How to set up Google Search Console? Google Search Console is a free and easy-to-use toolkit that helps you monitor, manage, and troubleshoot your website’s presence in Google search results. It provides valuable information about how Google finds your site, crawls and indexes your pages, and how your website is performing in search.
The most valuable GSC tools and reports include:
- Page Indexing Report: Quickly check, identify, and fix technical issues that prevent Google from properly crawling and indexing your websites.
- Search Results Performance: See how often your site is viewed and clicked in search results, and which search terms are driving traffic to your site.
- URL Inspection Tool: Check how Google is crawling, indexing, and serving any page on your site, either directly from Google’s index or in a live test format.
- Basic Web Vitals Report: Monitor key metrics related to your site’s loading speed, engagement, and visual stability.
- Improvement Reports: Get insight into how to improve your website’s structured data, identify errors and warnings, and optimize for improved results.
- Link Report: See who’s linking to your website.
Who should use it?
- Business owners: Learn what features are available in Google Search and learn the basics of search optimization.
- SEOs: Access data to inform and improve search optimization strategies.
- Site administrators: Monitor and, in some cases, resolve technical and security issues.
- Web developers: Identify and resolve markup issues.
How to set up Google Search Console: Step-by-Step
How to set up Google Search Console? For a GSC you’ll need a Google account. If you don’t have one, you’ll need to create one first. If you already use a Google Account to track other websites, keep in mind that one account can manage multiple features in Search Console (up to 1,000 features, to be exact).
Learning How to set up Google Search Console to your website and verify your ownership is simple:
How to set up Google Search Console account
Select one of the suggested property types
Use one of the five available options to prove that you own your website:
- Domain Provider
- HTML tags
- HTML file
- Google Analytics Tracking Code
- Google Tag Manager Container Fragment
Adding a domain attribute in Search Console
After adding a new property, you will need to select a property type. GSC accepts two main types of website attributes: URL prefix attributes and domain attributes. Unlike the URL-prefix attribute, which supports several types of validation, this attribute only refers to DNS record validation. A domain attribute includes all subdomains, such as m, www, and multiple protocols, such as http, https, FTP.
The DNS method is considered one of the best ways to validate your website because it eliminates the need for re-validation if you decide to switch from www to a non-www address in the future. To learn how www affects your site’s SEO and technical setup, check out this article on choosing www and non-www.
A domain attribute URL does not include the http/https protocol and ignores www (if you add www.website.com, the attribute is rendered as website.com). It also includes all subdomains and subpaths.
How to set up Google Search Console Using a DNS Record
How to set up Google Search Console using a DNS record? You really need to understand the basics:
- Select the domain ownership type in Search Console.
- Select your DNS provider from the list of DNS providers. For example, if it’s Gandi.net, select it and click Start Verification. Log in to Gandi.net and click Authorize. From there, verification should happen right away.
If Search Console doesn’t show your domain provider or if it shows a provider that you don’t own, you’ll need to add it manually. Here’s how:
- Select the record type. GSC offers two options: TXT and CNAME.
- To determine which type to choose, enter the domain name in the Google Admin Tools box on the CNAME tab and observe the output. If the verification process doesn’t find any records, proceed with the TXT record type. If you see the output as CNAME, pay attention to the target value.
If the target value matches the parent domain of the specified domain, select the CNAME record type. If it doesn’t match the parent domain, follow the TXT record instructions.
- Copy and paste the created TXT record or CNAME Tag/Host and CNAME Target/Destination, depending on the record type you selected, into your domain provider.
- Click the Validate button on the GSC validation details page.
- Please note that it may take two to three days for your provider to start providing the registration.
If you do not know who your domain host is, review Google’s instructions on how to find your domain host. Once you have identified your DNS provider, select it from the drop-down list or select Any DNS provider.
How to Get Your Website Verified in Google Search Console
Now that we’ve covered the steps for the domain and URL prefix attributes, let’s take a look at how other verification methods work. Each method is suited to different types of websites, technical configurations, and levels of site access. This way, Google ensures that almost all legitimate site owners and their peers can verify that they own a site in Search Console, regardless of their specific situation. Instructions are provided below.
- Insert an HTML tag
- Upload an HTML file
- Use your Google Analytics account
- Use your Google Tag Manager account
Google Search Console Users, Owners, and Permissions
The next step on How to set up a Google Search Console account is to manage access to your projects. Once you’ve logged in to GSC and confirmed that you’re a property owner, you’ll be able to grant permissions to other users.
Let’s take a closer look at user roles and permissions.
Owners
In GSC, property owners have full control over properties. Users with owner rights can add and remove users, configure settings, and access all Search Console data and tools.
There are two types of owners in Google Search Console:
- Verified Owner: A person who proves ownership of a property through a verification token (for example, an HTML file uploaded to a website). If a property loses its last verified owner, no authorized users in Google Search Console can access the property until someone verifies ownership.
- Delegated owner: A person who has been granted ownership status by a verified owner and added directly through Search Console without using a verification token.
Users
Users can access Google Search Console, but with fewer permissions than owners. Full users: Can view all data and perform most actions, but cannot manage users.
- Limited users: Can view most data, but have fewer permissions than full users.
- Common: Can access certain data or perform certain actions on behalf of your website from outside the console. Actions and permissions depend on the type of associated entity, such as a Google Ads or Web Store account.
To view and manage your user list, go to Google Search Console Settings and click Users & Permissions.
Conclusion
Now you have all the instructions and guidelines on how to set up Google Search Console. It may not be the most exciting task on your to-do list, but the information it provides will give you a better understanding of your website’s organic performance and how everything works behind the scenes. For example, you’ll learn which search terms are driving traffic to your site, identify technical issues that could be hindering your search performance, and learn how Google displays and indexes your pages. So get started, explore the features and reports, and continue optimizing your site based on real, actionable data.
