A page sitting at position 14 can have thousands of impressions and almost no clicks. Backlinko’s analysis of 4 million Google results found that only 0.63% of searchers clicked anything on the second page.
That’s what makes page two interesting. Google already considers the page relevant: it’s ranking, just not quite high enough. Moving it a few positions is usually far less work than getting a new page to rank from nothing. SEOs call these striking distance pages, and the queries they rank for striking distance keywords.
What counts as a striking distance page?
There’s no official definition. Here’s the one Crawlens uses for its Pages ranking just below page one check:
| Condition | Threshold | Comes from |
|---|---|---|
| Average position | Above 10.5 and up to 20.5, i.e. page two | Search Console |
| Impressions | At least 100 in the selected period | Search Console |
| Indexable | 200 status, no noindex, canonical to itself | The crawl |
One caveat about the position figure. Search Console’s average position is the topmost position your page held for each query, averaged across all queries. A page averaging 14 may rank 8th for one query and 25th for another, so always open the individual queries before deciding what to change.
Why isn’t Search Console enough on its own?
Search Console tells you how a URL performed. It doesn’t tell you what the page looks like today. Filter the Performance report to positions 11–20 and the list will include:
- pages that have since been redirected or noindexed
- canonicalised duplicates, where Google reports one URL and you’d be editing another
- pages that now return errors
Working on any of those is wasted effort. Joining Search Console data to a fresh crawl removes them, and adds the on-page context you need to decide what to do: title, H1, word count, internal links, depth and Core Web Vitals.
In Crawlens, connect your Google account under Settings → Integrations. Then, in the project’s Search section, fetch Search Console data for the crawl and pick a period (last 28 days, 3 months or 16 months). The data is matched to every crawled URL, and the striking distance check runs as part of the audit.
How do you improve a striking distance page?
Sort the list by impressions: the pages with the most impressions have the most to gain. Then work through these checks, roughly from least to most effort.
1. Does the title match the main query?
Open the page’s top queries (Crawlens shows the top 25 for each URL in the URL details panel). If the main query isn’t in the title, or appears near the end, fix that first. It’s the cheapest change there is. Google’s title link guidelines are worth a read here: descriptive, concise titles are less likely to be rewritten in the results.
2. How many internal links point to it?
Internal links tell search engines which pages you consider important. Striking distance pages are often under-linked: a single link from a paginated archive, or buried four or more clicks from the homepage. Crawlens flags both separately, as Pages with only one internal link and Pages more than 4 clicks from the start.
The fix is usually simple. Link to the page from two or three of your strongest related pages, with anchor text that describes it.
3. Does the content answer the query better than page one?
Compare the page with what ranks on page one for its main query. If those pages cover the topic in more depth, answer a question yours skips, or are more current, that’s the gap to close. Word count is a weak proxy. What matters is whether the page is the most useful answer, which is also what Google’s guidance on helpful, people-first content asks for.
4. Is anything technical holding it back?
Before rewriting anything, rule out the boring problems:
- Core Web Vitals: a poor LCP or INP on a page that’s otherwise competitive. See Google’s Core Web Vitals documentation.
- Content that depends on JavaScript: if most of the text only appears after rendering, indexing can lag.
- Duplicate signals: near-duplicate URLs splitting relevance between them. Google explains how to consolidate duplicate URLs.
What about pages already on page one with a low CTR?
Striking distance has a sibling worth checking at the same time: pages that already rank on page one but get far fewer clicks than they should.
Crawlens flags a page as Low click-through rate for the ranking position when it ranks in the top 10, has at least 200 impressions, and its CTR is less than half of what’s typical for that position. The fix is almost always the snippet: the title and meta description. That’s usually less work than improving rankings.
How do you measure the result?
Give Google a few weeks to recrawl the pages you changed, then compare. In Crawlens, crawl again and use Compare crawls: pages that moved onto page one drop out of the striking distance check and show up as fixed issues. Keep the Search Console period the same length between the two crawls so you’re comparing like with like.
Checklist
- Positions 11–20, at least 100 impressions, and indexable in a fresh crawl
- Sorted by impressions, starting from the top
- Individual queries checked, not just the average position
- Main query near the start of the title
- Two or three internal links from strong related pages
- Content gaps against the current page-one results closed
- No Core Web Vitals, rendering or duplicate issues
- Re-crawl and compare after a few weeks
Frequently asked questions
What are striking distance keywords?
Queries for which a page already ranks just off page one of Google, usually average positions 11 to 20. Google considers the page relevant, so a modest improvement can move it onto page one, where nearly all clicks happen.
How do I find striking distance keywords in Google Search Console?
In the Performance report, add the Page and Query dimensions, filter Position to greater than 10 and up to 20, and sort by impressions. Then check each URL in a crawl to remove pages that are redirected, noindexed or canonicalised elsewhere.
How many impressions should a striking distance page have?
There's no fixed rule. Crawlens uses at least 100 impressions in the selected period so low-volume noise is left out. On large sites you can raise the threshold to focus on the biggest opportunities.
How long does it take to move a page from page two to page one?
It depends on the competition and how often Google recrawls the page. Small changes such as a better title or new internal links are often reflected within a few weeks. Compare the same Search Console period before and after.
Is average position in Search Console accurate enough for this?
It's an average of the topmost position across all queries, so a page can rank higher for some queries and lower for others. Look at the page's individual queries before deciding what to change.