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Your website plays a key role in business growth, but is it as effective as it should be? Google Analytics is one of the best free tools to analyze the performance of your website, but you need to know what to look for before you can make any improvements. By looking at and responding to the following three basic areas of Analytics, you’ll be able to accomplish more of your marketing goals.
1. Learn How Your Audience is Using Your Website
Do you know which are the most popular pages or articles on your site? Which are the top landing pages? When you know, you can see which areas of your website are “working” and which areas need improvement. Google regularly changes its dashboard, so how you find out certain information may change over time, but here are a few ways to currently analyze how your audience is interacting with your site.
- In the “Behavior” section, click on “Site Content” and then “All Pages” and you’ll see which parts of your site are attracting most attention
- Under “Audience” and the “User Flow” section, you can see how visitors are moving through your site, where they click, and where they exit
- In the “Landing Page” section under “Behavior” you’ll see which pages visitors are landing on
Tips to Improve Your Stats:
Take note of the most popular pages in a certain time period. Is there a common theme or style that they have in common? In the future, create more content that has the same characteristics.
In terms of traffic flow, see which pages people are exiting your site from. Can you improve on their design and content? You may find that writing clearer calls-to-action will keep people on your site for longer.
Finally, the most popular landing pages will tell you the most common entry points to your site. Make sure you are happy with the pages that attract most visitors. Are your visitors taking the desired action once they land on these pages? If not, make the necessary changes.
2. Find Out Where Your Web Traffic is Coming From
Do you know how people are finding your site? What percentage of your traffic is coming from organic search engine queries, people linking from social media channels, and other websites? Your other marketing activities such as email newsletters, guest blog posts, and press releases will also drive traffic back your site.
For a broad overview of where your traffic is coming from, visit the “Acquisition” section of the Analytics dashboard. Here you’ll see the “All Traffic” section. One of the most useful areas to focus on is the “Referrals” section, which shows the specific web pages visitors were referred to your site from.
Tips to Improve Your Stats:
Keep a record of who is referring more traffic to your website. Is it from another website or from Google Search? If most of your traffic is coming from organic search, maybe you need to focus more on building relationships with other relevant businesses online. On the other hand, if the organic search percentage is low, you may need to make your articles and web copy more search-engine friendly by creating more content that answers searchers’ questions.
3. Discover Who is Visiting Your Website
Google Analytics provides a number of demographic stats on who is viewing your website. One datapoint to look into is “Location” in the “Geo” category. Maybe a significant percentage of your traffic is coming from a country other than the US or UK.
Once your Analytics dashboard is linked correctly to your website, navigate to “Audience”, “Demographics”, and “Overview”and you can view exactly who is engaging with your website. The data can be broken down into age, gender, location, and more.
Tips to Improve Your Stats:
When you know more about your audience, you can modify your content accordingly. If there are lots of visitors from another country, you could have sections of your website translated into their specific language to encourage sharing and links to your site. You could also write more content that addresses topics associated with specific locations.
In Summary
These are just three areas of Analytics stats you can explore and then react to in order to improve your website. Remember that your site isn’t just an online brochure for your business; it’s a great tool for learning about your target audience.
By understanding how your audience behaves on your website, where your traffic is coming from, and the particular characteristics of your visitors, you can find more effective ways to engage your audience and attract more qualified leads to your business.
Need help developing your website for today’s digital marketplace? Get in touch today. Creative digital solutions are my passion, and my livelihood depends on your success.
