to suggest a subject for a future episode, you can contact me on Reddit. My username is Grumpy SEO Guy. You can visit the Grumpy SEO Guy subreddit or you can email [e-mail] if you email me, please either whitelist my email address or check your junk folders, because I've been told that my replies are going into the junk folder and it's probably because we're talking about things like SEO and backlinks, and I think those words will classify an email as spam. And if you want to support the podcast because it's the best source of SEO information on the planet and it's free, you can do [e-mail] grumpy SEO guy and I will talk to you later. You're listening to Grumpy SEO Guy, the SEO podcast that doesn't waste your time with nonsense that doesn't work. Join us next Wednesday for another episode. Sam.