The Dashboard is most valuable when it becomes part of your regular SEO workflow rather than something you check occasionally. This guide outlines recommended review cadences, tips for getting the most from each section, and common pitfalls to avoid.
Recommended Review Schedule
Consistency matters more than frequency. Pick a cadence that works for your workload and stick with it.
Daily Check-In (5 Minutes)
A brief daily scan keeps you on top of urgent issues and prevents small problems from becoming big ones.
Open the Dashboard and scan the Needs Attention section. If anything is flagged, decide whether it requires immediate action or can wait for your weekly review.
Glance at the Activity Feed for the top three to five events. Look for anything unexpected — a significant ranking drop, a sudden spike in new backlinks, or a completed audit with a changed health score.
Check the Exchange Status Widget for any pending requests that need a response.
That's it. Five minutes, three sections, and you're confident nothing critical is being missed.
Weekly Review (15–30 Minutes)
A weekly review is where you shift from reactive monitoring to proactive optimization.
Review the Portfolio Metrics Cards and compare them to last week. Are totals trending up or down? Is the Average Domain Rating stable?
Check the Website Summary Table and sort by different columns to identify outliers — the best performers, the weakest links, and the most outdated data.
Run fresh analyses on your priority websites. Focus on the ones flagged in Priority Cards as "Growth Opportunities" or "At Risk."
Review the Smart Next Action recommendation and decide whether to act on it this week.
Address any remaining Needs Attention items that weren't urgent enough for your daily check-in.
Monthly Review (60 Minutes)
The monthly review is your strategic planning session.
Assess portfolio-level trends. Are you gaining or losing backlinks overall? Is traffic growing across your portfolio, or concentrated in a few sites?
Review Priority Card changes. Have any websites moved between categories since last month? A site moving from "Growth Opportunities" to "Top Performers" validates your strategy; one moving to "At Risk" means something needs to change.
Audit your tracked websites. Remove any domains you're no longer managing. Add any new ones that need monitoring.
Check Usage & Credits. Are you consistently using your full allowance? Running out early? Adjust your plan or usage patterns accordingly.
Plan next month's priorities. Based on what the Dashboard is telling you, decide which websites and projects deserve the most attention in the coming weeks.
Tips for Power Users
Keep your portfolio lean. Every website you track adds data to your Dashboard. If half your tracked sites have stale data from months ago, your portfolio metrics become misleading. Regularly prune inactive domains.
Use sorting as an investigation tool. The Website Summary Table isn't just for browsing — it's for asking questions. Sort by Estimated Traffic to find underperformers. Sort by Last Analyzed to find neglected sites. Sort by Referring Domains to compare backlink diversity.
Don't ignore Recent Wins. It's easy to focus only on problems, but acknowledging progress keeps morale high — especially when managing SEO for clients who want to see positive results. Use Recent Wins as material for client reports and team updates.
Respond to exchange requests promptly. The Exchange Status Widget is easy to overlook, but timely responses build your reputation in the Backlink Exchange system. A strong reputation means better exchange opportunities over time.
Let Smart Next Action guide your focus. When you're unsure where to start, follow the AI recommendation. It's based on your actual portfolio data and is often better at identifying high-impact actions than a manual review.
Common Pitfalls to Avoid
Adding websites and forgetting to analyze them. A website with no analysis data is invisible to most Dashboard features. Always run at least a backlink analysis and site audit after adding a new domain.
Ignoring the Needs Attention section. Alerts exist for a reason. Letting flagged issues accumulate defeats the purpose of the early warning system and can lead to bigger problems down the line.
Over-refreshing data. Running analyses daily for every website is rarely necessary and burns through your credits quickly. Match your refresh frequency to the pace of change — most sites benefit from weekly or biweekly refreshes. High-priority or volatile sites may warrant more frequent checks.
Treating metrics as absolute truths. Dashboard metrics like Estimated Traffic and Domain Rating are estimates and indicators, not exact measurements. Use them to spot trends and compare domains, but don't make decisions based on small fluctuations in a single number.
Neglecting your Top Performers. It's natural to focus on problem areas, but your strongest websites also need maintenance. A Top Performer that stops getting attention can gradually slide toward "At Risk" as competitors catch up.