Web Analytics 101: How you can use web analytics to increase your website’s ROI

July 29th 2010Presented by:

Richard Sharp and Amberlie Denny

5 Things You Want to Know About this Presentation

1. The presentation will be 45 minutes including Q & A2. You can send your questions to us via your

GoToWebinar controls at any time during the presentation

3. We will answer timely, topic-specific questions during the presentation and save the rest for the Q & A period

4. We answer all the questions we don’t have time for during the presentation in a blog post later in the day

5. We will send out a link to the recording and a PDF of the presentation slides after the presentation

Web Analytics (noun)Pronunciation: /wɛb anə’lɪtɪks/

Web analytics is the measurement, collection, analysis and reporting of web data for purposes of understanding and optimizing web usage

Why are Web Analytics Important?

• They are tangible evidence of visitors actions on your site

• They give you real insight into what your visitors are doing once they arrive

• Measuring your website metrics is the only way to optimize your website

• They give you proof of your website’s ROI • They tell you areas to need to improve to reduce

barriers to sales and optimize your website for conversions

What are the Different Types of Web Analytics?

• Web Logs – Web Log Expert– AWStats– WebTrends

• JavaScript Driven Tools – Google Analytics – Piwik– Yahoo! Analytics – WebTrends (On-Demand)

How Does Google Analytics Work?

• Google Analytics is a JavaScript driven tool

• Google produces a tracking code which you place in the HTML of your website

• The code looks something like this:

<script src="https://ssl.google-analytics.com/urchin.js" type="text/javascript"></script><script type="text/javascript">_uacct="UA-414726-1";urchinTracker();</script>

The 4 Basic Element of Google Analytics

• Visitors - number of visitors, number of page views, unique versus returning visitors

• Traffic Sources – direct, referral, search engine

• Content (Site Interactions) – top content, entry pages, exit pages, navigation paths

• Goals (Outcomes) – conversion rates, conversion values, conversion paths, funnel analysis

What are the Basic Visitor Metrics to Look at?

• Pageviews – The amount of views your website pages are getting

• Visits – When someone arrives at your website and starts looking at your webpages

• Unique Visitors – The number of distinct people that are visiting (making visits) to your website in a particular period

• Time Spent – Indicates the amount of time a visitor spends on your website and webpages

• Bounce Rate – Indicates the amount of people that upon arriving at your website immediately leave

Long term Visitor Trending

Map Overlay

Canada = 72% USA= 28%

Time Spent On Site

Bounce Rate

• Referring Sites– This tells you the places where people are finding your website and visiting from

• Top Search Engines – Tells you which search engines people are visiting your site from

• Direct Traffic - The number of visitors who come to your site without first visiting a search engine

• Top Keywords – The top keywords people are typing into search engines to arrive at your website

What are the Basic Traffic Metrics to Look at?

All Traffic Sources

Direct Traffic

Referring Sites

Search Engines

What are the Basic Content Metrics You Can Look at?

• Top Content – The most frequently viewed content page on your website

• Exit Pages – The amount of “exits” from individual pages on your website

• Entrance Pages – The pages which are most often use as “entrances” to your website

• Navigation Paths – Allows you to view how visitors got to a page and where they navigated to after

Top Content

Top Landing Pages

Top Exit Pages

Navigation Paths

What are the Basic Goal Metrics You Can Look at?

• Total Conversions – The total number of conversions for all of the goals you have created

• Conversion Rate – The ratio of visitors to your site who convert website visits into desired actions

• Funnel Visualization – Depicts the leaks your conversion funnel by showing which pages resulted in lost opportunities and where your customers go

Total Conversions

Conversion Rate

Funnel Visualization

What are the Most Important Metrics to be Tracking?

• Unique Visitors

• Traffic Sources

• Referring Keywords

• Top Content

• Bounce Rate

• Conversion Rate

How Often Should You be Looking at Your Analytics?

• Google Analytics is updated every 24 hrs

• It’s important that you keep an eye on what’s happening

• The amount you need to check will vary by industry, but weekly is usual a good starting point

Web Analytics Tips

• Set up IP filtering to exclude internal traffic

• Set up filtering to track full referring URLs

• Google Analytics URL Builder– Allows you to track clickthroughs on calls-to-action by creating a

custom URL

• Set up goal tracking

• Schedule reports to be emailed – Useful for organization where not everyone has access to Google

Analytics

Web Analytics 201 - Segmentation

• Sometimes aggregate data can be too general for some users

• The best way to get deeper insights is to segment your data by different dimensions

• Ex. If you want to get better analysis of your traffic, segment it by geographic location as a % of all your visits

Segments

Campus visitors

Campus visitors

Campus visitors

Campus visitors

Campus visitors

Campus visitors

Takeaways

1. Configure your account correctly

2. Have targets that relate to your business

3. Look at the data regularly

4. Be curious

5. Focus on insights and outcomes

6. Not sure or don’t have time? – hire an expert

Richard Sharp, VP Marketing

richard.sharp@marqui.com

604.484.8543

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