Are the days now gone that when you hear the whisper of an update from Google you frantically start searching the internet for answers, wasting hours of your valuable time only to find opinions and rumors about what is happening.

Well maybe it is, if everything I am seeing in the my Google webmaster tools account is any indication of the direction Google wants to take.

Detailed Search Queries In Google Webmaster Tools

Yesterday I logged in to my webmaster account to see a very interesting development in the way Google displays information. Have a look at the screen shot below to see what I mean.

As you can see above Google is now placing a divider line in the search queries time line to tell you exactly when an update has happened and even what the update has affected. There is also a new amount of data about single pages on your site.

Looking at the screen shot above you can see what position your page is and even the CTR ( Click Through Rate). This information if it’s up to date and accurate meaning not days behind as it has been in the past will be extremely valuable in being able to see how your site is performing in the search index and fix any problems you may encounter along the way.

As a scenario what if you logged in today and saw that one of your pages had dropped in the listings by 100 or more places. You can now instantly react to the issue and fix any changes you may have made to that page or do more research as to why it has happened. Unlike in the past where it was mostly guess-work and usually your whole site had been effected before you realized something was wrong.

More Actionable Metrics

However if the rumors are true then this will be a huge benefit to every webmaster not only to track performance of single pages but be able to identify high performing pages as well as those not doing so well allowing you to tweak and change to get better results. At the end of the day it is going to give you a much bigger picture of how users are finding your website and what search queries they are using.

Follow this link to read the full announcement from Google.

Do you use Google webmaster tools to monitor your website, if so do you trust the information that you receive and do you think these new benefits will be a benefit to you.