What are the best Google business and web tools?

The Best Google Business and Web Tools - An Overview

There is an abundance of tools available to you when it comes to maintaining your website and growing your online platform. It can be overwhelming to work out which ones you should master and which ones aren’t relevant to you. That’s why we’ve put this post together for you, we’re going to give you a brief overview of some of the best Google business and web tools so you can decide which ones you need. Just log in with your free Google account, verify ownership of your website if required and off you go…

1. Google Analytics

The first is one that most people have heard of and nearly everybody with a website uses, Google Analytics. This platform allows you to understand your website’s data in as little or as much detail as you want. It doesn’t matter if you have a blog, a news-portal, an online business, a corporate site or even an ecommerce store, Google Analytics will be able to help you get to know your website traffic. See where your site’s users come from, navigate to and drop off or whether your marketing efforts are improving your organic traffic figure. For a complete overview of behaviour on your website, this is a one-stop-shop tool. It can be confusing to use to begin with so we suggest you check out the Google Analytics Academy, a free online training, so you can get the most out of the platform.

2. Google Data Studio

As we’ve already established, Google Analytics isn’t the most straight forward tool to use so if you’re looking for its less complicated sister then meet Google Data Studio. This tool gives you everything you need to turn your website’s analytics data into informative, and most importantly, easy-to-understand reports through data visualisation. You can also pull in data from other sources and it’s dynamic so it’s always updating for you. This is definitely a tool worth checking out if you’re a visual learner, plus, you can also share the nice-looking reports with your clients and the rest of your team.

3. Google Ads (Keyword Planner)

For those that pay attention to their site’s SEO, a Google AdWords account is a must. You can sign up for free and the process doesn’t take long at all. The platform is primarily for running paid search adverts via Google Ad campaigns but the SEO use we’re referring to is for key phrase research. The Google Keyword Planner tool within Google Ads allows you to see how many people search for each keyword in a particular country and get suggestions of other phrases to research too. If you want to reach the right customers you definitely should not be guessing your target key phrases. You can refer back to this tool whenever you need and use it to aid your content marketing strategies. The results will give you plenty of ideas to narrow down and find what you can insert into your website’s copy and meta data to make it more visible in search.  So really we suppose there are two of the best Google business and web tools in one, right here.

Best Google Tools from Shake It Up Creative

4. Google Tag Manager

Google Tag Manager is also one of the free Google business and web tools and will help you to update all of the tags and code snippets on your website from one place. It also works for mobile apps. It’s quick and easy to use, all you have to do is insert JavaScript and HTML tags that you use for tracking and analytics on your website into the Tag Manager, into ‘containers’. You don’t need to even touch the back end of your website. If your website doesn’t have a tracking function or has unreliable data collection, which many sites do due to a messy code set-up, Google Tag Manager is a godsend. Consolidate and manage all your tracking codes or scripts in one place without any hassle.

5. Google Trends

If you want to stay on top of the latest trends and keep your site up to date, Google Trends is going to be your new friend. With this tool, you can search whatever you like and even narrow it down to a specific country or category. In return, it will identify latest trends and viral news in your location. Once you’ve identified a relevant trend, we suggest you write a new blog post or involve your findings in your new promotional ideas to stay relevant or better yet, put yourself ahead of your competition.

6. Google Alerts

If Google Trends appealed to you then Google Alerts most likely will too. If you’re wanting to be aware of a particular topic and all the related information that comes up in the news, you can have all of that information automatically delivered to you through Google Alert. You can also get notified every time your keywords or phrases have new updates. You can choose how many emails you receive with the info, too. Get notified or as they happen or once per day or once per week, it’s up to you. We use them to highlight mentions of ‘Shake It Up Creative’ and whilst it may highlight some things with those words that are not relevant, if we’re mentioned online, we should hear about it pretty quickly.

7. Lighthouse

If you’re involved in the backend of your website then Lighthouse is one for you. It is an open-source, automated tool which allows you to improve the quality of web pages. It works on any web page, whether it’s public or requires authentication and has audits for performance, accessibility and progressive web apps.

Which Google business and web tools, or other tools do you use to keep your website running to the best of its ability and keep yourselves up-to-date? Are there any new tools you’ve read about today that you’re interested in using? You can comment below.

Meg Fenn, Director of Shake It Up Creative