Four Ways to Leverage Your Web Stats
Measuring your web site and social media traffic should not be an afterthought but a valuable tool for growing your audience.
Aliza Sherman
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Four Ways to Leverage Your Web Stats
Hi there, the Digital Marketer here, ready to help you put the power of the Internet and technology to work for your business.
Are you tracking your Web traffic? If so, how are you using that information to optimize your web site? And if not, why not?
There are many ways to measure your Web traffic, but what information should you be tracking? And once you have some numbers, how do you leverage that information?
What to Expect from a Web Tracking Tool
A free solution to Web tracking is Google Analytics. Setting up a Google Analytics account to track Web activity is as easy as signing up at Google.com/analytics then pasting a line of invisible code into the HTML of the home page of the site you’d like to monitor. At its most basic, Google Analytics provides site usage stats such as:
- Visits by all visitors per day, week or month;
- Pageviews which measures actual number of pages viewed by all visitors;
- Pages per visit to give you an average number of pages each visitor looks at as they go through your site;
- Bounce rate meaning how many visitors “bounce away” to other sites instead of staying within yours, so people who visit a single page on your site and then leave;
- Average time giving you an idea of how engaged your visitors are within your site;
- Percentage of new visits versus returning visitors; and
- Number of visitors, and then you can drill deeper into the analytics to get profiles of your visitors including their language, the browser they use, the computer operating system they have, and their geographic location.
You can also get a list of search engines that are referring visitors to your site and the keyword searches they conducted to get there as well as the top “referrers” or referring Web sites sending traffic your way.
Leveraging Your Site Analytics
Once you really start paying attention to your site analytics, there are many ways to leverage the data you’re getting in order to optimize your site. Some ways you can improve your site include increasing engagement, upping conversions and building new as well as repeat traffic. Here are some actions you can take to act on the Web stats and data you’re getting:
Get feedback. Don’t underestimate the power of a quick survey on your site to ask why people are visiting, what they find most useful, what they don’t like about your site — you name it. Provide more than one way for visitors to give you their feedback. And then listen, digest, and incorporate what you’re hearing into changes on your site. How does their feedback correspond with your Web stats?
Test different interface designs. In many cases, poor Web site design can be a barrier to accessing information on a site and make your site hard to navigate. Without implementing an entire redesign, where do your stats show bottlenecks on your site? Are visitors not going to the places on your site that you’re trying to emphasize? Small tweaks to site design can mean the difference between visitors interacting with your site in a productive way or leaving out of confusion and frustration.
Test different content. No matter how many times we try, we don’t always get our Web content right. There is nothing wrong with making incremental edits to make content catchier, easier to digest and more timely and relevant to engage your visitors. The kiss of death for Web content is taking your print content and expecting it to translate online. Think “sound bites” and “actions” to make your site content more effective.
Increase conversions. An effective Web site is one that leads visitors to do what you would like them to do. Do you want them to contact you for more information? All signs, design and content should point them to that action. Do you want them to buy something? Don’t be shy — don’t forget to ask them to buy. Are you trying to get them to provide feedback? Give them simple and interactive ways to do this.
Not sure where your site is lacking? Google Analytics has a Website Optimizer feature to test your site and identify stumbling blocks to visitors. You may also want to check out another metrics site called GetClicky.com which claims to provide Web Analytics 2.0.
Bottom Line: Leveraging your Web site analytics takes strategy, a long term commitment, consistent tracking and measurable actions to make those stats work for you.
Contact Me
That’s all we have time for today. Visit the show’s website at digitalmarketer.quickanddirtytips.com for links to all of the sites mentioned in the show. If you’d like to ask a question or request a topic for the Digital Marketer, e-mail me at digitalmarketer@quickanddirtytips.com .
Tune in for another business boost from the Digital Marketer, the host who’s not afraid to go under the Internet’s hood & get a little dirty!
Resources
Google Analytics – Google Analytics
Facebook Pages – Facebook Pages
GetClicky – GetClicky