Website reporting counts. Here’s why.
Heard of ‘website analytics’ or ‘reporting’ but not quite sure what these terms mean or why you should know about them? When it comes to your website, the numbers are more important than you might realise – they can tell us a lot about how your website (and your business) is performing and what is (and isn’t) working in your online space.
Let’s start with a definition – the term ‘website analytics’ refers to the reporting, measurement, and analysis of your website traffic in order to optimise your website. The gathered data includes who visits your website, where they can from, what they did while on your site (and for how long), and when they left. There are a number of online tools that offer analytics services and these can be particularly powerful for inbound marketing sites.
Useful information you can get from website reporting
1. Visitor info
The number of visitors to your site, whether they are new or returning, demographic information such as what browser they are using, what country they are coming from, how they behave when they are on your site.
2. Website info
What landing pages are the most popular, where visitors spend most of their time while on your site, where they exited the site.
3. Campaign info
The domains that referred visitors to your site, the campaigns that drove them to your site, the keywords and phrases used by visitors who searched for your site or services.
4. What to do next
The information gained from website analytics is important because it allows you to understand what is working on your website and how to enhance that, as well as giving you insight into your visitors’ behaviour, acting as a clue as to what to do next to improve results and drive visitor engagement.
How to use website analytics
1. Know what you want
Website analytics tools can provide you with a huge amount of data about your site and you might not have the time or energy to go through it all. Decide at the start on the purpose of your website (for example, to make online sales or to engage with new visitors) and what you want to learn from the site traffic data (essentially, establish your main metrics). Focus on that.
2. Set up key reports
Once you know what you’re looking for, you can set up detailed yet focused reports to be delivered to you within set time frames. This allows you to keep up to speed with what is happening on your site in a consistent manner as well as compare results over time or in line with particular campaigns or seasons.
As marketing experts, we understand that the world of online marketing (and all the tools that come with it) can be daunting but learning how it all works is essential if you want to succeed in a digital space. Website analytics is just one example of a way in which you can continually improve your website, making it work better and harder for your business. Need an expert helping hand with all things digital marketing? Talk to us – we’re all about website design that works.