5 Keys to Unlocking the Power of Google Analytics
By Kélyn Donough
Today’s marketers need to know how the Google Analytics tool works in order to get the most out of optimizing their sites for search engines. This tool gives you insight into what sources were responsible for sending visitors to your site and then what those visitors did once on your site. The following definitions are useful in getting a better understanding about what the Analytics tool is reporting on.
1. The meaning of bounce rate.
The bounce rate is the percentage of people visiting your site who then leave without visiting another page and not simply the number of people who left the site after landing on it. Single- page websites will always have a high bounce rate due to not having any additional pages to visit.
2. The meaning of session duration.
Google does not use a timer to measure how long users have been on your site but simply calculates the average session durations based on the difference between the time of day that you entered the first page and the time that you entered the last page.
3. Tag links.
If you are sending out any content like a newsletter, make sure to tag a link of your website in the mailer to find out how many users are performing a given action on your site. By tagging links you automatically guarantee that you will be able to track where your visitors are coming from.
4. Link Analytics to AdWords and AdWords to Analytics.
When you link Google Analytics to AdWords it allows you to track all the information of your campaigns in Analytics and find out patterns that will maximise profitability. Another option is to link the two platforms from AdWords. This allows you to import new columns in AdWords, such as the bounce rate, time on the site and pages viewed per session.
Google Analytics is there to provide you with as much data on how your site is viewed by the search engine as possible and this can only improve performance if you know how to use it properly. It is important to focus on key issues such as finding the pages that cause the highest exit rate on the website, the geographic areas with the best customers and the most common target age and gender. Once you’ve got a handle on this sort of data you will be able to use it across several marketing channels.
