Are your Website Vistors Behaving Properly?

Remember the good old days when the success of a website was gauged solely on tracking hits. How about hit counters on the bottom of a website that would display the total number of hits and accumulate with each passing visitor. The more hits, the more successful the website. Bring back memories? In just a few years web analytics, as we now know it, is a completely different animal for a completely different audience. No longer is analytics just for developers and technology professionals. Viewing analytics has now shifted to marketers, designers, small business owners and business executives, all of whom seek answers to more complex questions about website behavior.

Fortunately, analytics has adapted to the complexity of today's websites, which is no longer about getting just visitors but rather turning those visitors into customers. For most websites, it all starts with understanding visitor behavior. Whether you know it or not, the people who visit your website are doing you a favor by helping you improve site performance, telling you what's working or not working and growing your business. That's why there's a whole area in Google Analytics dedicated to visitors. Here are some key performance indicators (KPI) to understanding visitor behavior.

1. Time on site: Time spent on site is calculated by generating time stamps on a visit to every page and then calculating the difference between the last and first time-stamp of a visitor session. In case of a bounce, time on site and time on page are both reported as 00:00 minutes. Because the time on page cannot be fetched for bounces and exits, the reported values are not 100% accurate because the data for exited and bounced traffic on a page is missing.

2. Average Pageview:  Average pageviews per session is one of the most used KPIs as it's a quick indicator of website engagement. This is a ratio of the number of pageviews the average web visitor views per session. This a ratio and not a metric so it can be compared between segments, varying time frames and across multiple sites or sub-domains.

3. Bounce Rate: Google Analytics defines a bounce as any visit where the visitor views only one page on the site, and then does something else like clicking on a link to a page on a different web site, closing an open window or tab, typing a new URL, clicking the “back” button to leave the site, or perhaps the user doesn’t do anything and a session timeout occurs. Furthermore, there's been studies that correlates bounce rates with search engine rankings. Although these studies are not conclusive, they do serve as a warning that high bounce rates may be a very good indicator of a poor site experience.

4. Funnel Visualization: This report allows you to create a custom path that you want the visitors to take before they reach your designated goal. This can be used for both e-commerce and lead generation websites. If your shopping cart abandonment rates are high, you can see what page visitors are most likely to drop off before making a transaction. Then take action to change or fix this page so that visitors are more likely to continue with their purchase.

You don't necessarily need experienced professionals to identify behavior patterns.  Simply utilizing the above KPIs will help you identify and understand visitor behavior, which will, in turn, assist you in improving your website's overall performance. 

What Goal Type Are You?

Talking about goals is an old topic in the world of analytics but one worth repeating. Enabling goals is one of the best ways to assess how well your site meets its business objectives. The hardest part for most website owners always seems to be identifying what goal type to use. A goal can be any activity on your website that’s important to the success of your business.  An account signup or request for a sales call are two examples of a goal. No website is immune from setting up a goal, especially if you would like to: 

1. Understand how much time visitors stay or, more importantly, do not stay on your site.

2. Try to minimize the amount of time people spend on a specific section of your site (ex. support section)

3. Move visitors from one time-based goal to the next (i.e. from 2 to 5 minutes, 5 to 10 minutes, etc.)

Every website should have at least one goal, especially now since Google Analytics allows for up to 20 goals.  Let's take a look at the different variations of goals to choose from. 

Time Based Goals

Time based goals can be set if you would like to measure a specific amount of time a visitor has spent on your website. Simply edit the goal by entering in the hours, minutes and seconds that you would like a visitor to spend on your site before a goal is counted. You can even track a time based goal if a visitor does not reach a certain period of time on your site simply by setting the condition to "less than". 

Pageview Based Goals

This is similar to time based goals except you are tracking goals when a visitor exceeds (or doesn't exceed) a certain number of pages. The same conditions apply, meaning greater than or less than and the number of pageviews you would like to set up as a goal for each visitor.

URL Destination Goals

Identifying a specific URL destination has alway been the traditional method of tracking goals in Google Analytics. To define a goal in Google Analytics, you specify the page that visitors see once they have completed the activity. For an account sign-up, you might set the “Thank You for signing up” page as a goal. For this type of goal, you can even enable a funnel to see where visitors have dropped off in the process. The trick here is determining the type of "match" for your URL. Google has three to choose from. I recommend visiting the following URL for more information on match types - http://www.google.com/support/analytics/bin/answer.py?hl=en_US&answer=72285&utm_id=ad

Downloads

This is a variation from the other three goals but worth mentioning as many sites have downloadable files. The beauty of setting a download as a goal is that you can assign a value, just like the other three goals mentioned. The only difference being is that file downloads can occur multiple times during one visitor session whereas any other type of goal can only happen once during a visit. So, for example, if a visitor comes to your site and downloads 5 PDF files during a single session, and each file is worth, say, $5, then you would accumulate 5 transactions totaling $25.

Setting goals is not a difficult process but rather a thought process. With that said, keep the below points in mind and you will be on your way to successful tracking. 

• Consider organizing goals by function (i.e. by time, download, etc.)
• A visitor can only convert at each goal once per visit.  
• If you have multiple goals then consider consolidating into one profile in order view them all in one interface
• Creating new goals will not modify your historical data, only future data
• Add a value for each goal

Is Event Tracking One of Your New Year's Resolutions?

It's a new year and a fresh start. For some, that means resolutions and goals for 2010. Okay. I realize that dropping a few pounds and not smoking are ideal resolutions but what about goals for your website? To me, setting up a goal would be just as easy as not touching that piece of chocolate cake.

The process of establishing website goals begins with identifying and then tracking specific events on your website. Alas, most analytics programs, Google specifically, give us the ability to track a wide variety of events visitors take on websites and then act on those results to improve upon your website's performance.

The first of the two-step process begins with you, the site owner, asking questions in order to determine what event it is you would like to track. For example, if you have an e-commerce site then you would probably want to know how many sales were  generated last week or last month. That seems obvious. But, have you ever wondered how many people are clicking on Product A on the products page? For non-e-commerce related sites, you might ask yourself whether people are opting-in your recurring e-newsletter or downloading the latest e-newletter in PDF format.

Event tracking really depends on the specific goals and needs of your site, and what you want to track. Nonetheless, you should be tracking some type of event because when a visitor interacts with a video player or game on your website, no pageview is generated, thus making it difficult to measure.

Here are some common events that are tracked that do not generate pageviews:

• Clicks on links that take the visitor to another site
• Clicks on an image or button (ex. Facebook icon or ‘shop now’ button)
• Banner Ad clicks
• File downloads (ex. PDF)
• Page widgets
• E-commerce activity/shopping cart purchases
• Member functions (ex. tracking new member sign-ups, log-ins, etc.)
• Flash, Ajax and Javascript related contentPlay button on a video or audio

Tracking specific events, the second part of the process, is relatively easy. If you are using Google Analytics, then all you need to do is call the _trackEvent() method each time you want to register an event such as how many clicks to an external link or video downloads.  For example, if you want to track how many people clicked on the "follow us" Twitter icon/link on your web page then the code would look something like this:

onclick="pageTracker._trackEvent('Home', 'Follow', 'Twitter');" href="http://www.twitter.com/companyname">

The "Home", "Follow" and "Twitter" identifiers represent the category, action and label so you can view the specific results for this event right in your Analytics account. It's really that simple. For more information on setting up event tracking in Google Analytics visit:  http://code.google.com/apis/analytics/docs/tracking/eventTrackerGuide.html

Remember, event tracking is there to help improve your overall online sales and marketing goals and allow you to have a better understanding of your visitors' actions. Now, isn't this a resolution worth sticking with?

Web Site Success Comes With Goals, Not Design

It's amazing there are still business owners who just don't understand the fundamentals of owning a web site. With all the buzz about technology and social media, the primary focus always appears to be on web design. True, web design is important. Especially when it comes to branding. But good web site design and layout is not rocket science given the plethora of open source solutions and software available on the Internet.

Truth be told, the success of any web site will depend on more than just design. Besides, just having a web site isn't good enough anymore. If a business is spending money on a web site, shouldn't there be some talk about a return on investment? With no cookie cutter approach to count on, we can take a look at some guidelines for establishing goals to measure that return.

• Before you even start the design and development of your web site, ask what you want to accomplish with your web site and what type of desired result you seek not only for you but also for your visitors. 

• Describe what you want to accomplish with as much clarity and detail as possible. If your goal is to provide information to the public or generate product brand awareness, don't just state that. Write down exactly how you are going to provide information or generate product awareness. You should also state exactly how and when you will evaluate your progress.

• Break your web site goal(s) into smaller, obtainable minor goals. For example, if you sell multiple products organized in multiple categories, then establish a goal for each category or each product web page. This will help identify areas of strengths and weaknesses on your way to evaluating your overall web site goal. 

• Establish goals you know you are actually capable of obtaining. If the goal is to generate new leads but you get very little site traffic, then set your sites low. Be realistic. It's better to reach your goal regardless of how small than to not reach it at all. That will allow you to better determine what works or doesn't work. 

• Set goals by time and/or importance into specified target dates. For example, if you are trying to sell products for the holiday season or communicating the latest product or service information to customers, then make sure you note your start and completion dates.

• If your goal is to obtain new web site visitors and customers, then your site should be centered around the relevant keywords that new customers would use to search for your site. 

Whether it's increasing traffic, converting customers or just simply sharing information, having clear, established goals and objectives will prevent you from performing unnecessary analysis. It will also help you better understand your web site's successes and failures and allow you fix and improve your web site. Otherwise, you will never be satisfied with the results regardless of the design.

I Have the Analytics Data, Now What?

Every business entity today is faced with a problem (or two), whether related to an internal process or customer. Analytics offers up part of the solution by providing us with the intelligence to understand and address the problem while benefiting the customer in the end.  Yet, the data offered up by web analytics providers like StatCounter, Webtrends, Google, etc. can be overwhelming, to say the least. This is especially true if you are a small business owner or new to the business of tracking website visitor behavior.

One look at an analytics dashboard and one can come away feeling lost or anxious to get answers. Ah, but therein lies the key: Intelligently interpreting, disseminating and utilizing the data to derive at conclusions and decisions. Otherwise, the information becomes useless. Here are some suggestions on dealing with your data.

Invest in the analysis, not the technology - You will want to first establish a team of analytical minds that will be able to interpret, disseminate and manage the mounds of data. Free programs (e.g. Google Analytics) are sufficient for the needs of most businesses. So there's no need to fret over the technology. However, you should try to avoid using two analytics programs. Experience has taught me that more discrepancies and questions arise when dealing with multiple sets of data. Not everyone may agree but let's not forget,  the primary goal and a better use of time for the Analytics team should be on the analysis and drawing conclusions. Not on the technology.

Establish Goals - Ask yourself  "What is the desired result?" or "What am I trying to accomplish?" for a particular web page. Whether it's increasing traffic or converting customers, having clear, established goals and objectives will prevent you from performing unnecessary analysis. It will also keep your website on right track to achieving its goals. Note that Google Analytics now lets you create up to 20 conversion goals per profile, a feature released just this week. Now there is no excuse for adding such simple goals as length of time on site and number of pages per visit.

Test and tweak then test some more - Now that you have a team in place and goals established it is time to put the data to the test. Literally. Because what do bounce rates really mean if the data is not coupled with the testing of a message, design, layout or call to action? The results will show how users react to  changes. So, if your goal is to decrease the bounce rate, then did the test show the visitor staying on the website longer or leaving quicker? You want to keep tweaking and testing until you reach the desired result. Otherwise, how can you really make a sound, logical decision pertaining to your website? And there are no excuses for not testing. Google has a free tool called 'Website Optimizer' to achieve the desired test data you seek.

Patience is a virtue - It is generally not a good idea to make changes on the basis of a few days worth of data. Before you delete or pause a keyword or ad, for example, question whether you have enough data to make a sound decision. The longer the date range, the more abundance of data. Thus, the easier the decision. Shorter time frames offer misleading theories and lead to miscalculated decisions. Take into account returning customers, those who find the site via a paid ad, for example, and then return later to the site to make a purchase. You may miss out on important conversion data if you react too quickly due to a small sample set of data. Also, depending on your goal, it may take days or even months for many of your visitors to convert to customers. So, be patient and set a date range that will last as long as your expected sales cycle or return statistically significant conclusions.

Remember, we're dealing with technology so stay 'in the know' by subscribing to the plethora of blogs out there including the Google Analytics Blog, Analytics Market, or Web Analytics World.

How Analytics helps to improve Your Business

So your website is as noticeable as an elephant in the room? Great, but is the elephant working for your business, or is it the other way round? Is your “great” website also great for your business, in fattening your order books, and adding to your bottom line?

That’s why you need analytics. Loosely speaking, analytics drives real shopping, not window shopping. It helps you to distinguish the real customer from the window shopper.

When you know what kind of visitor buys your product or service, when, why, where, how, and the conversion time between a casual interest in your product and confirmed point of sale, your sales pitch can be on song!

With analytics enabled on your website, you can track where your traffic is coming from, from which referring website and landing page, the search engine and keyword used. It tells you about the visitor’s location, their operating system, browser and monitor resolution (yes!). It gives you a snapshot of how much time the visitor spent on your site/your advertising/listing on another website, the number of pages visited, the bounce rate (percentage of users who viewed only one page before leaving), the conversion rate. It gives you precise data on your past and current traffic.

Analyze This. Go for analytics.