The Nuts & Bolts of Web Analytics
Measurement has always been a challenge for marketers. “Impressions” and “views” gave a hint to the exposure that messages receive, but harder numbers, like how many people actually converted because of a message, were difficult to find.
Until the internet. Web marketing enjoys unprecedented measurement tools that allow web marketers to constantly improve messages, design and layout toward better results. While those tools include “split-testing” “eye-tracking” and “click-thru rates”, it is web analytics that brings the data together in one comprehensive package for analysis.
5 Web Analytics Measurements
Traffic Sources
Using web analytics, internet marketers see precisely from where web visitors have arrived. With an internet marketing strategy that might include PPC advertising, organic SEO, banner advertising, blogs, etc., traffic sources lets you know how much of your web traffic has been generated by each tactic. You can break the information down even further and get an analysis of individual keywords in a PPC campaign or geographic locations of click-thrus from banner ads. Analysing traffic sources is invaluable in developing a more effective marketing mix and getting higher value for your marketing budget.
Bounce Rate
So, you got traffic, but what happened to it after it arrived on your site? Hopefully, your visitors stayed long enough to get your message or click through to another page on your site. If not, if they land on your web page and find no reason to stay or continue and they click the “Back” button, type a new URL into the browser, or shut down their web browser, they become part of your bounce rate statistic. You spend a lot of money to get people to your site, so it’s important to know if they leave too soon – and why. When you compare bounce rates from different web pages, you learn what visitors find appealing, and what causes them to bolt.
Conversions
It’s the main purpose of web marketing to convert customers. You made the effort to get them to your site, now you want them to take action. When they do, it’s a conversion. Converting a visitor to an ecommerce site means getting them to make a purchase. Perhaps you just want them to “Learn More” about your company. Regardless of the action, if your web page fails to get visitors to convert, you need improve it.
Time on Site
You want people to stay on your site at least long enough to take your call to action. When combined with other web analytics information, time on site can be one of the most valuable web stats you have. For example, if you manage to get people to stay on a page, but have a high bounce rate, it might mean your call to action needs to be stronger.
Number of Visitors
Plain and simple, a primary goal of any web marketing strategy is to attract traffic to a web page or site. Without traffic, you can accomplish nothing else with your site. The combination of numbers of visitors and conversions produces a conversion rate, which is one of the most important gauges of the success of your web marketing strategy. Small shifts in conversion rates can mean large differences in results.
Regardless of your web marketing goals, web analytics gives you useful information to help you achieve them.
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