Google Search Console is the most important free SEO tool available — and most WordPress site owners either ignore it completely or glance at it once and close the tab because it looks overwhelming. This series breaks down every section of Search Console into plain language, starting with the one that shows you how your site is actually performing in Google search: the Performance report.
What is the Performance report?
The Performance report shows you data about how your site appears in Google Search results — how many times it showed up, how many times people clicked on it, what position it ranked in, and what search queries triggered it. This data comes directly from Google and is the most accurate source of organic search traffic information you have.
Note: this is Google Search data only. It doesn’t include Bing, DuckDuckGo, or any other search engine. And it only covers organic (unpaid) results — not ads.
The four core metrics
Clicks
The number of times someone clicked on your site’s listing in Google search results and landed on your page. This is real traffic driven by organic search. If you have 2 total clicks like the screenshot above — that means your site has just started getting discovered. It takes time to grow, especially on new domains.
Impressions
The number of times your URL appeared in Google search results — whether someone saw it or not (it counts even if the result was below the fold and not scrolled to). Impressions tell you your reach. High impressions with low clicks means your title or description isn’t compelling enough to make people click.
CTR — Click-Through Rate
The percentage of impressions that resulted in a click. Calculated as: Clicks ÷ Impressions × 100. A CTR of 3–5% is average for most positions. Position 1 typically gets 25–35% CTR. If your CTR is below 2% on pages ranking in the top 5, your meta title and description need work — the RankAlSEO plugin lets you optimise these per page.
Average Position
Your average ranking position across all queries that triggered an impression. Position 1 is the top result. Position 10 is the last result on page 1. Anything below 20 means you’re on page 2 or beyond, where almost nobody looks. Focus your efforts on pages ranking between position 5 and 20 — small improvements here can significantly increase clicks.
How to read the Performance report
Date range
The default view shows the last 3 months. Change it to 12 months to spot long-term trends, or 7 days to see what’s happening right now. Comparing two date ranges (click the “Compare” option) helps you spot growth or drops.
Queries tab
This shows what search terms people used to find your site. Sort by Clicks to see your best-performing queries. Sort by Impressions to find high-reach terms you’re not getting clicks for. Sort by Position to find keywords where you rank just outside the top 3 — these are your best upgrade opportunities.
Pages tab
Shows performance broken down by individual URL. Click any page to see which queries that specific page ranks for. This is invaluable for understanding whether a particular post or landing page is working.
Countries, Devices, Search type
Filter by country to see where your traffic comes from. Filter by device to compare mobile vs desktop performance. Filter Search type to separate Web, Image, Video, and News results.
What to look for first on a new site
If you’re just starting out (like the data in the screenshot above — 2 clicks, site active for a few days), here’s what to focus on:
- Impressions over time: Are they growing week over week? Even 10 impressions growing to 50 is a positive signal
- First queries: What are the first search terms Google associates with your site? These tell you how Google currently understands your content
- Position for branded queries: Search your own brand name — you should rank #1 for it. If not, your site may have indexing issues
How the RankAlSEO plugin helps your Performance numbers
Every metric in the Performance report is influenced by how well your pages are optimised. The RankAlSEO plugin directly impacts:
- CTR: By letting you write optimised meta titles and descriptions per page — the RankAlSEO plugin’s AI generation feature can write click-worthy titles based on your content
- Position: Through schema markup, technical SEO audits, and page speed (a lighter plugin means faster pages, which Google rewards)
- Impressions: Through proper XML sitemaps that get all your content discovered faster
Action steps after reading this
- Open Google Search Console → Performance
- Note your current total clicks and impressions
- Go to the Queries tab — what are your top 5 queries?
- Go to the Pages tab — which page gets the most clicks?
- For any page with high impressions but low CTR, open it in WordPress and update the meta title and description using the RankAlSEO plugin
Next in this series: Pages (Indexing) — understanding why some of your pages aren’t in Google’s index at all.
RankAl SEO PRO gives you unlimited AI content generation, daily rank tracking, full-site audits, and WooCommerce SEO — all inside WordPress. From €8.99/month.
