Why track keywords?
If you own a business website, you will want to track keywords that people may search in search engines (such as Google, Yahoo, Bing, DuckDuckGo), and find out which keywords are leading people to your website.
By tracking keywords, you can take steps to improve the performance and rankings of your keywords on search engines.
With Nightwatch, you can track keywords and even scrutinize the data to your liking. For example, you can filter and segment keywords into countless different categories to track, such as search engine platforms, country, language, device platform, and more.
On this page:
Adding keywords
When you log into Nightwatch for the very first time, our wizard will automatically prompt you to add your very first URL, and together with that, your first set of keywords.
You'll then need to access the specific website's keywords page to add more keywords. Here's how you can start adding subsequent keywords:
Within a URL dashboard, click on All Keywords at the left sidebar.
You will then see the blue (+) Add Keywords button towards the right side of the page; click it.
Add keywords dashboard:
⚠️ Keywords with special characters like \!@%,*{}<>; are not supported. The reason is that Google Ads API defines them as invalid and doesn't show Search Volume and Cost-Per-Click stats for them. |
Adjusting keywords for multiple locations, search engines, languages, or devices
To track the same keywords but with multiple different settings, such as different locations, search engines, languages, or devices, you will need to adjust your keywords time with different settings. You can adjust all this on this page:
First, you enter the keywords - separately or in a batch by choosing the +Batch Add Keywords field. If adding your keywords in batch, make sure you add one per row.
Adjust your Location and Language — these are to determine where you would like to track your keywords and in what language. For example, if you choose France and the language is French, your keywords would be tracked in google.fr in French.
Optionally, set or adjust the Precise Location settings for tracking, if you would like to track your keywords locally, for example, in New York. Otherwise, the keywords will be tracked on a national level (the US in this case).
Choose the search engine where you want to track the rankings. By default, it is Google, but you can track rankings also in Youtube, Bing, Yahoo, and Google My Business.
Choose the device where you want to track your keywords - mobile devices or desktop,
Add Tags,
You can use batch actions (above the list), to adjust settings for your keywords in a batch.
Set up Views (filters) to organize your keywords, so that it's easier to track.
💡 Note: You will need to add keywords for different locations, search engines, languages, or devices separately because each keyword with different settings would count individually. This is because the system has to make separate queries for them, even if they are the same keywords.
For example:
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Reading keyword data
After you've added your first keywords, you will be redirected to the specific URL's keywords page where you can view your dashboard and keywords list.
Keywords overview dashboard
With the overview dashboard, you will have an overview of your website performance:
Here are the definitions for each stat:
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Keywords list and rankings
You'll find the keywords list right below the overview dashboard, with columns set up to display their ranks and performances:
Example: The first column, Rank, shows the best rank from all tracked rank types. If, for example, your Local Pack position is higher than your Organic rank, it will be selected to display:
The Last update column will let you know when our tool refreshed your rankings previously.
Note: Nightwatch will refresh your rankings on a daily basis.
Our system determines the optimal time for updating the rankings, and all rankings are refreshed on a regular daily basis, in a 24h interval. |
Click here to read more about how to customize the columns, add multiple columns on your keywords table to display your preferred data: Customizing keywords columns
Check out our Graphs feature to take your data-reading to the next level: Graphs and Segmentation
Check out our tutorial video on YouTube:
Important articles to check out
The list and definitions of all metrics and data dimensions we use in Nightwatch can be found here: Metrics Explanation.
To learn more about SEO metrics, check out our article on 6 Overlooked SEO Metrics for Growth.
Rankings don't show up? Take a look here: Website Isn't Ranking?
Don't see the same results in your browser? Take a look here: Rankings Are Inaccurate? or read our article on Why Your Search Engine Rankings Are Inaccurate.
If you are tracking keywords locally, take a look at our Ultimate Guide to Tracking Local Rankings.