Identify the language your visitors Google analytics-workshop-open-access-workshop-august-2010-slideshare

Google Analytics Client Workshop How to use Google Analytics to improve your web site and online marketing John Duffy Marketing Director, Nemisys john@nemisys.uk.com 01189 122226

Google Analytics - Agenda Introductions<br />What is analytics? Page tagging vs log files Basics User & administrator set up The dashboard Working with dates Spark lines Different views for different news Visitors Map overlay Landing pages & bounce rates Site search Traffic sources Clever functionality Report distribution Google Analytics help & support The really useful part Segmentation Within reports Working with profiles Some useful profiles Working with filters Some useful filters Working with advanced segments Some useful advanced segments Choice: profiles vs advanced segments Truly measuring performance Goals Funnels Campaign measurement Reporting Pulling it all together in to a report Homework Action plan Further reading

Nemisys Client Workshops <ul><li>This is one of a series of workshops we run for our clients

Workshops run either in-house or open access where we take up to 6 clients a day

The purpose is simple – if your web site works better for you, you may win more budget to further develop it. </li></ul>We also want choosing to work with Nemisys to be a “career-enhancing” decision! <ul><li>See www.nemisys.uk.com/workshops for more information

Or email john@nemisys.uk.com</li></li></ul><li>Before we start – your history

Aims for today Learn the usefulness and limitations of analytics Learn your way around Google Analytics Learn how to set up and interpret reports and profiles Define online goals for your day to day activities Start to measure the effectiveness of your (online) marketing Build a “better” structure for your monthly reports Show you how to save money online shopping

Over to you <ul><li>Introductions and roles

How do you use your web site?</li></li></ul><li>Fundamental question Q. “Is 10 registrations a day on our site good or bad?”

Correct answer <ul><li>A. “I’ve no idea, but 10 on Monday, 11 on Tuesday, 12 on Wednesday etc is great!”</li></li></ul><li>What is analytics? <ul><li>Measuring what happens on your web site

Measuring other promotional activity

Setting and progressing towards goals

And ideally, making sure you plan in at specification stage how what success looks like</li></li></ul><li>Analytics ‘history’ - log files

Analytics ‘history’ – log files<br />

Log file report - Urchin<br />

Analytics tools – page tagging<br />

Urchin vs Google Analytics <ul><li>Numbers differ

Not worth getting in to too much detail, but plenty you can read

BUT, if you insist on comparing old with new:

Work out a conversion factor in parallel sets of data and use that going forward (but be warned, it’s messy)</li></li></ul><li>Why Google Analytics? <ul><li>Level 1 – out of the box tagging/reporting

Level 2 – bend the reports to better understand your web site

Level 3 – bend your tagging to (eg) record on-page activities, Flash activity, ecommerce activity

Remember - You have both – Urchin and Google Analytics</li></li></ul><li>Use analytics to your advantage

So let’s dive in <ul><li>www.google.com/analytics</li></ul>Not got a Google Account yet? <ul><li>https://www.google.com/accounts/newaccount

Use your work email address</li></ul>Or for today, if you do not have access to your work email address, use an email address you can access, then change it later – I’ll show you how

Help & support 

Get stuck in, explore <ul><li>Don’t be afraid to get stuck in

Explore the reports – there are new reports added all the time

I’d guestimate that there have been 20 fundamental improvements in the last 2 years, so do get used to using the online help to remind and steer you – I DO!</li></li></ul><li>Where you can look for help / tips <ul><li>How to videos - http://youtube.com/googleanalytics

GA support - http://google.com/support/googleanalytics

GA blog - http://analytics.blogspot.com/

Webmaster tools - http://googlewebmastercentral.blogspot.com/

My blog, analytics posts & tips - http://www.nemisys.uk.com/blogs/nemisys/Default.asp?keyword=analytics</li></li></ul><li>Basics 1 - user set up

Basics 2 – dashboard Shows “most useful” reports – that’s subjective! Add up to 12 reports Reorder and delete reports

Essential concepts - averages <ul><li>Averages are your enemy

EXCEPT within tightly defined segments or for specific pages

BAD – bounce rate across a whole site

GOOD – bounce rate for a specific page</li></li></ul><li>Basics 3 – date ranges Defaults to last 31 days Change to view 1 month Change to view 1 week Change to compare 2 months

Exercise – date ranges <ul><li>View 1 month

View 1 week

Compare March and February

Align start/end days when comparing date ranges</li></li></ul><li> Basics 4 – comparing metrics <ul><li>Get used to exploring the reports and comparing figures</li></li></ul><li>Basics 5 – spark lines Watch spark lines to spot anomalies worth looking in to

Exercise – spark lines <ul><li>Can you spot any activity worth looking in to on your spark lines?</li></li></ul><li>Basics 6 - views Cut data in different views to provide insight

Basics 7 – report distribution<br />Report distribution Top link to set up an email Left link to see all of the emails you’ve set up across the whole site

Exercise – report distribution <ul><li>Identify some useful scheduled reports for your site

Set up some scheduled reports for your site to your colleagues</li></li></ul><li>Basics 8 - segmentation <ul><li>Metrics – basic counts of things that happen on your site, like visitors, page views etc

Dimensions – attributes that the basic action create, like time on site, new vs returning visitors and keywords used to reach you

That’s much easier with an example</li></ul>Top content & bounce rate

Visitors – sessions & uniques<br />Sessions Unique visitors

Visitors - new & returning<br />Absolute numbers are OK But differences between segments are much more interesting Bounce rates Conversions Revenues

Map overlay Zoom from country to city level Use for targeting cost per click adverts Measure goals by campaign and geography?

Exercise – map overlay <ul><li>Is geography important to you

Overseas offices?

Overseas sales drives?

UK-only traffic

City-specific traffic?

Landing pages per city maybe for local events?</li></li></ul><li>Landing pages and bounce rate Spot best performers Improve problem pages There’s no “right” or “wrong” figure But don’t just look at rates – concentrate on high volume pages

Landing pages and source Drill in to individual landing pages to see where the visitors came from

Homework – landing pages <ul><li>Identify 3 landing pages using the following criteria:</li></ul>High volume of entrants (so you don’t spend effort with insignificant rewards) Significant bounce rate <ul><li>Over the next month, reduce the bounce rates for each page</li></li></ul><li>Site search How many people searched? How often did they search? What for? Any problem content?

Homework <ul><li>Now search tagging is enabled, use it to:

Identify problem areas on your site

Identify the language your visitors use to check you’re “jargon free”</li></li></ul><li>Traffic sources Referring sites Search engines Keywords used Campaign traffic

Profiles <ul><li>A profile is a report, created by filtering (ie discarding) some information as the analysis is done

Useful profiles might be:</li></ul>Subdomains Microsites<br />Site sections UK visitors Paid search visitors <ul><li>Profiles are also useful for controlling access when administering users</li></li></ul><li>Creating a profile Overview page > add new profile Work through the wizard, probably choosing: Existing domain UK Then overview page > edit profile Default page = default.asp Exclude query string parameters = blank Currency displayed as = GBP Yes, an e-commerce site Do track site search, query parameter = searchexpression But do check the query parameter by doing a search on your site! Result = a new profile that will behave exactly like your main profile from this point forwards, unless we apply some filters to it

Filters and profiles <ul><li>Filters make your profiles useful, by allowing you to focus on a specific segment of visitors

They cut out the “noise” created by visitors who you aren’t interested in for the specific piece of functionality you are looking at

Examples of useful filters:</li></li></ul><li>Applying filters to profiles Before we start: <ul><li>NEVER apply filters to your base profile or you will discard information</li></ul>Stuff to understand <ul><li>New profiles can’t look back in time – you start to record information from the day when you set the profile up</li></ul>Advanced segments can look backwards though <ul><li>You need to reapply your “settings” (home page, site search etc) when you set up a new profile

Then apply filters</li></li></ul><li>Filter - subdirectory<br />If you have a microsite, intranet or extranet running in a separate folder So here, we are isolating people who use our Ecards system at www.nemisys.uk.com/ecards

Filter – new visitors only<br />Here, I just want new visitors as I already know I can “convert” returning visitors

Filter – exclude other domains<br />Because anyone can add your tag to their site, you might want to set up a filter that excludes all traffic from other sites This actually happened to Nemisys - a developer in India ripped our site and rebadged it for a client. The other site showed up in our numbers until a polite email suggesting they shouldn’t pay their developer found its way to them ... 

Filter – visitors from organic search If you’re focussing on SEO, this is a useful profile to help measure your progress Remember – search rankings are old hat. This lets you monitor true success – visitors who convert

Filter – exclude your staff<br />If you know your IP company address(es), you can exclude traffic from staff Or flip the logic on its head and look at only traffic from staff if that’s useful to you

Filter – UK visitors Useful if overseas visitors really are irrelevant to you

Exercise – set up a new profile <ul><li>Call it something you’ll recognise</li></li></ul><li>Setting GoalsSegmentationTracking your marketing activity

Fundamental question <ul><li>So what?

Or more constructively

So what now?</li></li></ul><li>Reporting your goals<br />First, let’s define them! For our purposes, a goal is a meaningful outcome for your business Example goals: Submitted the contact form Made a donation Made a purchase Registered for an event Support log ins Split in to pairs and come up with a list of goals for your site

Our goals <ul><li>To complete – list of goals we’ll aim to add</li></li></ul><li>Beyond goals to funnels Measure the progress from 1 page to another, finishing in a goal Can be simple – submitting a form Or more complex – a basket & checkout process Review your goals – are there any funnels that we should set up?

Measuring your goals <ul><li>Default measure is percentage, not absolutes

But there’s a custom report to give you the absolute figures</li></li></ul><li>Goals - getting to the numbers Default report gives %ages only This custom report gives absolute numbers

After goals – segmentation Level 1 – within reports Level 2 – profiles Level 3 – advanced segments

Segments – “best” approach <ul><li>Drill in to and pivot the STANDARD REPORTS to identify interesting segments

Use PROFILES and FILTERS to “clean” your data</li></ul>And to produce reports for segments you know you will be interested in long term <ul><li>Use ADVANCED SEGMENTS to explore your profiles</li></li></ul><li>Segments again - advanced <ul><li>Simple exploration we’ve covered

Beta service – advanced segments

Portable across profiles AND accounts

Retrospective analysis</li></li></ul><li>Exercise – profiles & filters <ul><li>Set up a new profile and apply a filter that will be useful for you in preparing your reports</li></li></ul><li>Advanced segments <ul><li>A great way to fish about in your reports

Unlike profiles, can look backwards

But don’t be tempted to use INSTEAD of profiles

Use Google’s default segments

And add your own</li></li></ul><li>Suggested segments<br /><ul><li>Member activity (this should really be a profile too)

UK visitors

Specific sources

What other segments are relevant to your organisation?</li></li></ul><li>Campaign measurement <ul><li>GA “automatically” measures your Adwords

But can also measure your other marketing activity, such as:</li></ul>Banner adverts Exchanged/paid links Click-throughs from email Click-throughs from other documents

Campaign measurement Examples <ul><li>http://www.nemisys.uk.com/portfolio_item.asp?section=00010001000800010001&itemid=23

http://www.englishgolfunion.org/?utm_source=nemisys&utm_medium=web&utm_campaign=portfolio</li></li></ul><li>Campaign measurement http://www.google.com/support/googleanalytics/bin/answer.py?answer=55578&topic=11014 (or Google “Google URL builder”) Produce a coherent approach to record all campaigns in to a master report, and making it easy for people to choose new tracking URLs

Pulling it all together <ul><li>“Management” likes it all in 1 place – and in fact that’s a useful discipline

Use MS Excel to bring together most important numbers

Over a series of months and years

To focus on trends and campaigns</li></li></ul><li>Real world actions <ul><li>Let’s make a 1 month action plan for improving your site’s performance</li></ul>Implement all of your goals so that you start to measure against objectives Identify 3 landing pages to tweak and reduce bounce rate / improve goal conversion Identify 2 current campaigns – how can we improve them?

Cutting your shopping bill <ul><li>Just browse before you buy</li></ul>Say you visit and purchase something in December Then revisit in Feb, but just browse without even signing in Top end analytics systems will tie the visits together via your cookies and don’t be surprised if you receive an email containing the products you browsed To really reel them in, add the product to your basket and then leave ... <ul><li>And only respond to the type of offers you prefer</li></li></ul><li>Further reading Blogs, hints & tips <ul><li>But this book - http://www.advanced-web-metrics.com/

Helpful if you have lots of time to devote to analytics, highly entertaining - http://www.kaushik.net/avinash/

My blog (analytics tag) - http://www.nemisys.uk.com/blogs/nemisys/Default.asp?keyword=analytics</li></ul>Online help How to videos - http://youtube.com/googleanalytics GA support - http://google.com/support/googleanalytics GA blog - http://analytics.blogspot.com/ Webmaster tools - http://googlewebmastercentral.blogspot.com/