Google Search Console Social Data Is Finally Here

Today's post is about an update to Google Search Console. We are now going to get data from social platforms coming into Google Search Console. But there are a couple of things to be aware of.

What this data actually shows

The first thing to understand is exactly what data this is going to show. Right from the announcement: site owners and creators will now understand how their social and video posts perform on Google Search and Discover. That line is really important, because this is not data coming in from your YouTube channel telling you how many times your video got clicked on YouTube.

This is your video showing up in a Google search, someone clicking it, and that data coming into Google Search Console.

To make it clear, if I search something like how to shell a lobster and look at the results, there's going to be a videos section. If your video shows up there and you get a click, or even an impression, it's going to come into Google Search Console. You've got your AI overview, and you've got short videos as a section as well. Any one of these, if you get an impression or a click, it's going to show up.

It only covers four platforms for now

The other thing to keep in mind is that this only applies to four social platforms for now, as per the announcement:

• Instagram
• TikTok
• X
• YouTube

The reports you're going to get

There are going to be a few reports associated with this within Google Search Console:

• A performance report. This is very similar to what you already see in Google Search Console and are used to. It shows your clicks, your impressions, and additional metrics.
• Query data. This is going to be highly actionable, because you'll be able to see the search terms that associate with your different social assets.
• An insights report. This one helps you make sense of all the data coming in. Google's example screenshot shows a report noting that YouTube content had 17,800 clicks in the last 28 days on Google Search, and I'm sure there are plenty of areas you can click into for further insights.

They also say you can export the data. Personally, I'm hoping the Google Search Console MCP that hooks into Claude Code will give us access to this, because it would be really nice to just talk to Claude Code and get insights on the data coming in here.

How to sign up, and when you'll see it

Here's how you sign up. In the top left of Google Search Console, where you'd click to see a dropdown of the properties in your account, you go to the bottom and click Add Property like you normally would. From there you should get the option to add any one of those four social platforms, or maybe multiple.

When will you actually see it? That's kind of unpredictable. I'm not seeing it for any clients at my agency yet, and I'm not seeing it in any of my personal accounts yet either. Some people I follow on LinkedIn do see it already, and they have pretty sizable social followings, so maybe that's why they got it first. Google says it's rolling out over the next few weeks, so be on the lookout.

The marketing pinball machine

On that topic, I want to talk a little more about socials and how important these are. We've kind of gone away from the traditional marketing funnel with top, middle, and bottom. People don't follow such a rigid, structured path anymore.

The folks at SparkToro refer to this more as a marketing pinball machine, where people bounce around from social platforms to websites, all over the place. Here's one way it might play out:

• Someone notices something while scrolling on Instagram.
• They hop over to YouTube and watch a couple of videos to learn more.
• They go to Reddit to see what people are saying and get that human-to-human trust building.
• They land on a brand, do a Google search, and convert.

That's just one way it can play out. If you really focus on your own path toward buying a product or booking a service, it is all over the place. So it's becoming more and more important for businesses to get on social platforms.

It's a heavy lift, but it pays off

That's really prohibitive. It's difficult, especially the video platforms. It's a heavy lift, and it's hard for businesses and brands to be consistent with it. But it helps a lot.

If I search something like build a retaining wall uphill and look at the AI overview and the first traditional search result, I see a video from SRM Contracting. Click into that channel and this guy has well over 63,000 subscribers on YouTube, and his most popular videos have millions of views. A good portion of those millions won't become converting customers, but some portion will, and it's certainly helping his brand exposure.

His website has a domain rating from Ahrefs of just one, and yet that YouTube channel is one of his primary assets on digital.

The site is nothing to write home about. We can assume his PageRank isn't very strong and his authority isn't really there, so the website isn't doing him any favors. The channel is carrying the load.

Look at a giant in the local space, Roger Wakefield Plumbing, and he's got 725,000 subscribers on YouTube alone, plus one heck of a platform spread. He's on Facebook, Instagram, pretty much anywhere you look. But he's been working on this. His oldest video is nine years old, so he's been putting in the effort for almost a decade, and he really understands the social game.

This isn't just for local businesses

Something else that's really interesting is that this doesn't just apply to local businesses. Ten months ago I made a post about the Edward Jones YouTube channel and how I thought it was really under-nurtured. In another post a year ago, I compared them to one of their competitors, Schwab, and showed the difference in YouTube as an initiative.

At the time I posted, Edward Jones had around 11,000 subscribers. They now have 12,600. Charles Schwab, in that same timeframe, went from a little under 500,000 subscribers to 545,000. Schwab was way bigger to begin with, they've been investing much more heavily into YouTube, and it's paying off: tons of brand exposure, a lot of trust, and way more growth in that period.

Do what we did as young SEOs

I'm really bullish on YouTube, and this Google Search Console update just got me thinking about social media and how, as marketers, we need to find ways to convince our clients to get on social platforms, make consistency as easy as possible, and guide them through the whole thing.

We also need to challenge ourselves, because social is a different game. There's some overlap between traditional search on a website and social, but there's a whole lot that is completely different. So if you haven't yet, I'd advise doing the same thing we did as younger SEOs in years past. We started our own websites, we experimented, and we gained our own learnings.

This is an exciting update from Google, and they're recognizing the importance of social media. As marketers, I think it's important to help our clients expand far beyond just websites and Google Business Profiles so they can reach their full potential and pull ahead of the competition.