Google SEO APIs

Direct access to Google's own SEO data. Bridges the gap between crawl-based

analysis (existing claude-seo skills) and Google's real-time field data: actual

Chrome user metrics, real indexation status, search performance, and organic traffic.

All APIs are free. Setup requires a Google Cloud project with API key and/or

service account -- run /seo google setup for step-by-step instructions.

Prerequisites

Before executing any command, check credentials:

claude-seo run google_auth.py --check --json

Config file: ~/.config/claude-seo/google-api.json

{

  "service_account_path": "/path/to/service_account.json",

  "api_key": "<GOOGLE_API_KEY>",

  "default_property": "sc-domain:example.com",

  "ga4_property_id": "properties/123456789"

}

If missing, read references/auth-setup.md and walk the user through setup.

Credential Tiers

Always communicate the detected tier before running commands.

Quick Reference

PageSpeed + CrUX

/seo google pagespeed

Combined Lighthouse lab data + CrUX field data.

Script: claude-seo run pagespeed_check.py <url> --json

Reference: references/pagespeed-crux-api.md

Default: Both mobile + desktop strategies, all Lighthouse categories.

Output merges lab scores (point-in-time Lighthouse) with field data (28-day

Chrome user metrics). CrUX tries URL-level first, falls back to origin-level.

/seo google crux

CrUX field data only (no Lighthouse run). Faster.

Script: claude-seo run pagespeed_check.py <url> --crux-only --json

/seo google crux-history

25-week CrUX History trends. Shows whether CWV metrics are improving, stable, or degrading.

Script: claude-seo run crux_history.py <url> --json

Reference: references/pagespeed-crux-api.md

Output includes per-metric trend direction, percentage change, and weekly p75 values.

Search Console

/seo google gsc

Search Analytics: clicks, impressions, CTR, position for last 28 days.

Script: claude-seo run gsc_query.py --property <property> --json

Reference: references/search-console-api.md

Default: 28 days, dimensions=query,page, type=web, limit=1000.

Includes quick-win detection: queries at position 4-10 with high impressions.

The totals block comes from a separate dimensionless aggregate query because

query-level rows can omit anonymized low-volume traffic. Treat totals as

site-wide only when totals_complete is true. --limit caps total returned

dimension rows, not the size of every pagination request.

AI surfaces in GSC (2026):

• Generative AI performance report (launched 2026-06-03), a dedicated view of AI Overviews + AI Mode visibility. Impressions only (no clicks/CTR/position/query); dimensions Pages/Countries/Devices/Dates (Pacific Time); 1,000-row limit; newest data preliminary; a separate Discover gen-AI report also exists. Rolling out to a subset of properties.

• AI Mode already rolls into standard Performance totals (Web search type), clicks (external-link clicks in AI Mode) and impressions are counted in the normal report, so you cannot cleanly split "classic" vs "AI" traffic from totals. Use the Generative AI report for impressions-only AI visibility.

• Data-reliability caveat: a GSC logging error made impressions, CTR, and average position unreliable from 2025-05-13 to 2026-04-27 (clicks unaffected; fixed forward-only, no backfill). Treat impression/CTR/position trends spanning that window with caution; expect an apparent impressions drop after the fix.

/seo google inspect

URL Inspection: real indexation status from Google.

Script: claude-seo run gsc_inspect.py <url> --json

Returns: verdict (PASS/FAIL), coverage state, robots.txt status, indexing state,

page fetch state, canonical selection, mobile usability, rich results.

/seo google inspect-batch

Batch inspection from a file (one URL per line). Rate limited to 2,000/day per site.

Script: claude-seo run gsc_inspect.py --batch <file> --json

/seo google sitemaps

List submitted sitemaps with status, errors, warnings. Sitemap contents report

submitted counts only; URL Inspection API is the indexation truth for whether

specific URLs are indexed.

Script: claude-seo run gsc_query.py sitemaps --property <property> --json

Indexing API

/seo google index

Notify Google of a URL update.

Script: claude-seo run indexing_notify.py <url> --json

Reference: references/indexing-api.md

The Indexing API is officially for JobPosting and BroadcastEvent/VideoObject pages.

Always inform the user of this restriction. Daily quota: 200 publish requests.

/seo google index-batch

Batch submit URLs from a file. Tracks quota usage.

Script: claude-seo run indexing_notify.py --batch <file> --json

GA4 Traffic

/seo google ga4 [property-id]

Organic traffic report: daily sessions, users, pageviews, bounce rate, engagement.

Script: claude-seo run ga4_report.py --property <id> --json

Reference: references/ga4-data-api.md

Default: 28 days, filtered to Organic Search channel group.

GA4 "AI Assistants" channel (live ~2026-05-13): GA4 added a native AI Assistants Default Channel Group. Sessions referred by a recognized AI assistant get medium=ai-assistant. Google's recognized sources are ChatGPT, Gemini, Claude, Deepseek, Copilot, Grok and the channel excludes Google AI Overviews / AI Mode. Verify Perplexity separately if needed; unsupported sources may stay in Referral, and most AI sessions arrive referrer-less and fall into Direct, so this channel undercounts AI traffic. Forward-only, no backfill.

/seo google ga4-pages [property-id]

Top organic landing pages ranked by sessions.

Script: claude-seo run ga4_report.py --property <id> --report top-pages --json

YouTube (Video SEO)

Some third-party studies report a 0.737 correlation between YouTube mentions and AI visibility. Treat it as a methodology-dependent signal. Free, API key only.

/seo google youtube

Search YouTube for videos. Returns title, channel, views, likes, duration.

Script: claude-seo run youtube_search.py search "<query>" --json

Reference: references/youtube-api.md

Quota: 100 units per search (10,000 units/day free).

/seo google youtube-video

Detailed video info + tags + top 10 comments.

Script: claude-seo run youtube_search.py video <video_id> --json

Quota: 2 units (video details + comments).

NLP Content Analysis

Google NLP entity/sentiment output for internal content-quality checks. Do not treat it as Google E-E-A-T scoring.

/seo google nlp

Full NLP analysis: entities, sentiment, content classification.

Script: claude-seo run nlp_analyze.py --url <url> --json or --text "..."

Reference: references/nlp-api.md

Free tier: 5,000 units/month. Requires billing enabled on GCP project.

/seo google entities

Entity extraction only (faster, less quota).

Script: claude-seo run nlp_analyze.py --url <url> --features entities --json

Keyword Research (Google Ads)

Gold-standard keyword volume data. Requires Google Ads account.

/seo google keywords

Generate keyword ideas from seed terms.

Script: claude-seo run keyword_planner.py ideas "<seed>" --json

Reference: references/keyword-planner-api.md

Requires: Ads developer token + customer ID in config (Tier 3).

/seo google volume

Search volume for specific keywords (comma-separated).

Script: claude-seo run keyword_planner.py volume "<kw1>,<kw2>" --json

Supplementary

/seo google entity

Knowledge Graph entity check. Verifies brand presence.

Reference: references/supplementary-apis.md

Uses Knowledge Graph Search API with API key.

/seo google safety

Web Risk API check for malware/social engineering flags.

Reference: references/supplementary-apis.md

/seo google quotas

Display rate limits table. Read references/rate-limits-quotas.md.

Reports

After any analysis command, offer to generate a PDF/HTML report.

/seo google report

Generate a professional PDF report with charts and analytics.

Script: claude-seo run google_report.py --type <type> --data <json> --domain <domain> --format pdf

Workflow:

• Run data collection commands (pagespeed, gsc, inspect-batch, etc.)

• Save JSON output to file: claude-seo run pagespeed_check.py <url> --json > data.json

• Generate report: claude-seo run google_report.py --type cwv-audit --data data.json --domain <domain>

Convention: After completing analysis, suggest: "Generate a report? Use /seo google report <type>"

Rate Limits

Cross-Skill Integration

• seo-audit: Spawns seo-google agent for live CWV + indexation data (conditional)

• seo-technical: Uses pagespeed_check.py for real CWV field data

• seo-performance: CrUX field data supplements Lighthouse lab data

• seo-sitemap: GSC sitemap status shows submitted counts, errors, and warnings; use URL Inspection for indexation truth

• seo-content: GSC query data informs keyword targeting

• seo-geo: Use GSC Generative AI performance reports and AI Overviews/AI Mode/Discover gen-AI include/exclude controls where available

Output Format

• CWV metrics: traffic-light rating (Good / Needs Improvement / Poor)

• Performance reports: tables with sortable columns

• Always include data freshness note

• Save reports as GOOGLE-API-REPORT-{domain}.md

• Markdown/LLM templates in assets/templates/: cwv-audit-report.md, gsc-performance-report.md, indexation-status-report.md; distinct from google_report.py's PDF pipeline

Technical Notes

• INP replaced FID on March 12, 2024. Never reference FID.

• CLS values from CrUX are string-encoded (e.g., "0.05"). Scripts handle parsing.

• CrUX 404 = insufficient traffic, not an auth error.

• Search Analytics data has 2-3 day lag.

• round_trip_time replaced effectiveConnectionType in CrUX (Feb 2025).

• Custom Search JSON API is closed to new customers (2025).

Error Handling