> ## Documentation Index
> Fetch the complete documentation index at: https://docs.neariq.io/llms.txt
> Use this file to discover all available pages before exploring further.

# Metrics glossary

> Definitions for every metric in the NearIQ dashboard.

## Metric registry coverage

NearIQ maintains a shared metric registry for charts, table columns, exports, and autocomplete. The registry groups exportable fields by business, competitor, rank, review, content, alert, agent, AI visibility, engagement signal, gap analysis, citation, GBP insight, market, ads, and hiring categories.

Each registry entry declares a stable key, label, unit, type, category, time-series support, supported aggregations, and the stored source column when one exists. Chart builders should use numeric time-series entries; table and export builders can use any exportable entry.

## Rating metrics

**Star rating** — Current Google Maps star rating (1.0–5.0). Pulled directly from the Google Business Profile listing.

**Rating momentum** — Direction and magnitude of rating change over the past 30 days. Expressed as a delta (e.g. +0.2, -0.1) and a trend direction (↑ ↓ →).

**Rating velocity** — How fast the rating is changing. A business gaining reviews much faster than its current average will see its rating converge toward the new reviews' average.

## Review metrics

**Review count** — Total number of Google reviews on the listing.

**Review velocity** — New reviews per week, averaged over the past 30 days. High velocity can indicate a review campaign (positive or negative).

**Review surge** — When review velocity exceeds 2× the 90-day baseline in a short window. NearIQ generates a `review_surge` alert when this is detected.

**Owner response rate** — Percentage of reviews that have received a business response. Used by Google as a local ranking signal.

**Average response time** - Average hours between a review publish timestamp and the owner's reply timestamp. Stored as `competitor_reviews_cache.avg_response_hours` so dashboard and v1 reads can compare response speed without triggering review-provider lookups.

## Rank metrics

**Average rank** — Mean rank position across all grid points where the business appeared in the top 20. Lower is better (1 = top result). Points where the business didn't appear are excluded from the average but counted in coverage metrics.

**Top 3 coverage** — Percentage of rank check grid points where the business ranked in positions 1–3. Positions 1–3 receive the large majority of clicks on Google Maps.

**Local search visibility score** — Composite estimate of how often the business appears in local pack results across its service area. Derived from rank check history and local pack tracking data.

## GBP metrics

**GBP health score** — Completeness and optimization score for the Google Business Profile (0–100). Checks: name, address, phone, website, categories, hours, description, photos, and recent post activity.

**Local pack rank** — Position in the "3-pack" (top 3 map results) for a given keyword at a given location. Tracked per rank check.

**Is running ads** — Whether the business is currently running Google Local Services Ads or Google Ads (detected via search result analysis).

## Competitive scores

**Competitor health score** — A 0-100 directional score for each tracked competitor. The score is a composite of rating strength, review volume, review velocity, rating trend, owner response rate, and data coverage. Rating strength is confidence-adjusted by review count, review volume uses a log scale, and missing live-signal inputs are treated as confidence gaps instead of automatic penalties or free points.

**Data coverage** — Whether NearIQ has enough recent reviews, listing snapshots, rank checks, and first-party business data to explain a metric confidently. Coverage improves confidence and diagnostics, but it is not a direct score booster by itself.

**Average competitor score** — The mean competitor health score across your active tracked competitors. Higher means your market contains stronger competitors and should be interpreted as competitive pressure, not your own performance.

## Business signals

**Job postings (30d)** — Number of verified local job postings in the past 30 days. Public job-board scrape counts are excluded; high verified hiring activity can signal a competitor is scaling at the tracked location.