How to connect Google Search Console to an SEO tool

Connecting Google Search Console to SEO by Zaweba takes three things: switching on the Search Console API in Settings, entering your own OAuth client ID and secret for a Desktop app, and pressing Connect. The connection is read-only, so the app can read your performance data but can't change anything in your Search Console account. A Disconnect button ends it whenever you like.

If you would rather not set up an API connection, you don't have to. Search Console export files dropped on the Logs and Search Console page give the same kind of analysis.

Why your own client

Most online tools connect to Search Console through the tool maker's account. SEO by Zaweba doesn't have one. It is free, offline software with no account and no cloud, so the connection goes through an OAuth client that you create in your own Google Cloud project. That keeps the link between your PC and Google directly, with nobody in the middle. The keys are stored encrypted for your Windows account.

Setting it up

In Google's developer console, create a project if you don't already have one, enable the Search Console API for it, and create an OAuth client of the Desktop app type. Google gives you a client ID and a client secret.

Back in SEO by Zaweba, open Settings and find the optional integrations. Switch on the Search Console API, paste in the client ID and secret, and press Connect. Google then asks you to sign in with the Google account that has access to the property and to allow read-only access. Once you accept, the app shows that it is connected.

What you get

With the connection in place, the app can read performance data without you downloading CSV exports each time. The analysis is the same as from an export: page two quick wins at positions 11 to 20, queries with weak click-through for their position, and queries where a different page from the one you intended is ranking. Those lists feed straight into the decisions you make in the guided audit.

Using exports instead

If the developer console feels like too much, use the exports. Download the Performance report from Search Console (a zip with Queries.csv and Pages.csv), and drop it on the Logs and Search Console page, then click Import. The Links and Crawl stats exports add top linked pages, linking sites, anchors and crawl stats. The page explains where each export lives in Search Console. Files are recognised by their headers, so you don't have to rename anything.

Many people start with exports and only set up the API once they find themselves importing every week.

Keeping it tidy

Disconnect when you no longer need the link, for example if you stop working on a client's site. You can also revoke the app's access from your Google account settings, which is worth doing when you hand a site over.

The rest of SEO by Zaweba never needs Google's API. It never contacts Google search at all; the results pages it analyses are ones you paste in. The Search Console connection is optional, off by default, and limited to reading data you already own.