Hi, I’m Nikki Pilkington. My site is https://nikki-pilkington.com/ and in this episode of "SEO F**king What", I’m talking about: the three free tools you need set up before any of the rest of it makes any sense. Because I cannot tell you how many times I've sat down with a business owner for an SEO one-to-one, asked them to share their Google Search Console, and found out they haven't logged in for 18 months. That's like having a sat nav and refusing to look at it, then wondering why you keep getting lost.

And yes, there's actual homework at the end.

Because listening is lovely, but without doing, you're wasting both our time.

You'll learn:

What each tool does and why it matters, how to get all three set up today (it takes about 25 minutes), what to actually look at once they're collecting data, and why ignoring this stuff is one of the most expensive mistakes a website owner can make.

Links mentioned:

1. Google Search Console: https://search.google.com/search-console
2. Google Analytics: https://analytics.google.com
3. Microsoft Clarity: https://clarity.microsoft.com
4. Clicky Analytics: https://clicky.com/101357342
5. Non-Wanky SEO Course: https://nonwankyseo.com

Follow Nikki:

1. LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/nikkipilkington/
2. Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/nikkipilkington/
3. Bluesky: https://bsky.app/profile/nikkipilkington.bsky.social

Mentioned in this episode:

ICN Network

I've been struggling with this podcast,

but I think I've figured out what I really wanna do,

and it starts with helping you to help yourself. So let's fucking go.

This is SEO Fucking What? I'm Nikki,

and I've been doing SEO for over 30 years — before it was even called SEO.

I help people like you make money from your website by getting found on search.

Today. Today I need to be honest with you about something.

I've been struggling to find my feet with this podcast.

When I started, I came in hot. All ranty. All sweary. Really furious about the bollocks in this industry.

And look, I'm still angry. The way small business owners get treated by dodgy SEO agencies

and LinkedIn course floggers makes my fucking blood boil.

But there's only so much sustained rage one woman can maintain.

And after a chat with my brilliant producer Neil — shout out to Neil, he's amazing —

I realised I'd lost sight of why I actually started this.

It wasn't to make a name for myself. It wasn't to be the sweary one on Spotify.

It was to help website owners like you to help yourselves.

So whether you decide to do your SEO yourself or pay someone to do it,

I want to educate you. I want to give you the knowledge to either crack on, or spot when someone's talking absolute shit.

So we're kind of starting again.

Still sweary — that's not going anywhere. Sorry, not sorry.

Still angry about a lot of things, but focused more on what you can do to help your website right now.

And that brings me to what we're doing today.

This episode is the first in a series that's loosely based on my non-wanky SEO course.

We're gonna walk through your SEO step by step. I need to be blunt with you right now.

This only works if you actually do the thing I tell you to.

Listening is lovely. Thank you. Thinking about it is nice,

but without the doing, you are wasting my time and yours.

And I don't say that to be a twat. I say it because I genuinely want you to get results.

So today we're talking about the tools that will help you understand what's happening with your website.

The tools that most people I speak to either don't have — or, and this is the common fucking denominator —

they've got them set up and they never look at them.

And seriously, I can't tell you how many times I've done an SEO one-to-one

and asked someone to share their Google Search Console,

only to find they haven't logged in for 18 months.

It's like having a sat nav, but refusing to look at it, and then wondering why you keep getting lost.

So. Three tools. All free.

Tool number one: an analytics platform.

You need to know who's coming to your website, where they're coming from,

and what they're doing when they get there.

And I know your hosting company probably gives you stats. Wix has built-in analytics.

Squarespace shows you numbers, and that's fine for a quick glance.

But honestly, get the external analytics too.

First of all, they're more detailed. Your hosting stats might tell you someone visited.

Good analytics will tell you where they came from, how long they stayed, what pages they looked at,

and if set up properly, whether they did anything useful — like filling in a form.

Secondly, they integrate with other tools.

If you wanna connect your analytics to an SEO tool or build a proper dashboard in Looker Studio,

you need external analytics.

And thirdly — and this is kind of the big one — as much as you can, you own the data.

If you move hosting providers, change platforms, whatever — your analytics history goes with you.

Google Analytics is the obvious choice. It's free, it's powerful,

and most SEO tools play nicely with it. I know it's got a learning curve,

and since they changed to GA4, it's been a bit of a bin fire,

but you don't need to understand every single report to get value from it.

If you hate Google or want something simpler, I personally love Clicky Analytics.

It's paid, but it's dead easy to use, and it shows you what's happening in real time.

My affiliate link is in the show notes if you wanna check it out.

But just pick one and install it today, before you do anything else.

Tool number two: Google Search Console. If you take one thing away from this episode, let it be this.

If you do not have a Google Search Console account already, get one.

No other tool will tell you more about how Google sees your website.

Nothing else gives you an almost direct gaze into Google's mind.

And I know Google is not the only search engine, but right now, even with the rise of AI search,

it's the one that matters most to most businesses.

Now, the thing about Search Console is it takes a few days to start collecting data,

and it doesn't do it retrospectively.

So if you don't have Google Search Console, just do both of us a favour and sign up now,

before you listen to another word. I'm serious. Pause this.

Go to search.google.com/search-console. Get it set up. It'll take 10 minutes.

Done it? Okay. Now let me tell you what Search Console tells you.

It shows you the search phrases people type into Google when your website appears in the results.

Not "keyword not provided" or secure search like Google Analytics gives you —

the actual phrases.

It tells you how many times you showed up for those phrases, how many people clicked through roughly,

and where you were ranking on average.

It shows you which pages on your site are indexed by Google, and crucially which ones aren't — and why.

It alerts you when Google finds problems with your site — mobile issues, security problems, indexing errors.

You can submit new pages to Google directly and request they're crawled.

So when you publish that new blog post, you don't have to sit around waiting for Google to find it.

The data in Google Search Console is gold. Absolutely fucking gold.

And I see business owners every week who've either never set it up

or haven't looked at it in months. Don't be that person.

Tool number three is Microsoft Clarity.

And this one flew under the radar for ages. Microsoft launched it quietly a few years back

and most people ignored it 'cause they're already using analytics.

But Clarity does something different. It shows you how people use your website —

not just that they visited. It records user sessions,

so you can literally watch what people do on your site — where they move their mouse, what they click on, how far they scroll.

It creates heatmaps that show you where people click the most, and it highlights problems like rage clicks.

You know, when you're on a really shit website and you click the same button 15 times

because it's not doing anything? Clarity tracks that.

It also shows you dead clicks — where people click on something expecting it to do something and nothing happens.

It's incredibly useful for figuring out why people aren't converting. Maybe they're not scrolling far enough to see your call to action.

Maybe they're clicking on something they think is a button but isn't. Maybe your contact form is broken on mobile.

And you know what? It's completely free. Forever. With no limits on website size.

It takes about five minutes to set up and it won't slow your site down.

Install it, check it every couple of weeks. You'll learn things about how people use your site

that you'd never discover any other way.

Quick thing — if you're enjoying this but thinking, Nikki, I don't wanna wait a week for the next podcast,

I just wanna know how to do all of this myself right now — I've got you.

I developed an on-page SEO course that shows you exactly how to get your pages ranking

without hiring an SEO. It's all the stuff I do for clients,

broken down so that you can do it yourself. Video, audio, text — however you like to learn.

It's £200. No upsells. Just the course. If you want more, there's a bigger course.

Have a look at nonwankyseo.com.

Right. Let's make this practical. Here's your homework. I mean actual homework.

Remember what I said about doing the thing?

Sign up for Google Search Console if you haven't already.

Verify your site. It takes 10 minutes.

Check you've got Google Analytics or another analytics platform properly installed.

Sign up for Microsoft Clarity and add the tracking code to your site.

If you can't do this, message me. I'm easy to find. Then this week, log into Search Console.

Once it's collecting data, have a look around. Don't panic about what you see.

We'll cover how to look at it properly in a future episode. Watch a couple of Clarity session recordings.

Just observe. Notice anything surprising. And then, ongoing —

set a reminder to check these tools at least once a month. Put it in your calendar. Make it non-negotiable.

Because look, these tools are only useful if you actually fucking look at them.

Data sitting unread is just noise. But data you actually review —

that's how you make better decisions.

That's your lot for this week. If this was helpful, make sure you're following

SEO Fucking What in whatever app you're using to listen right now, so you don't miss the next episode.

'Cause next time we're talking about keywords, key phrases, and search intent.

'Cause if you don't know what you're optimising your site for, you've got no bloody way of knowing if it's working.

And if you know another small business owner who's been winging it without proper tracking,

send them this episode. They'll thank you for it eventually.

Until next time: get found, make money, stop stressing.