What is a SERP analysis report?
A SERP analysis report is a document that consolidates data from multiple sources (e.g., Google Search Console, Ahrefs, SEMrush) to track and display key performance indicators (KPIs) (e.g., keyword rankings, organic traffic, click-through rate), enabling teams and agencies to monitor search engine performance and create presentations for clients and executives.
SERP analysis reports are typically created using flexible tools like Google Looker Studio, Power BI, Google Sheets, or platform-specific solutions to enable high customization and integration of multiple data sources.
What to include in a SERP analysis report?
An actionable SERP analysis report balances context and specificity based on the audience (executives, managers, and analysts) and their use cases.
Executive SERP analysis reports
Executive reports for CMOs, CEOs, and clients show the impact of search engine visibility on business goals. Reviewed weekly, monthly, or quarterly, they include:
- SEO ROI analysis: by keyword, using attribution for large budgets.
- Traffic analysis: organic traffic growth, bounce rate, session duration
- Cohort analysis: user behavior and engagement by search query cohort
- Add text for additional context to translate metrics for non-technical audiences. Present in slide decks and simplified Looker Studio reports.
SERP manager reports
Manager reports have cross-channel views with drill-downs to see performance by keyword, region, team member, and campaign. They help align teams, define tactics, and include:
- Keyword performance reporting: overall keyword, page, or region reporting across search engines
- Goal tracking: compare current performance vs objectives
- Audits for prioritization and spotting issues
- Competitive analysis for keyword and tactic mapping
- Topic, keyword, content, audience research
Operational SERP Analysis Reports
Operational reports for analysts and SEO managers have granular, customizable KPIs to solve technical issues. Monitored hourly, daily, or weekly, they cover:
- Keyword rankings: position tracking, visibility, SERP features
- Backlink analysis: new and lost backlinks, domain authority
- Technical SEO: site speed, crawl errors, mobile usability
- Content performance: page views, engagement metrics, bounce rate
Operational SERP analysis reports are highly customized, built in flexible tools like Google Sheets or Looker Studio to enable data cleaning, blending, annotations, and integrating multiple sources.
How to build a SERP analysis report?
To build a SERP analysis report, connect your data sources, choose a template on Looker Studio or Sheets, build your queries by selecting metrics and dimensions, choose charts to visualize your data, customize the report, design and share via link, PDF or email.
Here’s the breakdown:
Connect data sources
Define and connect the data sources to bring to your report. Common sources are Google Search Console for search performance, Ahrefs or SEMrush for keyword and backlink data, and Google Analytics for web analytics.
To connect your data sources, go to portermetrics.com, choose the data sources to bring to your report.
You can follow these tutorials on connecting your data:
Choose a template
Choose from dozens of SERP analysis report templates in Google Sheets or Looker Studio, designed for use cases like keyword tracking, backlink analysis, and technical SEO monitoring.
Learn to copy Looker Studio templates.
While templates are the starting point. Make them specific for your business or agency. Map your specific metrics, especially custom conversions, CRM contact data, GA4 events, and all the fields and metrics that you define as "conversions" and "revenue".
Depending on your reporting tool—Google Sheets or Google Looker Studio, pick any of the dozens of templates created by our team and customers to solve your SERP analysis reporting use cases, such as keyword tracking, backlink analysis, and technical SEO monitoring.
Select metrics, dimensions, and charts
Once your report template is downloaded, you may 1)modify it or 2) create a blank page to build it from scratch. Whatever the case, setting up a query always follows these steps:
- Select the data source and the account connected to it
- Choose metrics (e.g., keyword rankings, organic traffic, CTR, etc.).
- Choose breakdowns to segment your data (e.g., by date, keyword, page, etc.)
You can follow these tutorials on adding data to your reports
Design
To make your SERP analysis reports truly white-label you can add logos, colors, fonts, and styling to mirror your brand.
Follow these tutorials to design your SERP analysis reports:
Share
Share your SERP analysis reports via links, PDF, schedule emails, and control permissions.
KPIs to include in a SERP analysis report?
SERP analysis reports should include a mix of visibility, engagement, conversion, efficiency, effectiveness, and cost metrics and KPIs to fully understand the performance of search engine efforts towards business goals. They include:
Visibility KPIs measure the search engine presence:
- Visibility metrics: impressions, average position, SERP features
- Engagement metrics: clicks, CTR, bounce rate, session duration
- Conversion metrics: goal completions, leads, key events
Efficiency KPIs compare your search outputs to the cost, including:
- Visibility: cost per impression
- Engagement: cost per click
- Conversion: cost per acquisition
Effectiveness KPIs compare the input with the output from one stage to another
- Visibility: frequency
- Engagement: CTR, engagement rate
- Conversion: conversion rate
Sales and cost KPIs show the bottom-line impact of your search performance:
- Sales: customers, revenue
- Cost: SEO spend, OPEX, payroll
- Efficiency: ROI, ROAS, CAC
- Effectiveness: AOV, ACV
To analyze these SERP KPIs, segment them by:
- Channel: organic, paid, Google vs Bing
- Time: Hourly, daily, weekly, monthly
- Campaign: funnel stage, objective
- Business: client, branch, region
- Audience: geo, tech, demographics, interests, behavior, placement
- Content: creatives, format, topic, keyword
