Web traffic and theDivision of Student Affairs

Shaun Geisert, Assistant Director of Web Development, Division of Student Affairs

shaun.geisert@colostate.edu

Overview

• What is Web Analytics?

• How Do We Collect Data?– Google Analytics, Crazy Egg, ClickTale

• What Kinds of Data Do We Receive?– Page Hits, Bounce Rate, Other Terminology– How Can the Data Be Fine-Tuned?

• How Do We Effectively Use the Data To Improve The CSU Visitor’s Web Experience?– Better Understand What Users Want– Improving Content Delivery– Get interested/Get Access to the Info That’s There.

What is Web Analytics?

• The process of collection, measurement, and analysis of user activity on a website to understand and help achieve the intended objectives of the website.

• A tool that collects data on website user’s behavior. Eg, Google Analytics

• Common Misperception – Analytics is Page Hits

Why Do We Use Analytics?

• Measurable– Provides concrete

numbers about site usage.

• Accurate– Surveys are less

accurate; what people say they do is often inaccurate.

• Timely– We can track usages to

create trends over time period. Benchmarking

• Automatic– Analytics does the data

mining for me, providing numerous reports that in turn help us extrapolate data to form hypothesis about what we’re doing right/wrong.

• Health/Effectiveness– How healthy is your site?

How effective?– How much time do you

spend creating content that’s actually used?

Provides Deep Insight Into The Effectiveness of Our Web Sites

Privacy: Is Shaun the Real Big Brother?

Tools Used to Collect Data

• Google Analytics - http://www.google.com/analytics/ – Free service offered by Google which

provides detailed stats about a site’s visitors.

• ClickTale - http://www.clicktale.com/ – A commercial analytics tool that lets you

watch movies to understand user behavior.

• CrazyEgg - http://crazyegg.com/– Another commercial site which provide

visuals such as overlays/heatmaps.

Google Analytics Installation

• Sign up for Google Analytics– https://www.google.com/analytics/

• They provide a JavaScript code snippet, which needs to be pasted into your source code, on every page of your site

Analytics Sidebar

• Over 80 reports• Real-Time (who is on your site now)• Audience (audience demographics, what

technology they are using, location)• Acquisition (how are people getting to our

site?)• Behavior (What is the traffic doing once on

your site?)• Conversions (Is this traffic turning into

leads/conversions, etc.? What is the desired action?)

Sample Reports

• How many people have visited our site in the past? How many people are on our site now?

• Where were they located geographically?• How many visitors leave after seeing just one

page?• How do people get to our site?• What is the most popular content on my site?• How much time do users spend on my site?• Where are folks first arriving, then later exiting?• What percentage of visits occur on mobile

devices?

Number of Visits

• Where Is It: Audience Overview• Definitions:

– Hit: Any request from a file or a web-server. A single page likely contains multiple hits.

– Pageview: How many times a complete page is displayed.

– Bounce rate: % of single page visits (1 and dones)– Session (often called a visit): A visit is an interaction a

visitor has with a website over a specified period of time.

• Example: Housing and Dining has had 112,837 visits in August.

Real-Time Visits

• Where Is It: Real-Time Overview

Where Are They Located

• Where Is It: Audience Geo Location

• Example: 76% of all visits to the Housing and Dining site in August came from Colorado.

One and done visits

• Where Is It: Behavior Site Content All Pages• Definitions:

– Bounce Rate: The percentage of web site visitors who arrive at a web entry page, then leave without going any deeper into the site (this then becomes the exit page).

– Entry Page: The first viewed page on a visitor's path through a site.

– Exit Page: The last page viewed on a visitor's path through a site.

• Example: HDS has a 76% bounce rate on its technology-services page, but a 11% rate on its meal-plans page. Why???

How do people get to our site?

• Where Is It: Acquisition Overview• Definition:

– Referrer: The URL of an HTML page that refers visitors to a site. Eg, Google is a common referrer.

• Example: 43% of visitors to the HDS site got there by using organic search. 18% came by bookmarks/typing in url.

Most Popular Content

• Where Is It: Behavior Site Content All Pages

• Example: HDS’s home page garnered 10% of the total pageviews for the site, and had a 25% bounce rate.

What keywords did visitors use to find us?

• Where Is It: Acquisition Search Engine Optimization Queries

• Example: “apass”, “eunice chang” and “2007 luau” account for a large portion of keyword-driven traffic on the APASS site. 90+% of the people who arrived at the APASS site via the last two entries immediately left the site.

Time Spent On Page/Site

• Where Is It: Behavior Site Content All Pages

• Example: On average, visitors to the /dining page spent only 18 seconds on the page, versus over 2 minutes on the /locations-hours page

Landing/Exit Pages

• Landing Pages: Behavior Site Content Landing Pages

• Exit Pages: Behavior Site Content Exit Pages

Mobile Usage

• Where Is It: Audience Mobile• Example: 38% of the traffic to HDS

comes from mobile devices (in August). 33%

Custom Reports

• https://blog.kissmetrics.com/expert-google-analytics-reports/

• https://www.google.com/analytics/gallery/

Visualizing the Data

• In-Page Analytics within Google– Behavior In-Page Analytics

• Crazy Egg– See heatmaps of where people click on your

site. Can be used to see what people click based upon their specific interests.

• ClickTale– Watch movies of what people are doing on your

site. ClickTale records every action as visitors browse your website, allowing you to to better understand visitor behavior to enhance usability.

Using What You Know

• What is the objective of your site/page?

• Turning your objectives into conversions– Definition: An action that signifies a

completion of a specified activity. • Eg, buying a product, signing up for a

newsletter, downloading a file.

Setting up GoalsGoal Type Description Example

Destination A specific url loads Visitor reached thank you page after applying to your program

Duration Visits that last a specific amount of time or longer.

Visitor spent 5 minutes looking through our volunteer page

Pages/Screens per visit

Visitor views a specific number of pages

Visitor viewed at least 3 pages on our site

Event An action defined and an Event is triggered

Visitor watched a YouTube video or clicked a link in our e-mail newsletter

Reasons for Failure

• Poor Design– Improper Branding Lack of Credibility– Distracting Graphics, Fonts, Headers– Non-Responsive

• Poor Technology– Slow page loads, presenting identical content to mobile users as

you do to desktop users (eg, large images)• 40% of users will abandon a site that takes longer than 3 seconds to

load: https://blog.kissmetrics.com/loading-time/?wide=1 • Use https://developers.google.com/speed/pagespeed/insights/

• Poor Content– Is there a lack of focus, either site-wide or by page? What is the

primary purpose and can it be determined in 2-3 seconds?– Inadequate or outdated info– Difficult to find, isn’t concise, or scannable (text not chunked).

Miscellaneous Tips

• Know where to get help within the site itself– Use Cap Icon, Question Marks, Search Reports, or Just Hover

• Take advantage of searching/sorting• Explore Page In-Sights and install Chrome extension• Always Pay Attention To Mobile vs Desktop• More on Event Tracking

– http://code.colostate.edu/tracking-e-mail-opens.aspx – https://support.google.com/analytics/answer/1033068?hl=en

• Enable Webmaster Tools

Next Steps

• Want access to reports? Get a Gmail account

• Determine your reporting needs– I’m available to set these up for you– Do you want login access, reports mailed to

you automatically, etc.? Define goals / Identify how your site can be

improved. Collaborate with your resident web

developer to make it happen!

Thank You!

• For Further Research– Google Analytics

• Tutorials– https://support.google.com/analytics– https://

blog.kissmetrics.com/google-analytics-resources-2014/

• Features– https://www.google.com/intl/en_us/analytics/features/

• Google Reporting Basics/Set Up Checklist– http://

www.google.com/analytics/learn/setupchecklist.html