One of the hardest things about analytics is really being able to pinpoint where your page views are coming from. Once you have that down it can be much easier to decide where to focus your marketing efforts. Below are a few articles from top bloggers showing which tools are useful for analytics and which are not.
Also included is a social sharing report for Google analytics that shows specifically what content is getting shared and on which social networks it’s being shared on. This can be very helpful to identify which social networks your viewer’s use more frequently.
15 Brilliant Products For Web Analysts
As a web analyst, your job is incredibly important. Without you, how do developers, designers, marketers, and website owners know who their visitors really are, let alone what they enjoy? Well, they might have a hunch, but your job is to give them exact information. While the field was once a combination of guesswork and vague data, web analytics is slightly less “foggy” nowadays: With easier data tracking and a wide array of comprehensive tools, getting to know a website’s visitors is becoming easier with each passing day. The following list highlights our 15 favorite analytics tools that range from visitor analyzers to email trackers.
1. UserTesting.com | www.usertesting.com
Usability testing is one of the most beneficial things you can do for your website: There’s really no better way to see how effective a website’s design is than looking over the user’s shoulder! Doing this, however, tends to be both time consuming and expensive. Thanks to UserTesting.com, however, it doesn’t have to be. Their software not only helps you keep track of who visits your website, but also tells you what exactly they’re doing! With prices starting at around $39 per participant, UserTesting.com is one of the web’s most affordable usability programs.
See all 15 products for web analysts from Web Analytics Book here
Web Analytics Consulting: A Simple Framework For Smarter Decisions
As I’ve gotten older I’ve come to appreciate the value of frameworks a lot more.
When we are young, the answers to everything are simpler because, of course, we know everything.
What metrics should I use? Use BR & CV. What digital marketing works? Definitely Y, do that. How can I improve my business? Simple, do A then B and you’re done. So on and so forth.
One upside (or is it a downside?) of age is the wisdom of realizing how much you don’t know. Suddenly you don’t have concrete answers because you realize: 1. You usually lack all the information you need and 2. Even the most mundane and obvious situations are incredibly complex and unique.
So you start answering questions like “What is two plus two?” with “Tell me a little bit more about what you are adding” or “It really depends on the process you use to add them” or … you get my point.
This is the main reason I love frameworks. They don’t contain answers; rather, they help place a situation or a process or steps and encourage you to think a certain way. They force you to step back and think. They make you go talk to other people. They force you to say “hmmm …” And if you can make a person think, if you can encourage them to cover all the bases, if you can get them to ask themselves some tough questions, then you have given them the greatest gift of all. Not the pat answers, but rather the way to figure out the best answers for themselves all by themselves.
See the full article on web analytics consulting from Kaushik here
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Social Sharing Report for Google Analytics
A friend recently asked me for a Google Analytics report that shows which content is getting shared on a site and on which social networks it’s being shared on.
No problem, that’s a job for a custom report!
Rather than just a simple data dump, I want to explore this segment of people: the people who take the time to share my content.
I want to understand:
1. Have these people been to the site before?
2. Where do they come from?
3. What do they share?
4. How do they share it?
5. What impact does it have on my business?
I added all of this information to the custom report.
Download the Social Sharing report and add it to your Google Analytics account.
A bit caveat to this report: you need to use the social tracking code or you’ll just see lots of Google+ events.
And this isn’t data that I would review daily. Maybe bi-weekly or monthly. Unless someone needed it sooner.
On to the report and data!
The social sharing report starts with a basic trend of social actions. These are people clicking on your Tweet buttons, +1 buttons, etc.
You can use the trend over time to look for any patterns. For example, if you blog or promote your content in any way (like via email), you probably see spike on the dates that you publish or the dates that you promote your content.
See the full social sharing report from Cutroni here
Below is an article from Chris Sturk from Mequoda on analytics and content:
Analytics and Your Content – Finding True Value
Analytics only have value to those who know how to interpret the data
We’ve been talking about video content a lot lately because it is one of the cornerstones of online content creation. In the process of creating great online video content, some digital publishers have turned to private hosting websites because the associated analytics are more comprehensive. Amanda MacArthur has written about the differences between free and paid hosting sites in this article, in case you are interested in the topic.
For all types of online content – from video to written articles – analytics play a huge part. Without knowing the most popular content your audience is turning to, you have no idea how to focus your content creation efforts. You cannot properly target and allocate resources in the right places without understanding your analytics. And this is the main reason we’ve developed our new webinar Understanding Google Analytics, so digital publishers can learn which metrics are the most important in their content publishing endeavors.
See the full article from Chris here
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