Making the Most of Web Analysis

Understanding metrics can help enable companies identify big problems such as poor timing, inconsistent search phrases, incorrect prospect definitions and flawed audiences. Most importantly, it can help avoid wasting time and money due to poorly executed websites or marketing campaigns.

The tricky part is knowing the different types of metrics and how they can affect a business. There are four basic ways to break down web metrics: Traffic, Conversion, Performance, and Maintenance.

As it pertains to traffic, “visitors” tracks the overall traffic to a website. It’s important to know who the repeat visitors are and who they unique visitors are. “Page Views” refers to the number of pages requested from a site. Pageviews are used to convey the popularity of a website or page. They are usually what someone means when they say their site gets "a lot of hits" (Kyrnin, 2012). The “length of time” a visitor stays on site may determine the level of interest in a company. The busiest or slowest times can help figure out if certain campaigns or times of day tend to bring about more traffic. Most popular pages are reported also to what visitors to a website are interested in finding (Kyrnin, 2012). Search engine rankings, referrals, and Keywords show how a company ranks within top search engines, the traffic coming from search engines, and the keywords used to find the website. Traffic is just the first step in understanding and using web metrics.

Goals should help to separate valuable visits from less valuable ones and should reflect an organization’s goals and reason for having a website. A goal is worthless if a visitor can accomplish it accidentally. Conversion rates are based on how many times the desired goal was reached. What are you asking in return from your visitors as they move toward the goal? Do you ask for an email address? A credit-card number? Are visitors filling out a form or watching a video?

Regular maintenance to a website can have a positive impact on web metrics. A sites needs updating with fresh, accurate content. As this is done, companies improve their search engine rankings, increase the number of visitors to the site, and strengthen their online presence. If the site is not updated regularly, visitors will assume there’s nothing new to share and they will not bother to return. Without occasional new information or resources, visitors will not have a reason to come back.  What's worse, companies may lose them as a potential customer.  No matter how well designed and well publicized a site is, if it’s not maintained, it will decline in popularity and eventually in search engine rankings.

This ties hand in hand with performance. Tracking a websites performance can make companies aware of possible errors, long download times, problematic data, broken links, etc. Errors can drive visitors away from the website. A company would  also want to know if their website is functional across many platforms. A non-optimized website can have a low conversion rate because the customer was unable to complete their desired function due to poor mobile functionality.

References

Kyrnin, J. (2012). Web Analytics Basics: Learn to Measure Your Web Site. About.com. Retrieved on November 5, 2012 from,http://webdesign.about.com/od/loganalysis/a/aa092605.htm.