Google Analytics: Valuable Reports & Metrics

Before using Google Analytics for this blog, I had only watched tutorials on how to use the tool and read over some of the free lessons Google provides on using its analytics tool online.  I’ll be the first to admit that I had no idea what I was looking at during the first few times I attempted to review some of the reports and metrics.  As I began to click through more and more of the reports, I also However, as time went on I slowly but surely began to put some (and still no where close to all) of the pieces together and finally understand how valuable the tool can be.  Now, not only have I discovered how valuable Google Analytics can be for bloggers, but also how valuable it can be for marketers and companies in nearly any industry.  Through custom reports and filters, Google Analytics allows you to track the data you want to track in order to reach the goals you set. 

Although fully understanding how to utilize all or even most of the data available through Google Analytics would take a lot longer than the few weeks I have spent using the tool, I have already come across quite a few measurements and reports that I feel are valuable for a blog such as this one. 

Google Analytics standard reports are broken into three sections; audience, acquisition, and behavior.  According to Google Analytics online support, the Audience reports help to better understand who makes up your audience, how the audience is reaching your site and consuming your site’s content, and their level of loyalty and engagement (About the Audience reports, 2013).  The Acquisition reports give insight on how you acquire users, how users behave on your after you acquire them, and user conversion patterns (Acquisition overview, 2013).  And last but definitely not least, the Behavior reports can provide you with the necessary information you need to create effective content and improve your overall site in order to meet visitors’ expectations (About Behavior, 2013). 

Here is an overview of some of the reports and metrics I have found to be the most helpful:

·      Demographics/Interests: These reports can tell you a lot about who your visitors are.   Demographics are broken down by age and gender and interests are broken down into affinity categories, in-market categories, and other categories.  “This data is also available in custom reports, and you can use it as the basis for segmentation, which lets you evaluate how your users' behavior varies by demographics and interests; for example, do males interested in automobiles convert more frequently or read specific types of content more than females who are interested in athletic apparel” (Overview of Demographics & Interests reports, 2013). 

·      Mobile: The number of smartphone and tablet owners is continuing to grow and as technology continues to develop, consumers are becoming more and more comfortable with using their mobile devices to perform activities they may have previously only done on a desktop.  According to Keizer (2013), in April of this year, “mobile browser usage—a combination of browsing from smartphones and tablets—surged by 1.4 percentage points to account for 13.2% of all unique visitors to the 40,000 websites that California-based Net Applications monitors for clients.” Analyzing the mobile traffic to your site can help you determine whether or not your site’s design should accommodate mobile devices.  Navigating the desktop version of a website can easily become frustrating on a mobile device, which could result in mobile users having a high bounce rate because they quickly after discovering there is no mobile site or the mobile site has not been set-up for an optimal user experience. 

·      Channels:  This a new acquisition report that allows me to view visitors’ Acquisition-Behavior-Conversion (ABC) cycle for each channel driving traffic to my site.  GA provides all users with eight default channels which include direct, email, generic organic search, referral, generic paid search, social, and other (New Acquisitions Reporting, 2013).  Not only will this data show me which channels are acquiring the most users, but more importantly, which channels are acquiring the most engaged users and which channels are acquiring the most users that result in a conversion (New Acquisition Reporting, 2013). 

·      Referrals:  This report is important because it shows me the sites referring traffic to my site, the landing pages for each referring site, and the referred visitors interactions with my site.  From this information I can determine which sites are sending me the most valuable and least valuable visitors, which may prompt me to build new marketing relationships and or strengthen existing relationships with the sites sending the most valuable visitors and cut off relationships that are continuously sending invaluable visitors. 

·      Keywords:  This report is important because it allows you to see the words and terms people are searching for when they arrive on your website.  Google Analytics breaks this report down between paid and organic.  The report shows which keywords drive the most traffic to your site but also which one’s are most valuable by showing the average time spent on your site, the percentage of new visitors, and the bounce rate for each keyword.  Additionally, the report allows you to see the most popular landing pages for each keyword.  Knowing the keywords people use when coming to your site along with their engagement level can help you tailor your content to show up in a higher placement for organic searches.  It can also help you tailor your paid search strategy in order to get the most out of your money.  Additionally, knowing which keywords produce the most valuable visitors can help you generate content ideas in order to keep these users satisfied. 

·      Landing Pages: The landing pages analysis can be helpful for a variety of reasons but for bloggers, knowing the top pages visitors are entering your site on can help you to better understand the general topics and or information people seem to be most interested in.  Additionally, according to the Google article, Analysis Techniques for Google Organic Search and SEO, “Landing pages are a good signal for analyzing organic search traffic because each landing page has likely been created around a focus keyword, product, or theme. As a result, incoming keyword searches generally relate to the focus of the page. You can see which organic searches on Google relate to which landing pages on your site.” 

References:

About behavior. (2013). Retrieved from https://support.google.com/analytics/answer/2404517?hl=en&ref_topic=1120718

About the audience reports. (2013 ). Retrieved from https://support.google.com/analytics/answer/1012034?hl=en

Acquisition overview. (2013). Retrieved from https://support.google.com/analytics/answer/3196960?hl=en&ref_topic=3125765

Analysis techniques for google organic search and seo. (2013). Retrieved from https://support.google.com/analytics/answer/3306157?hl=en&ref_topic=1308589

Audience: Mobile. (2013). Retrieved from https://support.google.com/analytics/answer/1011360?hl=en&ref_topic=1007027

Keizer, G. (2013, March 25). Mobile's browser usage share jumps 26% in three months. Retrieved from http://www.computerworld.com/s/article/9237855/Mobile_s_browser_usage_share_jumps_26_in_three_months

New acquisitions reporting & channels shows a more complete picture of your users & marketing. (2013, October 09). Retrieved from http://analytics.blogspot.com/2013/10/new-acquisitions-reporting-channels.html

Overview of demographics and interest reports. (2013). Retrieved from https://support.google.com/analytics/answer/2799357

Referral traffic. (2013). Retrieved from https://support.google.com/analytics/answer/1247839?hl=en

     Using the seo reports. (2013). Retrieved from https://support.google.com/analytics/answer/1308

Comparing Google AdWords & Facebook Advertising

            After viewing informative YouTube videos on Google Adwords and Facebook advertising, both seemed to offer users streamlined and easy-to-follow instructions on how to create a campaign.  AdWords lays out how to get started on your first campaign in four steps: 1) Choose your budget; 2) Create your ads; 3) Select keywords; and 4) Enter your billing information (Getting Started with Google AdWords, 2009).  Facebook lays out a very similar process where users begin with choosing a budget and continue creating the campaign from there.  Both allow you to access your account at anytime as well as the ability to start or stop running an ad at any time.  Also, AdWords and Facebook both use keyword bidding.

One main difference between the two was immediately evident was the way users are able to target their ads.  Google AdWords allows users to target Google searches in order to reach audiences most relevant to their ads.  AdWords also offers geographic targeting where you are able to target internationally, nationally, by region, state, city, etc.  According to the YouTube video, Getting Started with Google AdWords, this can be as “specific as users searching for dog toys within 20 miles of San Francisco.” AdWords doesn’t use any Facebook user information to target ads.

On the other hand, Facebook only uses the information provided on Facebook user’s profiles.  User location, demographics, likes and interests, education, work or workplace, and connections are used for Facebook ad targeting.  Connections are broken down into three categories, which include: 1) Users already connected to your page, event, group, or application; 2) Users who are not already connected to your page, event, group, or application; and 3) Users whose friends are connected to your page, event, group, or application (Facebook Tutorials-How to Advertise on Facebook, 2010). 

            I personally prefer the ability to target by search with Google AdWords.  Between the targeting capabilities offered by both tools, I feel like this is likely to be accurate form of targeting regarding relevancy.  I also think AdWords allows for more specific targeting.  Because of this I would most likely (but still depending in the audience, brand, and product/service/idea) use AdWords when there is a more specific target audience because the relevancy of the ads would help increase the likelihood of a click resulting in a sale. 

            Facebook ‘s targeting seems to be broader in terms of the ability to define a very specific target audience based on users recent inquiries outside of the Facebook network.  Because the ads are targeted using information only provided from user profiles, it may be difficult to provide relevant information because there is no way to tell how long it has been since someone updated their profile information.  Due to the lack of specific targeting compared to AdWords, I would use the Facebook advertising tool for targeting a broader audience and increasing brand awareness. If I was to use Facebook advertising to drive sales, I would only target current Facebook fans for my brand because they are already aware and engaged.

References:

(2009, June 15). Getting Started with Google AdWords [Web Video]. Retrieved from http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tx2L6EGa9DY

(2010, April 05). Facebook Tutorials-How to Advertise on Facebook [Web Video]. Retrieved from http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8jOBDIql4yc

Without Conversation There Is No Social

To be completely honest, the debate regarding whether content or conversation is “king” of social marketing really got my head spinning.  After reading Greenberg’s Content is King of Social Marketing, I was sold.  It made complete sense that content would rule over conversation because you can’t have a conversation if there is no content to talk about.  But after reading Novak’s Why Conversation, not Content, is King, my views began to change. 

Content does not always result in conversation and I believe conversation is what drives social media.  As Novak (2010) points out, “Content without conversation is just broadcasting, or just advertising.”  If the content does not trigger a conversation, then where is the social aspect?

However, I still wasn’t completely convinced that conversation was “king” until I started looking at how social networking sites like Facebook work.  If I post a status on my Facebook fan page, my status will pop up on the news feeds of all of my “followers”.  For this example, lets say I have 100 “followers” on my Facebook fan page.  Now, although my status offers valuable and relevant information, what happens if none of my followers are prompted to “like”, “share”, or comment on my status?  The answer is that status goes no further than my 100 followers. 

But, what if I wrote a status that was still relevant and informative (maybe even a little less informative) but was able to get just a couple “likes” and three comments all from different people?  For this example we will assume each of these people has 100 friends because Facebook indicates that 100 is the median friend count on its social network (Backstrom, 2011).  Now my status would appear on the newsfeeds of my 100 followers and on the newsfeeds of the” friends” of each person who interacted with my status (I’m referring to those who liked or commented on my status as “people” rather than my “followers” because as previously mentioned, once one of my followers has liked, shared, or commented on my status, that follower’s interaction with my status will show up on the newsfeeds of the follower’s friends.  That follower’s friends can then like, share, or comment on my status even if they don’t follow me, ultimately exposing my status as well as my brand to even more people).  This means my status could potentially reach 600 people just by receiving a couple “likes” and three comments. 

I realize this number is probably a bit high since it is likely some of my followers would have mutual friends, but you get the point.  Without conversation, my status only has the potential to reach my 100 followers.  With conversation, that number grows with each like, share, or comment.  Conversation wins again when I respond to the comments in a timely fashion, which could potentially, generate even more likes and more comments.  In summary, one interaction with my status from one follower opens up potential interactions with that status to every person who is “friends” with that specific follower on Facebook. 

Greenberg (2009) also suggests adding the development of your social content to your marketing calendar.  But if you develop all of your content ahead of time, the information may not be as relevant by the time you go to post it.  Plus, being social doesn’t always require a brand to spend hours thinking of what to say.  Sometimes posting a relevant post in the spur of the moment can generate the best conversation. It doesn’t even necessarily have to be a full thought.  For example, during the Super Bowl blackout this year, Oreo tweeted “You can still dunk in the dark.”  The tweet resulted in 15,811 retweets and 2,200 new followers (Costa, 2013).  The social media marketers for Oreo simply listened to what consumers were actively talking about and joined in the conversation.

Of course content is still important.  However, I believe the content must be developed around the idea of creating good conversation or adding to conversations consumers are already having.  If social content doesn’t generate some form of conversation, then what are really the odds of it being effective? 

References: 

Backstrom, L. (2011, November 21). Anatomy of facebook. Retrieved from https://www.facebook.com/notes/facebook-data-team/anatomy-of-facebook/10150388519243859

Costa, J. (2013, September 19). Brand building: Connecting with consumers through social media. Retrieved from http://www.huffingtonpost.com/jose-costa/brand-building_b_3950341.html

Greenberg, M. (2009, October 20). Content is king of social marketing. Retrieved from http://multichannelmerchant.com/social-media/content-is-king-of-social-marketing-20102009/

Novak, C. (2010, July 27). Why conversation, not content, is king. Retrieved from http://socialmediatoday.com/wordspring/152636/why-conversation-not-content-king