If you are looking to gain a better understanding of your customers and gather information that could help you to better shape your website around their needs, interests and consumer behaviour then a web analytics service such as Google Analytics, Heap Analytics or New Relic could provide the perfect tool for your business.
Far from being just a simple platform to measure visitor traffic, such software products can provide a tool for business and market research, alongside enabling you to assess and improve the effectiveness of your website.
Here’s 5 key ways you can begin using a web analytics tool to track and improve your digital activity
Track where your visitors are coming from online
Web analytics can help you to understand how your visitors have come to your website and how many of them are new or returning visitors. You can collect information on what browsers your customers are using, how they were directed to your site (such as from another site, social media, organic search or paid for advertising) and how the visitors behaved once they reached the landing page. This information could help you determine how your marketing activities are working to drive traffic to your website and whether your customers are repeat users!
Find out what is and isn’t keeping your visitors engaged!
Detailed information about the pages of your website will help you to determine which content is gaining the most attention and how long people are spending on your site, alongside how quickly people are leaving your site and insights into why this might be happening. By understanding the content your visitors are engaging with, you can ensure you’re generating the types of content and copy that are going to be most effective for your business aims.
Discover the devices consumers are using to browse your site
As mobile has overtaken laptops and personal computers as the preferred device to access the internet, it will be important for businesses to understand specifically how their customers are deciding to access their website. By accessing analytics on the types of devices used to visit your website, you will be able to tailor your content, design and layout accordingly rather than hoping for the best!
Where in the world are your customers?
Whether your business deals with consumers locally or worldwide, it is beneficial to understand important information such as where your site visitors are coming from, their chosen language and other key demographics such as age and gender. This will help you to develop a more in-depth understanding of who your potential customers are and the particular areas of the world that you are a hit with!
How do you compare to competitors?
Although not entirely comprehensive, tools such as Google Analytics’ benchmarking screen can enable you to compare your own traffic stats to those of your competition. It’s important to bear in mind that this data isn’t 100% accurate but it’s a great starting point to understand how your business matches up in relation to traffic and average time spent on the site. This information can help you determine how and where you can start making improvements to your own site depending on how you may be underperforming.