Enterprise SEO Metrics: 25 KPIs to Track Your Success [+ REAL Case Studies]

Here’s the main problem with tracking enterprise SEO metrics:

57% of enterprises say that their limited in-house SEO skills are their biggest challenge to building a solid online presence.

That means you’re probably having trouble building a solid SEO strategy and tracking the right KPIs.

But here’s what’s surprising: 

Even so, 72% of enterprise websites say improving SEO and growing their organic presence proves successful.

Imagine what you can achieve with a good strategy.

In this guide, you’ll learn about the key SEO metrics that matter most for large-scale enterprise websites. 

Understanding and optimizing them helps you drive better search rankings, enhance user experience, and achieve your business goals.

Let’s dive in.

TL;DR:

Enterprise SEO Challenges: 57% of enterprises struggle with limited in-house SEO skills, but 72% find SEO improvements successful with the right strategy.

Key SEO Metrics:

• Organic Traffic: Core indicator of SEO success.
• Keyword Rankings: Tracks performance in search results.
• Click-Through Rate (CTR): Measures effectiveness of titles and descriptions.
• Bounce Rate: Reflects user engagement with landing pages.
• Conversion Rate: Indicates success in driving desired actions.

Technical SEO Metrics:

• Page Load Speed: Crucial for user experience and rankings.
• Mobile Usability: Essential due to the dominance of mobile traffic.
• Crawl Errors & Indexation: Key for visibility in search results.
• Core Web Vitals: Focus on loading speed, interactivity, and visual stability.
• Broken Links: Impact user experience and search engine rankings.

Content Performance Metrics:

• Time on Page & Scroll Depth: Measure content engagement.
• Clicks & Shares: Track user interactions and content reach.

Backlink Metrics:

• Total Backlinks & Referring Domains: Indicators of online presence.
• Domain & Page Authority: Important for credibility and rankings.
• Anchor Text Distribution & Backlink Quality: Crucial for maintaining a strong profile.
• Lost/New Backlinks & Spam Score: Vital for managing SEO health.

Advanced SEO Metrics:

• Voice Search Metrics: Important for targeting mobile-first audiences.
• Featured Snippets and SERP Features: Enhance visibility in search results.

Reporting and Benchmarking:

• Setting Benchmarks & Custom Dashboards: Track and visualize key metrics.
• KPIs & Regular Auditing: Ensure continuous optimization and alignment with business goals.

Call to Action: Encourages scheduling a strategy call to enhance SEO with data-driven strategies.

Fundamental SEO Metrics

Here are the basic SEO metrics you have to follow.

1. Organic Traffic

Organic search traffic is the core indicator of SEO success because it reflects the number of visitors coming to your site through unpaid search results.

High organic traffic shows that your website is well-optimized and effectively reaching your target audience. 

Tracking organic traffic helps you gauge how effective your SEO strategies genuinely are.

If they’re not paying off, you can make the necessary adjustments to improve visibility and user engagement.

For example, we helped Meridian Compensation Partners gain 773 new strategic keywords, which led to a traffic boost of 1.6K in the U.S.

Our 4-pronged strategy included careful audit, keyword research, internal linking, and a solid backlink strategy.

That brings us to the next point.

2. Keyword Rankings

Keyword rankings reveal how your website performs in search engine results for specific terms.

Monitoring these rankings helps you understand your position relative to competitors and identify which keywords drive the most traffic and conversions. 

Pro tip: Tracking both branded and non-branded keywords is crucial for expanding market reach and staying competitive.

Here are some branded and non-branded keywords that helped Meridian Compensation partners jump from positions 30-47 on SERPS to positions 1-7.

3. Click-Through Rate (CTR)

CTR measures the percentage of users who click on your site’s link in search results.

A higher CTR indicates that your titles and descriptions are resonating with searchers. 

Optimizing CTR boosts your search visibility and attracts more qualified traffic.

Here’s what URL clicks and impressions look for another one of our clients, cold-press juicer brand Hurom:

Our targeted content strategy resulted in a 262% increase in blog clicks and a 114% rise in impressions from Q1 to Q2 2024.

4. Bounce Rate

This landing page metric is very important because it reflects the percentage of visitors who leave your website after viewing only one page.

A high bounce rate may suggest low-quality content or a poor user experience. 

Pro tip: Use images, videos, and recent examples to create high-quality content and get a larger return on investment.

5. Conversion Rate

Conversion rate measures the percentage of visitors who complete a desired action on your website.

We’re talking about making a purchase or signing up for a newsletter. 

Remember: Organic conversions are a direct indicator of how effectively your SEO campaign and larger marketing efforts are driving business results.

Tracking conversion rates helps you optimize your SEO strategy for better ROI.

For example, we track organic shopping for our client Hurom:

Technical SEO Metrics for Enterprises

Managing technical issues at an enterprise level is critical for maintaining a smooth user experience across large, complex websites.

You need to ensure your website performs well to stay competitive in search rankings and deliver a great experience to users.

Warning: Not tackling technical issues can hide your website from search results.

And since your website has more pages than regular ones, you may need third-party help.

Here’s what to target:

6. Page Load Speed

For enterprises, slow-loading time can lead to significant traffic losses and damage your brand reputation. 

Use tools like Google PageSpeed Insights and GTmetrix to measure key metrics like First Contentful Paint (FCP) and Time to Interactive (TTI). 

Pro tip: To optimize, focus on server response times, compressing images, and minimizing JavaScript and CSS impact.

Even renowned websites like Masterclass need to make some improvements:

7. Mobile Usability

With mobile traffic dominating, a flawless mobile experience is essential. 

Mobile usability covers how well your website works on mobile devices, including responsive design and touch-friendly navigation. 

Use Google’s Mobile-Friendly Test and Search Console to identify issues.

Adopting a mobile-first approach will improve mobile rankings and user satisfaction.

8. Crawl Errors

Crawl errors can severely impact your site’s visibility.

These errors prevent search engines from accessing key pages. 

Regularly use Google Search Console to monitor and fix crawl errors, ensuring all valuable content is accessible and indexed.

9. Indexation Status

Indexation status tracks how many of your pages are indexed by search engines.

Use Google Search Console to monitor this and address any issues like duplicate content or noindex tags.

Regularly check your indexation to ensure maximum visibility for all relevant content.

Here’s a great place to start:

10. Core Web Vitals

Core Web Vitals focus on loading speed, interactivity, and visual stability—key for user experience. 

Use Google Search Console and Lighthouse to monitor and optimize metrics like Largest Contentful Paint (LCP) and First Input Delay (FID).

Improving these at scale will enhance both user experience and search rankings.

Let’s check up on Masterclass again and see if they pass the CWV test:

11. Number of Broken Links

Broken links harm user experience and negatively impact search engine rankings, directly affecting online visibility. 

Basically, if you have a high number of broken links, Google can’t index your website as well because it doesn’t understand your website structure.

And large enterprise websites typically have a lot of broken links. 

By monitoring this KPI, you gain data-driven insights to enhance site structure, improve SEO performance, and ultimately drive business growth. 

Ahrefs, for example, shows that Masterclass has zero broken links on its website but 14,000 broken links from other sources linking to its website.

However, this pertains to off-page SEO, and we need to spend more time on-page, discussing the metrics below.

Content Performance Metrics

Content is king, but only if it performs well.

That’s why you should monitor the metrics below that show you whether your enterprise content brings you the desired results.

12. Time on Page

Time on page measures how long a visitor spends on a specific page.

This metric is a strong indicator of how engaging and relevant your content is.

A longer time on page suggests that users find the content valuable and are spending time reading and interacting with it.

Pro tip: To increase time on page, consider improving content quality, adding multimedia elements like videos and infographics, and ensuring the content is easy to read and navigate. Tools like Google Analytics can help track this metric and identify pages that may need improvement.

13. Scroll Depth

Scroll depth measures how far down a webpage a visitor scrolls.

This metric helps you understand whether users are consuming your content fully or leaving before reaching the most important parts.

A low scroll depth may indicate that your content isn’t engaging enough or that important information is buried too far down the page. 

Pro tip: You can use tools like Hotjar or Crazy Egg to track scroll depth and optimize content placement and design to encourage deeper engagement.

14. Clicks

Clicks refer to the number of times users interact with links, buttons, or other clickable elements on your webpage.

This metric helps you gauge how effectively your content is driving user actions.

Track clicks on key elements such as: 

• CTAs (Calls to Action)
• Internal links
• Multimedia 

That way, you’ll know which user pathways to optimize to improve conversion rates. 

Google Analytics and event tracking tools can provide insights into which elements are attracting the most clicks and how to optimize them.

15. Shares

Shares measure how often users share your content on social media or other platforms.

This metric reflects the perceived value and relevance of your content, as users are likely to share content they find useful or interesting.

Side note: Technically, shares are not exactly an SEO metric, but they'll tell you if you need to change your SEO approach with higher-quality content.

Encouraging social sharing can increase your content’s reach and drive more traffic to your site.

Tools like BuzzSumo, SEMrush, and social media analytics platforms can help you track shares and understand which content resonates most with your audience.

Pro tip: Our SEO experts use SEMrush to track this metric.

Backlink Metrics for Enterprises

An enterprise SEO campaign should include managing and optimizing your backlink profile.

Backlink analysis is time-consuming, but it can significantly impact search engine visibility.

Here’s what to look for:

16. Total Backlinks

Enterprises typically have a vast number of backlinks due to their extensive digital footprint.

Monitoring the total number of backlinks is essential to understanding the scale and reach of your enterprise’s online presence. 

Pro tip: For large organizations, it’s important to track not just the quantity but also the distribution of backlinks across various domains.

Ensure consistent link growth that supports the entire enterprise's SEO strategy.

This type of solid backlink analysis helped us increase iWave’s organic traffic from 6k to 18k per month.

17. Referring Domains

For enterprises, the diversity and quality of referring domains are critical.

A strong portfolio of referring domains from authoritative and industry-relevant sites helps build credibility and trust at scale. 

Tracking the number of unique referring domains across different segments of the enterprise can reveal opportunities to strengthen links in specific areas or regions.

As a result, you support localized and global SEO efforts simultaneously.

18. Domain Authority (DA)

Domain Authority is especially significant for enterprises that operate multiple subdomains or microsites.

Monitoring DA across the enterprise’s various domains helps ensure that all parts of the digital ecosystem contribute positively to the overall authority. 

Pro tip: Enterprises should focus on improving DA by acquiring high-quality links that enhance the credibility of their core and secondary web properties.

19. Page Authority (PA)

Page Authority is crucial for enterprises that manage large websites with numerous important landing pages, product pages, or content hubs. 

Tracking PA helps you prioritize link-building efforts toward high-value pages that drive conversions or are critical to the customer journey. 

Basically, improving PA on key pages can significantly enhance overall SEO performance across the enterprise.

20. Anchor Text Distribution

For enterprises, managing anchor text distribution is complex due to the scale and variety of content and links. 

A well-balanced anchor text profile that includes branded terms, exact matches, and natural phrases is crucial to avoid penalties and maintain strong rankings.

Here’s what the anchors look like for inBeat Agency, another one of our success case studies:

21. Backlink Quality

Given the large number of backlinks that enterprises typically acquire, focusing on quality over quantity is imperative.

Enterprises should prioritize links from high-authority, relevant websites that align with their industry or market. 

Pro tip: At Blue Things, we conduct regular backlink audits to maintain a high-quality link profile.

Our experts identify and disavow any low-quality or spammy links that could negatively impact your enterprise's SEO performance.

22. Lost and New Backlinks

For enterprises, the impact of lost backlinks can be significant due to the scale at which they operate.

Monitoring lost backlinks allows you to quickly identify and address any issues that may lead to declines in search rankings. 

Similarly, tracking new backlinks across your enterprise's vast network of pages can help you measure your global link-building campaigns’s effectiveness.

That means you can identify successful strategies that can be scaled.

23. Spam Score

Enterprises are particularly vulnerable to spammy backlinks due to their visibility and scale.

A high Spam Score can jeopardize the authority of your enterprise’s domains. 

So, monitor your incoming backlinks’ Spam Score and disavow harmful links to maintain a clean, authoritative backlink profile.

This profile will help you support your enterprise’s long-term SEO strategy.

Advanced SEO Metrics for Enterprises

As SEO continues to evolve, you must stay ahead by tracking advanced and emerging metrics.

It’s the best way to gain deeper insights and improve your predictive capabilities.

Here’s what we advise you to follow:

24. Voice Search Metrics

Voice search is rapidly growing, and enterprises need to optimize for this trend.

Tracking performance in voice search queries is essential, especially if you’re targeting tech-savvy or mobile-first audiences. 

Pro tip: Optimize for long-tail, conversational keywords that align with how users are interacting with voice-activated devices.

That’s a great way to ensure your content is featured in voice search results.

25. Featured Snippets and SERP Features

Featured snippets and other SERP features offer enterprises the opportunity to capture more organic visibility, even above traditional search results.

Tracking the presence and performance of your content in these features is crucial for maximizing SERP dominance. 

So, optimize content specifically for: 

• Featured snippets
• Knowledge panels
• Other SERP features

That way, you can significantly enhance your visibility and drive more traffic from search engines.

For example, our client Hurom saw a significant leap from 816 to 1,300 keywords captured in featured snippets over five months:

Enterprise SEO Metrics: Reporting and Benchmarking 

At Blue Things, we understand that effective SEO is driven by data.

Our approach to reporting and benchmarking is designed to provide clear, actionable insights that help our clients achieve and sustain top performance in search engines. 

Here’s how we do it:

Setting Benchmarks

Establishing accurate benchmarks is the foundation of our SEO reporting process.

We start by analyzing your current performance and comparing it to industry standards and competitors.

This allows us to set realistic, achievable goals for improvement. These benchmarks serve as reference points, helping us measure progress over time and adjust strategies as needed.

Custom Dashboards

To keep our clients informed and engaged, we create custom dashboards using tools like Google Analytics, Google Data Studio, and advanced enterprise-level SEO platforms.

These dashboards provide a real-time view of your key metrics, making it easy to track performance across various aspects of your SEO strategy.

Our dashboards are tailored to your specific business objectives, ensuring that you have the insights you need to make informed decisions.

Key Performance Indicators (KPIs)

Identifying the right KPIs is crucial for measuring the success of your SEO efforts.

At Blue Things, we work closely with our clients to determine which metrics align best with their business goals. 

Whether it’s organic traffic, conversion rates, or keyword rankings, we focus on the KPIs that truly matter to your bottom line, providing you with a clear picture of how your SEO investments are paying off.

Regular Auditing and Review

SEO is not a set-it-and-forget-it process.

That’s why we conduct regular audits and reviews of your SEO strategy, ensuring that your site remains optimized as search engines and user behaviors evolve.

Our continuous monitoring allows us to identify new opportunities and address potential issues before they impact your performance, keeping your strategy agile and effective.

Are you ready to take your SEO to the next level? Schedule a free strategy call with our experts!

Let's discuss how we can help you achieve your business goals through data-driven SEO strategies. Contact us today to get started!