SEO Metrics That Matter in 2026
If you are responsible for marketing in 2026 and SEO is part of your remit, traffic alone no longer tells the full story.
The last year saw a major shift in how people search, driven largely by AI-led results and on-SERP answers.
“Old” SEO metrics on their own no longer show the full picture, so if you are still reporting the same way you were a year or two ago, you risk underselling performance, misunderstanding impact, or drawing the wrong conclusions altogether.
AI answers now sit at the top of the page and people get what they need faster. Which is great, but this means fewer clicks happen, and so the already murky waters of SEO metrics that matter have become even murkier and your reputation online begins before anyone reaches your website.
This blog is written for:
-
Marketing managers who own SEO internally
-
Companies outsourcing their SEO
-
Anyone who has to explain results to a board, a founder, or finance
The goal is simple.
Prove visibility. Prove impact. Prove business value.
The mindset shift you need this year
In 2026, SEO success is built on three things:
-
Are we visible where people are searching, including AI answers
-
Are the right people landing on the site
-
Do those people turn into leads, sales, or revenue
If your report only shows rankings and traffic, it is not fit for purpose – and will make your job much more difficult!
Metrics vs KPIs (where most reports fail)
-
Metrics describe what is happening
-
KPIs prove whether SEO is worth the spend
Examples:
-
Impressions = metric
-
Organic leads = KPI
-
Rankings = metric
-
Revenue from organic = KPI
If you use an agency, this is where to push them.
The core SEO metrics that still matter
These are still the foundation, they are the first things to change when you change strategy, implement changes, and they allow you to optimise certain areas further. W
1) Organic traffic
What it tells you:
Is SEO bringing people to the site at all.
What to track
-
Clicks from organic search
-
Sessions and users from organic
Tools
-
Google Search Console
-
Google Analytics 4
How these numbers should be presented:
-
Look at trends, compare like for like periods
-
Segment by landing page, not just totals
-
Compare organic to paid, social, and referral
2) Keyword rankings
What it tells you:
Are you visible on the searches that matter to the business.
What to track
-
Average position for priority keywords
-
Coverage in top 3 and top 10
Tools
-
Google Search Console
-
Semrush or Ahrefs
How to use this data:
-
Focus on keywords with commercial and informational intent
-
Watch keywords stuck on page 2, what can be changed to tip them onto page 1?
-
Use rankings to explain why traffic moved
Rankings explain performance. They do not equal performance.
3) Organic impressions
What it tells you:
How often your brand appears in search results, even without a click.
Why this matters more now
AI answers reduce clicks. Visibility still matters. See our article on 0 click search.
Tool
-
Google Search Console
How to use these numbers:
-
Rising impressions with low clicks often means AI or SERP features are eating attention
-
Impressions prove presence when traffic does not grow
4) Click-through rate (CTR)
What it tells you:
When people see you, do they choose you.
Tool
-
Google Search Console
How to use this data:
-
Identify high-impression, low-CTR pages
-
Improve titles and meta descriptions
-
Treat CTR improvements as quick wins
CTR is one of the few SEO levers you can make a difference with fast.
5) Conversions from organic
What it tells you:
Is SEO delivering business outcomes.
This is the metric leadership/finance/stakeholders actually cares about.
Tool
-
Google Analytics 4
How to use this:
-
Track leads, sign-ups, or purchases from organic search
-
Monitor organic conversion rate, not just volume
-
Tie SEO performance directly to pipeline or revenue when reporting
6) Engagement and bounce
What it tells you:
Are people satisfied when they land.
Tool
-
Google Analytics 4
How a senior SEO uses this
-
Low engagement usually means intent mismatch
-
High bounce on ranking pages flags content or UX issues
-
Engagement quality matters more as traffic volume tightens
Fewer visits are fine if they are better visits.
7) Backlinks and authority
What it tells you:
Are you building credibility off site.
Tool
-
Semrush
How a senior SEO uses this
-
Track links to key landing pages, not just the homepage
-
Monitor lost links closely
-
Focus on relevance and authority, not raw volume
8) Technical SEO and site health
What it tells you:
Can search engines crawl, index, and trust your site.
Tools
-
Google Search Console
-
PageSpeed Insights
-
Semrush site audits
- Screaming frog audits
How a senior SEO uses this
-
Treat indexing issues as urgent
-
Focus Core Web Vitals on money pages first
-
Fix issues that block growth first, not cosmetic ones
Bad technical foundations kill good strategy.
AI has entered the chat
This is where most SEO reports are way behind.
AI answers now sit at the top of search results. People often stop there. That means being cited or mentioned matters, even without a click, we told you its got murky.
9) AI visibility (this is now a reputation metric)
What it really tells you:
Whether LLMs see your brand as credible, authoritative, and safe enough to reference.
In 2026, AI answers are not ranking pages. They are selecting sources. That selection is driven by reputation signals, brand consistency, and historical authority, not just on page SEO.
If your brand is missing from AI answers, it is usually a trust problem, not a keyword problem.
What to track (properly)
Brand mentions inside AI answers
Are AI platforms naming your brand, or just using your competitors as examples.
This matters even without clicks. Repeated exposure builds recall and future demand.
Source citations and linked references
Which of your URLs are being used as sources, and for what topics.
AI systems tend to reuse the same trusted pages again and again.
Topic ownership, not just page ownership
Are you consistently referenced for a theme or category, or do you appear once and disappear.
AI rewards brands that demonstrate depth across a topic, not one off articles.
Competitor presence gaps
Where competitors are cited and you are not.
These gaps usually point to missing authority signals, weak PR coverage, or unclear brand positioning.
Key AI platforms this applies to
Each platform has its own bias, but reputation travels across them.
-
Google AI Overviews
-
ChatGPT
-
Perplexity
-
Microsoft Copilot
Tools that actually help here
Semrush (AI visibility features)
Useful for understanding how often your brand and pages appear in AI-driven answers and where competitors outperform you. Strong for prompt-level insight and comparison.
Peec AI
This is where things get more advanced.
Peec is useful because it separates:
-
Brand visibility vs source visibility (being named vs being cited)
-
Performance by model, market, and audience
-
Repeated presence vs one-off mentions
How to use this data
AI visibility is treated as top-of-funnel brand equity, not a traffic metric.
It is used to:
-
Explain why impressions rise while clicks flatten
-
Justify investment in PR, brand, thought leadership, and authority content
-
Identify where brand trust needs strengthening, not just where content needs updating, a real mindset shift from how the SEO industry has worked in previous years.
This data sits alongside rankings and traffic, not instead of them.
What good SEO reporting looks like now
The bottom line
In 2026, SEO is not dead.
But lazy reporting is.
If you own SEO, this framework helps you prioritise properly.
If an agency is managing your SEO, this is how you hold them to account.
Measure visibility, but more importantly, measure business impact.
