Creating SEO Reports Your Clients Will Actually Understand

📖 Introduction

Most SEO professionals dread report day—and so do many of their clients. Reports are often bloated with metrics, overloaded with charts, and written in a language only Googlebot might appreciate. But it doesn’t have to be this way.

A clear, simple SEO report can do more than inform—it can inspire trust, highlight progress, and support retention. Whether you’re a freelancer, agency, or in-house marketer, this guide will help you create reports your clients will actually look forward to receiving.

🧠 Understand Your Client’s Goals First

Before deciding what data to present, ask yourself: what matters most to the client?

• 🎯 A local café might care about Google Business clicks and local map visibility
• 🛒 An eCommerce store wants to see traffic to product pages and conversions
• 🏗️ A B2B company may be more interested in organic leads and form submissions

Focus your reporting around business outcomes, not vanity metrics.

📊 Key Metrics to Include in a Client-Friendly SEO Report

Stick to what’s relevant and helpful:

• 📈 Organic traffic trends (month-over-month & year-over-year)
• 🔑 Top-performing keywords (and movement)
• 📄 Best-performing pages (with clicks & impressions)
• 📍 Google Business Profile performance (for local clients)
• 🚦Technical health overview (page speed, Core Web Vitals)
• 🔗 Backlink growth and referring domains
• 💡 Key recommendations and next steps

📉 What to Leave Out

Don’t include every metric you can think of. Too much data creates confusion and overwhelms non-technical readers.

• ❌ Bounce rate without context
• ❌ Crawl budget and server log summaries
• ❌ Pages indexed vs. crawled vs. canonicalised (unless necessary)
• ❌ Jargon like LSI, TF-IDF, or crawl depth charts

🧾 Format: Keep It Clean and Scannable

• 📋 Start with a 1-page summary or dashboard
• 🧭 Use headings and short paragraphs to guide attention
• 📸 Include screenshots or visuals when helpful (Search Console, GA4, SEMrush)
• 📤 Deliver reports as branded PDFs or shared dashboards (e.g. Looker Studio)

🎯 Explain What the Numbers Mean

Numbers alone don’t tell a story. Add 1–2 sentences of explanation per section:

• 📝 “Organic traffic grew 22% compared to April due to better keyword targeting on your Services page.”
• 📝 “Your keyword ‘plumber in Dublin’ rose from position 12 to 4—now on Page 1.”

Use plain English. Avoid technical speak. It’s a conversation, not a data dump.

📅 Reporting Frequency: What’s Ideal?

• 🗓️ Monthly: Great for retainer clients, shows steady progress
• 📅 Quarterly: Suitable for long-term SEO work or strategic clients
• 📞 Weekly check-ins: Better as quick summaries or verbal updates

🛠️ Tools That Make Reporting Easier

• 📊 Google Looker Studio (formerly Data Studio) – automated dashboards
• 📈 Ahrefs/SEMrush – ranking & backlink reports
• 📬 GA4 – audience and engagement metrics
• 📌 SEO PowerSuite or AgencyAnalytics – all-in-one reporting tools

💬 What the Experts Are Saying

• Wil Reynolds: “If a client can’t explain your SEO report to their boss, you’ve failed.”
• Areej AbuAli: “Reports should show impact, not just activity. Focus on outcomes.”
• Ross Simmonds: “Your SEO report is a retention tool. Make it beautiful, make it useful.”

✅ Conclusion

SEO reporting isn’t about showing off how much data you can collect—it’s about helping your client understand the value you bring. The best reports are clear, concise, and tied to business goals. When clients understand the impact, they’re more likely to trust you—and stick around.

Make your reports readable. Make them actionable. And above all, make them client-first.