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Search analytics contain valuable information.
Sure, it’s nice to see what pages on your site people visit, but the search terms they use?
That’s even better.
When someone searches on your site, they’re telling you exactly what they’re looking for.
Using a list of the top search queries performed on your site, you can rapidly optimize your site to provide better content and give visitors what they want.
The plugins listed below can help.
Best WordPress search analytics plugins
Each plugin below gives you a way to track search terms, and oftentimes, additional analytics and search engine customization.
Here are my top recommendations for the best search analytics plugins for WordPress.
1. Independent Analytics
Plugin Description
While it’s not an obvious choice, Independent Analytics is actually the best plugin to add search analytics to WordPress. As a free and lightweight analytics solution, it lets you track all of your views and visitors, and there’s a special difference between it and other tools like Google Analytics.
Independent Analytics has deep integration with WordPress unlike any other analytics plugin, so it can show you detailed information about your pages alongside the metrics it records. For example, you can use the filters to view only your Search pages, which gives you a list of all the search terms used on your site.
You can adjust the date range however you want and sort the results to find the most and least popular search terms on your site. Additionally, the results you see in Independent Analytics are more accurate than other plugins because spam searches from bots get blocked. If you don’t have an analytics tool that you like yet, you’ll love this plugin for both its search analytics and general-purpose web analytics.
2. Ivory Search
Plugin Description
Ivory Search will be an awesome new plugin for your site if you want to completely overhaul the search engine on your site.
The default search engine in WordPress doesn’t provide the best results, nor does it include any customization options. Ivory Search makes the results more relevant and lets you control how the search engine works. It even lets you create multiple new search engines. For example, you can create a search bar that will only find images, or one that only returns posts. You’ll get a shortcode to output the custom search bar wherever you want.
As you’d expect, this plugin also includes basic search analytics, so you can see what terms your visitors are searching for. In the end, this is an awesome plugin if you want simple search analytics and a lot more control over your website’s search engine.
3. SearchWP
Plugin Description
SearchWP is a premium search bar plugin and it’s been around for many years. This means you’ll get a robust and full-featured search engine solution for your WordPress site.
What makes this plugin awesome is its ability to find information on your site and use it for search results. For example, it can find text from custom fields and WooCommerce product descriptions. In fact, it can even find text in PDFs and documents uploaded to your site. There’s nothing else like it.
The analytics dashboard is also really nice in SearchWP. It shows you a graph of daily searches for each custom search engine you create. You can also see every search term ranked by the number of times it was used, and a list of terms that didn’t provide any results on your site. These insights are extremely valuable for generating new content and including important terms in your existing pages.
4. Relevanssi
Plugin Description
Relevanssi is another plugin that will optimize the WordPress search engine and includes search analytics too.
When it comes to search analytics, Relevanssi has some handy reporting features. You’ll find a new User searches menu added under your Dashboard menu item where you can track the terms that have been searched for. Additionally, Relevanssi can tell you how many results appeared for the search. Likewise, there is a separate column for search terms that yielded zero results. This information can be extremely useful for editing both your content and your search engine.
As far as the search engine goes, the coolest feature offered by Relevanssi is fuzzy searching. Normally, WordPress will look for a complete phrase and only return those results. Relevanssi is capable of finding results with a complete phrase and ranking them first but also including results that matched just one or more of the words in the search query.
The only thing I don’t love about this plugin is its interface, which is very text-heavy and takes some time to configure. Besides that, it’s an excellent plugin, especially since it’s entirely free.
5. FiboSearch
Plugin Description
If you want an Ajax search plugin for WooCommerce, you can’t go wrong with FiboSearch.
This plugin will let customers search for products and pull up suggestions as they type. It’s extremely customizable and will improve the profitability of your store by making your products easy to find.
While FiboSearch doesn’t include its own analytics, it does have integration with Google Analytics. This means you’ll be able to find the WordPress search terms used by visitors inside your GA dashboard.
While FiboSearch isn’t the best search analytics plugin, it’s one of the best search bar plugins for WooCommerce. Give it a try if you have an eCommerce store and want better product filters and search.
Which search analytics plugin is best?
If you’re unsure which plugin will be best for your site, here are a few final tips.
Independent Analytics gives you WordPress search term analytics and a whole lot more. If you are looking for a free Google Analytics alternative, or you just want more data, give it a try today.
Ivory Search is probably the best free plugin to optimize your site’s search engine, and it also comes with a simple analytics dashboard.
If you’re looking for something a little more advanced, you might enjoy the premium SearchWP plugin, which includes custom search engines, Ajax search, and search term reports.
Regardless of which WordPress search analytics plugin you choose, you’ll have a lot more data to work with than you do now.
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