Measuring Local SEO in 2026 | Mouthy Marketing

Local SEO reporting has become a lot messier. AI answers take clicks that used to go to websites, automated tools inflate your impressions, and some of the numbers in Search Console don’t mean what they used to.

If you’re judging your local SEO by impressions or average position alone, you could be getting the wrong picture.

Here’s how we approach measurement for Sussex businesses in 2026, with step-by-step instructions you can follow yourself.

Why Your Click-Through Rate Might Look Terrible

There are two common reasons.

The first is AI Overviews. An Ahrefs study of December 2025 data found that the click-through rate for the top-ranking result fell by 58% when an AI Overview appeared. If your pages rank well for research-style questions, fewer people may click even though you’re visible.

The second is automated queries. Rank-tracking tools and AI tools run searches all day long, and some of those searches can end up counted as impressions. They inflate your impressions without any chance of a click, so your click-through rate looks worse than it is.

How to Spot Automated Queries in Search Console

You can’t remove these queries from your data, but you can find them and filter them out to get a clearer view. Here’s how:

In Search Console, open Performance, then Search results, and select the Queries tab.
Sort by impressions and scroll through the list, looking for queries no person would type, such as strings that start with a number and a colon, oddly spelled phrases or long questions that end with “my location is United Kingdom”.
Click “Add filter”, choose Query, then choose “Custom (regex)” to filter by pattern.
Set the filter to “Doesn’t match regex” and enter a pattern that catches the oddities you found, such as ^[0-9]+: for queries that start with a number and a colon.
Check the Devices tab as well. Local searches usually lean towards mobile, so a heavy desktop bias can be another sign of automated traffic.

Keep the same filters each time you report, so you’re comparing like with like.

How Search Console Counts AI Results

Google includes AI Mode clicks and impressions in your standard Performance report, so you can’t separate them there. A click on a link inside AI Mode counts as a normal click.

In June 2026, Google added a Generative AI report to Search Console. It shows how often your pages appear in AI Overviews and AI Mode. It shows impressions only, with no clicks or average position, and Google has admitted that reporting for AI search is still limited.

To find it, open Performance and look for Generative AI in the left-hand menu. You can break the data down by page, country, device and date. Note which pages appear most often, because they show you what Google trusts you to answer.

Position is the trickiest number of all. An AI Overview is counted as a single position, so a page cited inside it can show a high average position without earning a click.

Waves on a rocky beach with chalk cliffs and a striped lighthouse

Track Your Google Business Profile Separately

Many local customers never visit your website. They call straight from the map pack. The Performance section of your Google Business Profile shows calls, direction requests, website clicks and the searches people used to find you.

To see profile visits in your website analytics as well, add tracking parameters to the website link on your profile. That way, visits from your profile show up separately instead of being lumped in with other Google traffic.

What to Track Instead

Here’s what we’d focus on:

Track enquiries, calls and bookings, and where each one came from.
Set up your enquiry form submissions as key events in Google Analytics 4.
Track clicks from search to the pages that sell your services.
Track Google Business Profile actions, such as calls, direction requests and website visits.
Track rankings for a short list of searches that bring you paying customers.
Check the Generative AI report as a sign of AI visibility.
Ask every new customer how they found you.

Look at Trends, Not Single Weeks

Search data moves around, especially while Google is rolling out an update. Compare months, not days, and compare the same period year on year where you can. If something changes, check whether an update was rolling out at the time before you change anything on your site.

Keep It Simple

The best measure of local SEO is still whether the phone rings. Everything else is there to explain why it did or didn’t.

If you’d like clearer reporting on your own local SEO, you can find out more about our local SEO services in Sussex.

Measuring AI visibility brings us full circle. If you’re starting from the beginning, read how AI search decides which Sussex businesses to recommend.

Measuring Local SEO in 2026: What to Track and What to Ignore