Best SEO Forecasting Methods For Your Business

Are you not getting enough traffic to your website? Has the bounce rate on your website increased? Do you think your competitors are stealing traffic from your website?

Check your SEO efforts to see if your website is experiencing any problems. Every SEO strategy has an expiration date, and as search engines periodically change their algorithms and policies, it’s crucial to have fresh strategies. If your website is not producing excellent results, it may have an outdated SEO strategy.

Thorough SEO forecasting is crucial to producing a good SEO plan.

If you’re unfamiliar with it, SEO forecasting includes studying historical data to estimate future SEO results. The historical data can include parameters such as search volume, traffic, CTR, etc.

SEO forecasting can help you develop a personalized effective strategy.

What is SEO Forecasting?

Do you know that 68% of online experiences begin with search engines? Therefore, if your SEO performance is good, your likelihood of reaching potential users and providing good expertise rises.

SEO forecasting involves analyzing past and current data to predict a website's future performance. Two types of data are used to forecast SEO performance.

First-Party Historical Data

The first-party historical data includes data about your website’s performance. The first-party data includes parameters such as:

• Clicks
• CTR
• Conversion rate
• Average order value
• Traffic

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You can use tools like Google Analytics Tool and Google Search Console to collect first-party data.

Third-party Historical Data

Third-party historical data includes data related to your competitors. You can access this data via third-party tools. The following are the third-party data parameters necessary for a practical SEO forecast:

• Competitor’s traffic from organic channels.
• URLs that get this traffic
• Number of backlinks
• Keyword rankings

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Effective SEO forecasting helps project feasible goals. Thus, you can adjust your efforts and resources accordingly.

How to Forecast SEO Growth?

Before diving into the comprehensive SEO forecasting process, here are some key insights to mind:

1. You should not perform an SEO forecast if the website’s performance is rapidly fluctuating or is consistent.
2. An SEO forecast is unnecessary if your website is new or has undergone significant changes.

Keep in mind that SEO forecasting is never completely accurate. As there are several dynamic factors, such as search engine algorithms and competitor’s strategies, and it is impossible to forecast SEO growth precisely. But, with the help of previous data, recent trends, and powerful tools, you can make a calculated and informed guess.

According to George Rosenbaum, the Founder of Rosenbaum & Rosenbaum, “There is a big difference between planning for a completely new project, like deciding whether to create and improve a new website in a specific area, and using predictive strategies for a project that already exists. The first option will not have any historical data for your forecasts, while the second option will provide multiple data sources and metrics for a more accurate forecast.”

Now, let’s move on to the SEO forecasting process:

1. Forecast Keyword Search Volume
2. Gather Historical Data
3. Analyze Your Competitors
4. Predict Website Performance and Traffic
5. Leverage SEO Tools to Automate Predictions
6. Predict Seasonal Trends
7. Forecast Ups and Downs During Core Updates

1. Forecast Keyword Search Volume

The first way to forecast SEO for your website is to analyze keyword search volume and CTR. That will give you an estimate of traffic, leads, and conversions.

However, it will depend on your website's targeted keywords and the ones you want to rank for. A more refined forecast will also include analyzing keywords for every page of your website, as each one has different goals.

Here’s how to do it:

• Find out the ranking data and search volume of the keywords.

First, filter out all the keywords for which your websites already rank and the ones for which you want to rank. You can list them using Google Search Console and Google Analytics.

Once you have a well-filtered list of keywords, select the target keywords based on your current goals and check their search volumes. Third-party tools like SE Ranking and SEMrush can be used here.

• Estimating the traffic

To do this, you have to learn about the CTR of the website and use the formula:

Estimated monthly traffic = total keyword search volume * average CTR

You can check the Google Analytics Acquisition reports for the average CTR. That will help you determine how many users will land on your website.

For example, one of your target pages has a focus keyword like WordPress gamification, and the page has a search volume of about 5000 and is currently ranked 10th. You want to rank it eighth. According to historical data, the average CTR of that position is 1%.

The estimated monthly traffic will be 5000*1% = 50 monthly visits.

2. Gather Historical Data

Historical data can help forecast future SEO performance. However, some factors can affect the forecast, such as additional search engine updates, a competitor’s strategy, the period of the forecast, etc.

If there have been no changes in the search engine algorithm and competitor’s strategy, historical data can help you estimate the future performance parameters with around 80% probability.

These parameters include impressions, clicks, CTR (click-through rate), bounce rate, conversion rate, and average position. Google Search Console and Google Analytics provide this data in raw form. However, to gain insights, it needs to be cleaned and formatted.

It's worth nothing that some businesses use linear regression and other statistical models to forecast SEO performance. 

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The statistical forecasting method is helpful for people who prefer to see data from different viewpoints rather than just reading data points and making guesses.

3. Analyze Your Competitors

In business, competitors can be your friends as they can teach you how to grow. With a comprehensive analysis of your competitors, you can learn several things, such as

• Website’s performance, such as organic traffic, traffic by country, traffic cost, etc.
• Backlink profile
• Social media presence

Traffic forecast metrics include competitors who jumped to the top 10, new keywords that began ranking in the top 30, and new pages that have started ranking in the top 30.

You can refine your backlink strategies, content preferences, targeted keywords, and website pages for maximum SEO performance based on these factors. Tools like SE Ranking or Ahref can help you gather more data on your competitors and compare your future performance with theirs.

4. Predict Website Performance and Traffic

Predicting a website’s performance cannot be 100% accurate.

It can vary due to several dynamic factors. However, you can make an informed guess based on carefully analyzing historical data, competitor strategy, and algorithm changes. Other factors strengthening your decision are rank tracking, consumer insights, and analytics.

Businesses can use Python libraries like Pandas, TensorFlow, and PyTorch to ensure higher accuracy. These libraries can help find patterns in heaps of data to predict future traffic and performance more accurately.

5. Leverage SEO Tools to Automate Predictions

SEO tools are perfect partners when developing a new strategy or updating an existing one. Here are several tools that can assist in SEO forecasting:

• Google Analytics: Track organic traffic, conversion rate, and revenue data.
• Google Search Console: GSC allows you to track impressions, clicks, and CTR but not search volume data.
• SE Ranking: It helps in keyword research, traffic analytics, and competitor research. It automatically calculates the traffic potential of your website.
• Ahrefs: This tool tracks search traffic and keyword data for any URL. It can also forecast SEO for your site and competitors and research backlink profiles.
• SEO Clarity: It has automated SEO forecasting features by analyzing historical performance.

Note: Implementing a no-change forecast will give you an idea of how the website will perform if the SEO strategy is unchanged. This strategy can be used to set a baseline for future SEO projections.

6. Predict Seasonal Trends

Businesses that provide products and services should be aware of seasonal trends. For example, your competitors might offer customers hefty discounts during certain occasions, such as Halloween, Thanksgiving, Black Friday, and Christmas.

That can increase the search volume of certain specific keywords, which can, in turn, cause your website's traffic to soar proportionally. Therefore, factor in seasonal trends when forecasting your SEO growth.

Google Trends can help you spot upcoming trends. Here are some quick tips for predicting seasonal trends:

• Analyze the historical data of these holidays and festivals.
• Consider outliers and anomalies.
• Check for specific keyword search volume and competition.
• Localize your SEO if you have a physical store.

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Ignoring seasonal trends can lead to inaccurate predictions of your site's performance. Recognizing these factors is essential to creating a better basis for your forecast.

7. Forecast Ups and Downs During Core Updates

Core updates can significantly affect your SEO performance, either negatively or positively. Now, it's up to you to decide how to handle them.

The golden rule to forecast ups and downs is to consider, study, and apply all the search engine core updates. Besides, you can follow these tips:

• Forecast for both longer and shorter periods.
• Keep track of the holiday seasons.
• Try experimenting only on a part of the website, such as product or blog pages.
• Change the period of initial data.

Download the complete historical data from the organic search overview chart to make accurate predictions. If you want to use less data, you can edit the downloaded .csv files or choose data for a specific time frame, like one year. This method helps you work with more straightforward datasets while providing valuable insights for your SEO forecasts.

What to Do After SEO Forecasting?

Now that you have a solid understanding of forecasting SEO traffic, the next crucial step is implementing actions that effectively leverage this data. Sometimes, your forecast can guide your SEO strategy directly. You can identify which tasks to prioritize, optimize your content, and focus on the best keywords to attract traffic. 

“Sometimes, the data shows you need more resources to achieve your SEO goals. If this happens, you should prepare a strong case for requesting a larger budget,” said Mark Anderson, the Founder of Anderson Injury Lawyers. “Use your forecast to highlight potential results and benefits of investing more in SEO, such as creating more content, improving on-page optimization, or using helpful tools. Presenting this information clearly can help you secure the funding you need.”

Leverage SEO Forecasting to Make Accurate Predictions for Your Business

SEO forecasting is not a sure thing. Your forecast may not be 100% accurate, and multiple factors affect SEO performance, making perfect results impossible.

However, aligning your growth strategies with search engine algorithms, competitors' strategies, and historical data can help close in on the near-perfect results. If your competitor makes additional investments, the growth trajectory can shift drastically. Hence, you can follow as they do. The key is updating your strategies based on recent trends for effective SEO forecasting.

About the Author

Irina Weber Content Strategist at SE Ranking & LawRank

Irina Weber is a content strategist at SE Ranking and LawRank. She helps startups and enterprises create, promote, and distribute content and increase brand awareness. With over nine years of content marketing experience, she regularly contributes to media outlets like SEW, Adweek, SME, MarketingProfs, CMI, etc.

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