Google Search Console (GSC) is a free tool from Google that shows how your website performs in Google organic search. It provides data on: which search queries trigger your pages to appear, your average position in results, impressions, and click-through rates; which pages Google has indexed; technical issues preventing proper indexing; Core Web Vitals performance; and any manual actions or security issues affecting your site. GSC is the primary source of organic search performance data — GA4 does not show search query data, making GSC essential for understanding and improving SEO performance.
Every UK business with a website should have Google Search Console verified and connected to their GA4 property. The setup takes 15–30 minutes and provides data that is unavailable from any other source. Many UK businesses have never installed GSC, meaning they have no visibility into their organic search performance — which queries drive their traffic, which pages rank, or whether Google is experiencing problems indexing their site.
Key Google Search Console reports for UK businesses
- Performance — total clicks, impressions, average CTR, and average position from Google Search; filterable by query, page, device, country, and search type (web, image, video)
- Pages (Index Coverage) — which pages Google has indexed, which are excluded, and why; reveals indexing problems that prevent pages from ranking
- Core Web Vitals — page experience scores across your site; shows which pages need speed improvements
- Sitemaps — submit your XML sitemap so Google can efficiently discover and crawl your pages
- URL Inspection — check any specific URL's indexing status, last crawl date, and see how Google renders the page
- Links — internal and external links pointing to your pages; useful for understanding your link profile
- Manual Actions — alerts if Google has taken action against your site for policy violations; must be resolved for rankings to recover
Using GSC for SEO strategy
The Performance report is the most strategically valuable part of GSC. Filtering for queries where your pages have high impressions but low CTR reveals pages that rank but fail to attract clicks — an opportunity to improve title tags and meta descriptions. Filtering for queries where your average position is 8–15 identifies pages close to the first page — with targeted optimisation, these can become page-one rankings. Comparing year-over-year performance at the query and page level reveals which topics are growing or declining in relevance to your audience.
Google offers several verification methods for GSC: (1) HTML file — upload a verification file to your website's root directory; (2) HTML meta tag — add a specific meta tag to your homepage's head section; (3) Google Analytics — if GA4 is already on your site, GSC can verify via the same Google account; (4) Google Tag Manager — verify through GTM if it is installed on your site; (5) DNS record — add a TXT record to your domain's DNS settings. For most UK businesses using a CMS like WordPress, the Google Analytics or meta tag methods are simplest. Agencies typically use the DNS method for clean access across multiple client sites.
GA4 tracks what happens after visitors arrive on your website — traffic volumes, user behaviour, conversions, and sales. Google Search Console tracks what happens before visitors arrive — how your pages perform in Google search results, which queries trigger impressions, and technical issues affecting indexability. The two tools are complementary: GSC shows your search visibility and organic click performance; GA4 shows whether those organic visitors convert. Connecting the two tools (which can be done within GSC settings) allows you to see organic search query data within GA4's acquisition reports.