Which software do you use for monthly reporting to clients for your agency?

[John Vuong]

Currently we use a mixture of Bright Local and SEMRush for reporting to clients. I would like to ask if there are other tools other agencies are using. Pros/cons to them? Ease of integration to GA?

Anyone using MOZ or SEO Powersuites?

 

[JoyHawkins]

I use the following tools internally and only share charts/graphs from them on client reports if it makes sense and relates to what we're trying to achieve for them:

Bright Local
SEM Rush
LocalFalcon.com
Ahrefs
Data Studio (importing GMB data from SuperMetrics)

The reports we send customers are completely custom and are hand-done every month.

 

[Digitaldar]

For traffic and conversions, I use Analytics Edge with Excel to pull data from GA or Google Search Console. I pull raw data, then pivot table it and chart it. I love it because I can do month over month as well as year over year. I can share a screenshot if anyone is interested.

 

[Genna_Local_SEO]

We use a combo pack similar to what Joy uses.

Agency Analytics
Ahrefs
GA/GSC
BrightLocal
call tracking metrics with whatever tools we're using.

 

[Greg Schueler]

I previously used Raven Tools.
They were pretty good and made very nice and customized reports.
They then one day they raised pricing and lowered the number of reports so I looked around at alternatives.

I ended up using Swydo.
It combines GA, WMT, Adwords, Call Rail (which was a big factor for me that Raven didn't include) and several other sources. I customize each report for the client's specifics and automate it to report each week/month.

Google Analytics.
On a few clients I just use a custom dashboard in Google Analytics and have it email me monthly reports of the basics.

 

[Scott ClientClicks]

We use a combination of Brightlocal, Ahrefs, Call Tracking Metrics and Adwords reports

 

[CarrieHill]

I use BrightLocal, Google Analytics, SEMRush and the Google Brand Score tool.

I've been using the Scoring Your Brand Page at Google - Local University tool to give clients a baseline on how we're doing in branded search, then giving updates as we complete work. I find it handy to not only create a "to do" list for clients (or include in our audits) it's a great way to show growth and screenshot changes to branded search.

SMBs see something like 60%+ branded search - so making sure the search for a brand is super saturated with client info ensures that contact, and hopefully conversion.

 

[Rich Owings]

I primarily use GA, GSC & GMB Insights, and then I use PowerPoint to create a PDF report. It's easy to insert graphics and add comments.

 

[Phil Rozek]

None. I do 3 things instead:

1. Once every couple months I do a deep dive in Google Analytics and tell my client what I found.

2. I constantly ask, "How's business?" and press for specifics on what kind of leads my client has gotten.

3. I send an extremely clear one-page summary of the work I and my helpers did in the previous month.

 

[Tim Colling]

None. I do 3 things instead:

1. Once every couple months I do a deep dive in Google Analytics and tell my client what I found.

2. I constantly ask, "How's business?" and press for specifics on what kind of leads my client has gotten.

3. I send an extremely clear one-page summary of the work I and my helpers did in the previous month.

That's almost exactly the same as what I do.

I have recurring video meetings with my clients, most of them every three or four weeks, and in those meetings we talk about how their business is doing, new ideas to try, and occasionally, how their SEO metrics are doing.

I also give them links to the online tools we use for SEO metrics via a page on our project management system, Freedcamp, to which they have access. On that page we have links to an external page on BrightLocal where we have a "dashboard" with all of their important metrics info. We also have links there to their Google Analytics page and to their Google Search Console page. To be honest, they don't seem to use those links on their own very often, but I think it's important to give them the ability to do so in order to maintain an atmosphere of complete transparency with them, regarding the results that we're producing for them.

 

[mborgelt]

We currently use Swydo and it is great! The only downside is that it doesn't really sync with Facebook's Business Manager but there are workarounds for that. It has great historical analysis and several different ways to present data.

 

[MattPelkey]

I also give them links to the online tools we use for SEO metrics via a page on our project management system, Freedcamp, to which they have access. On that page we have links to an external page on BrightLocal where we have a "dashboard" with all of their important metrics info. We also have links there to their Google Analytics page and to their Google Search Console page. To be honest, they don't seem to use those links on their own very often, but I think it's important to give them the ability to do so in order to maintain an atmosphere of complete transparency with them, regarding the results that we're producing for them.

How do you like Freedcamp, Tim? I'm looking to try out a new project management system.

Anyone using MOZ or SEO Powersuites?

Does anyone here have experience with SEO Powersuite? Thoughts on it?

 

[Tim Colling]

@MattPelkey - You asked how I like FreedCamp

I like it a lot. We've used it for a year or two.

I am using a paid account, which means that I am paying to use some of the premium modules. It works well for my agency's purposes. One of the things that I like about it a lot is that I can see resource utilization across two or more projects, instead of just one at a time like in Trello (at least, the last time that I looked at Trello).

 

[JasonKhoo]

I use the following tools internally and only share charts/graphs from them on client reports if it makes sense and relates to what we're trying to achieve for them:

Bright Local
SEM Rush
LocalFalcon.com
Ahrefs
Data Studio (importing GMB data from SuperMetrics)

The reports we send customers are completely custom and are hand-done every month.

I never heard of LocalFalcon before, but @JoyHawkins it sure is great!

How accurate do you find the tool? I found that it mostly returns what I expect, but sometimes it conflicts with BrightLocal or if I use the Ad Preview tool

 

[John Vuong]

Thank you for providing some great insight on how my agency can improve in terms of transparency and insights for clients.

We currently do monthly checkups on each client via phone and also monthly newsletters and ranking reports. We have looked into real time reporting however I'm not sure if that is something even necessary. I know some of my competitors offer that and was wondering if anyone in this forum have considered or used tools for that purpose?

 

[HoosierBuff]

We use google docs, and we cut and paste images from our rank tracker, GA, and a reputation monitoring tool to talk about business listings and reviews. We have an opening page which is narrative, about one page long, talking about the numbers and what we did. On page 2 we put a list of what we accomplished this past month.

For the GA stuff, we mostly show Total traffic MoM, Organic Traffic, and traffic by source. Occasionally, if the story warrants it, we will pull in some other data, WMT, keywords, whatever.

They are all done by hand - which is time consuming. It may be 30-45 minutes per report. I'd love to cut that down, but, don't see how. The Cutting and pasting of data only takes like 2-5 minutes, the real work is the narrative text, and I don't think we can get away with cutting that out (though I'd have to guess that fewer than 25% of our customers ever read the reports).

About 25% of our customers want to have a call to discuss this past month, which sometimes, there isn't that much content to talk about "traffic was up, we worked on your title tags and H1's, and improved site speed".

Sometimes I see the canned reports my clients have been getting from other providers, and they are very much canned data, with dumb non local keywords. They stink.

Also, we use Trello to keep track of our work, we have a good number clients, and using trello is helpful to keep track of everyhting

 

[JoyHawkins]

@JasonKhoo I find it mostly accurate. If it disagrees with BrightLocal, I'd say BrightLocal is more accurate.

 

[Yan Gilbert]

Bright Local uses the zip code center, and Local Falcon uses the location's exact geo-coordinate as the center of the grid. If the business is located near the zip code center, then the results will match up well. But if the business is located at the edge of a zip code, and there is some distance between the two, then Local Falcon will have a different, more exact result.

Both tools are returning accurate results, but they are checking the results from different locations.

For example, this is zip code 30606. Its center is the black dot which I have added.

Using Local Falcon, you can pinpoint the exact location that Google says is the center of the zip code as well by just entering the zip code btw.

If a business is at the edge of the zip code, it will be a few miles away from the actual center in this example, which is where Bright Local is scanning from. If there are many businesses with the same category in that space, then the results will be less accurate.

Local Falcon, and the other geo-location rank checkers are more accurate since they scan from the actual location of the business.

Here's an overview of the lawyer offices in zip code 30606

This is Bright Local's results from it's free scanner for 30606

..makes sense as Jeff Field & Associates is the closest to the center mark (plus seems to have a strong listing)

You'll see that with Local Falcon, we have the same result of the #1 ranking in that spot for that business.

In fact, if you click on the Ranking Pin which is almost exactly the zip center point to get the detail popup in LF, you will see this:

which matches exactly what BL results are.

However, Thomas A Camp which is still in the zip of 30606 (at the lower left edge of the zip code) would see a much poorer ranking from BL (The 2nd page of BL maps result never works for me as it does not keep the zip code intact so I can't screenshot) Someone else can check and add possibly.

But with LF, you will see a much clearer picture of why BL and LF would give different results.

Local Falcon ignores zip codes, because checking by zip code center has no actual meaning to ranking. Proximity to the business does.

Sometimes Local Falcon will glitch because an address is not standard for example, or the API hiccups for some rare reason, so if you see a large discrepancy between Bright Local and Local Falcon, probably BL is more accurate. But if you see small differences of rank order placement, it's because BL is scanning from a point that is further away from the business location.

 

[HoosierBuff]

This zipcode thing is such a good discussion. I think it can really result in a bunch of issues for tracking based on what was said above.

Plus, you have to consider that whomever is pulling your zipcode based data, they may decide, or Google may decide, to change where they thing the center of the zipcode is, and that would change the results altogether.

 

[vivekrpatel]

We use following tools to prepare chart and PDF.

SEM Rush - Ranking report
Ahrefs - To incorporate new keywords which were not previously in Google SERP result
Data Studio - Adwords reports, GA and GMB reports