Are you wondering, \u201cWhat is web analytics?\u201d Web analytics is a method of collecting and analyzing data from your website. It can cover everything from what your visitors are doing, where they come from, what content they like, and a whole lot more. By using a web analytics tool to collect data, you\u2019ll be able to know what is and isn\u2019t working, and then steer your website in the right direction. In this article, we\u2019ll answer the question \u201cwhat is web analytics?\u201d in greater detail and discuss why it\u2019s important. We\u2019ll also talk about some website analytics tools that offer various insights. Let\u2019s talk numbers!<\/p>
Website analytics is the collection, reporting, and analysis of data generated by users visiting and interacting with a website. The goal of web analytics is to measure user behavior, optimize the user experience and flow of the website, and gain insights that aid in meeting business objectives such as increasing conversions and sales.<\/p>
There is a wealth of data available to help you understand how visitors interact with your website and identify areas for improvement. You can monitor overall traffic, bounce rate, traffic sources, new and returning visitors, time spent on site, and much more.<\/p>
Web analytics is critical to the success of your business. It enables you to better understand your site visitors and use those insights to improve the experience on your site. For example, if you discover that the majority of users on your site are using a mobile device, you can focus on making your website more mobile-friendly.<\/p>
Your content and SEO strategies can be shaped by website analytics. You can start to identify what types of content and topics perform best with your audience by looking at your most popular posts. If you notice how-to WordPress tutorials make up the majority of your top viewed posts, for example, then you might shift and narrow your focus from definition articles about anything web-related to how-to WordPress tutorials. Or perhaps you examine your site\u2019s traffic sources and notice that organic and email traffic are the most important, while paid channels are the least. In that case, you might shift resources to invest more in your organic strategy than paid.<\/p>
Web analytics is the collection, analysis, and reporting of data to better understand and optimize web usage. There is a wide range of website analytics tools that provide a simple report to examine traffic trends, track user behavior, and monitor website conversation. The top website analytics tools are listed below, along with their most popular features and website links. The list of website analytics tools compared in this article includes both open-source (free) and commercial (paid) software.<\/p>
Google Analytics is the most popular free web analytics tool out there. It\u2019s a traditional analytics solution, which means it provides real-time data about your site\u2019s traffic, such as page views, sessions, time on page, bounce rates, and other stats and metrics.<\/p>
Clicky is a web analytics software that respects your privacy. Similar to Google Analytics, it provides real-time analytics on the traffic to your website.<\/p>
Hotjar is best known for its session recordings and heatmap tools, but it also includes user feedback widgets and survey functionality. The manual event tracking setup and limited quantitative analytics capabilities of this tool are two drawbacks, which we discussed in our Hotjar alternatives article.<\/p>
Woopra is a quantitative analytics tool for tracking your customers\u2019 journeys from beginning to end. It is more adaptable than traditional analytics tools because it includes features for product, marketing, sales, and customer service teams.<\/p>
Open Web Analytics is an open-source framework that allows you to collect and analyze user behavior data with granular control. It requires programming skills to set up and run, but it is also extremely versatile, as you can use it under your domain or as part of a web app.<\/p>
Clarity is a free user behavior analytics tool from Microsoft that includes session recordings, heatmaps, automated insights, and a Google Analytics integration.<\/p>
Crazy Egg is an online analytics application with a plethora of features for tracking user behavior. It is one of the best analytics tools which enables you to understand customer interests and boost your profile from your site.<\/p>
Before we discuss how to use website analytics for SEO, let\u2019s first define SEO.<\/p>
SEO (Search Engine Optimization) refers to a wide range of activities aimed at improving a website\u2019s ranking in search engine results pages. When a user enters a query (for example, \u2018marketing agencies in Dallas\u2019) into a search engine, the websites near the top of the page are optimized for search engines and thus rank for that term.<\/p>
SEO revolves around search engine algorithms\u2014a set of rules that dictates a website\u2019s ranking for a given search query (i.e. keyword) (i.e. keyword). To determine a site\u2019s SERP ranking, the algorithm considers a variety of factors. To achieve strong SEO, your website must display qualities that the algorithm considers important. Web analytics can help with that.
Web analytics allows you to track key metrics and data points that affect how the algorithm ranks your website. Understanding this data will provide you with the insights needed to make positive adjustments, ultimately improving your website\u2019s SEO.<\/p>
The SEO analysis of a website needs to be focused on relevant data that\u2019s applicable to search engine rankings. When conducting your website SEO analysis, here are some notable metrics and data fields to pay attention to:<\/p>
These metrics indicate how much time users spend on your website. Google may consider it a negative indicator if users frequently leave your site after only a few seconds. To reduce bounce rate and increase dwell time, work on making your site\u2019s content more engaging and making sure there are no technical issues.<\/p>
Scan your website for broken links using technical analysis. If your website contains broken links that lead to 404 pages, this can hurt your website\u2019s SEO rankings. Redirect those links to a relevant page or remove them altogether.<\/p>
Measuring scroll depth (how far down the page users scroll) can help you determine the quality of your content, and it goes hand in hand with bounce rate and dwell time. To assess scroll depth, you can use a Tag Manager to track the specific scroll percentage on your site\u2019s pages.<\/p>
Examining how users move from page to page on your site can help you gain a more holistic understanding of their behavior. Which pages do they tend to gravitate towards? Are there any CTAs on your blog that aren\u2019t getting many clicks? Optimizing user journeys will, in turn, elevate the overall user experience on your site.<\/p>
You can learn what your audience is looking for by using site search tracking and reporting. If you notice a trend (e.g., the majority of searches are for pricing because your pricing page isn\u2019t in the navigation menu), this can inform both site architecture and content planning.<\/p>
Separating your visitors into distinct segments can produce granular insights that paint a more accurate picture.<\/p>
It is important to look into the sources of your website traffic. Examining your acquisition metrics, for example, will reveal which external websites are referring the most traffic to your website.<\/p>
The process of studying your competitors\u2019 online presence to understand their marketing strategies and identify potential areas of opportunity for your own business is known as competitors’ website analytics. By understanding how your competitors attract customers, you can develop a more effective online marketing strategy that sets you apart from the competition.<\/p>
Analyzing your competition\u2019s online presence can provide you with an inside scoop on what tactics work best for other businesses in your industry. This will give you insight into how to improve the effectiveness of your site by examining what works and what doesn\u2019t.<\/p>
In other words, even if your competitors\u2019 strategies aren\u2019t particularly innovative, analyzing their websites may reveal specific strategies they\u2019re employing that you\u2019re not, and that could work well for your brand as well.<\/p>
Analyzing the competition entails identifying gaps in your rivals\u2019 strategies to assist you in deciding where to invest your time and resources when creating content, optimizing your site for search engines, and so on. You can do this by following these steps:<\/p>
Identifying your competition is the first step in any competitor website analytics. Depending on how thorough you want to be, this can be done in a variety of ways. There are three main sources where you can find this information:<\/p>
Once you\u2019ve identified your competitors, it\u2019s time to analyze their websites, beginning with positioning. This involves looking at what each company is saying about itself on its website and understanding how they see itself as the rest of the industry<\/p>
Once you have a solid understanding of your competitor\u2019s business, you can begin analyzing their marketing efforts, which begins with attempting to identify their target segment. This can be tricky, as it\u2019s not always easy to tell from their website or marketing materials. There are, however, some hints you can look for.<\/p>
Until now, we\u2019ve only focused our analysis on creating the most accurate company profile for each competitor. It is now time to develop an objective assessment of the quality of each competing website to identify its strengths and weaknesses. This begins with the performance of the website and the overall user experience.<\/p>
It\u2019s time to look at your competitors\u2019 marketing funnels and see how effective they are. This includes everything from their email marketing campaigns to their retargeting efforts. The best way to understand what each competitor is doing in this space is to use it yourself.<\/p>
There are dozens of different website-building tools and platforms, and some are better suited to specific applications than others. While WordPress is used to build the majority of websites on the internet, some specialized websites are not, so it\u2019s crucial to learn what your competitors\u2019 websites were built with.<\/p>
Even though they may present their content in a variety of ways, all of your competitors have one thing in common: they publish content regularly. Content marketing is critical to the success of an organization\u2019s website. They understand that to drive traffic, convert leads, and grow their customer base, they must publish high-quality blog posts, videos, or podcasts regularly.<\/p>
Looking at a company\u2019s website can reveal insights into its SEO strategies, which can be extremely useful if your competitors are ranking higher than you on SERPs. You can improve your ranking by understanding how they optimize their website for search engines and applying the same techniques to your website.<\/p>
The final step is to combine all of the information you gathered into a spreadsheet to get a high-level view of your competitive landscape. With this information, you\u2019ll have a clear picture of where each competitor excels and where they fall short, so make a list of each competitor\u2019s flaws and highlights. This summary will serve as the primary output of the entire competitor website analysis.<\/p>
There are countless tools available for managing your website. From inventory management platforms to plug-ins that improve your site\u2019s SEO (search engine optimization), there is an entire industry dedicated to helping you get more out of your website.<\/p>
But few tools provide as much value as Google Analytics, especially when you consider that it is completely free to use!
In this section, we\u2019re going to walk you through everything you need to know about how to add Google Analytics to your website.<\/p>
Analytics can collect basic data from your website.<\/p>
Step 1: Obtain an Analytics Property ID.<\/p>
Step 2: Insert the Analytics Property ID into your website.<\/p>
Data can take up to 24 hours to appear in Analytics.<\/p>
Step 3: Examine your data<\/p>
Tip: Adding a custom path to a page or renaming a page will generate a new URL and may interfere with Analytics data tracking.<\/p>
Create a Google Analytics account:<\/p>
Here are some examples of web analytics tools and when they can be useful.<\/p>
Analytics platforms track how many users visit a website, how long they stay, how many pages they visit, which pages they visit, and whether they arrived by following a link or not.<\/p>
Off-site web analytics and on-site web analytics are the two main types of web analytics.<\/p>
It all depends. Google Analytics is the most popular free web analytics tool out there.<\/p>
It is difficult to learn Google Analytics. Despite being the most popular web analytics tool, many users lack the knowledge to decipher their data. The new version is even more difficult to master.<\/p>
Google Analytics is the most widely used web analytics tool, with over 28 million websites using it.<\/p>
Many people run their websites without paying attention to their web metrics. That strategy could work. However, because you have so many great web analytics tools at your disposal (such as Google Analytics), not using them is a waste of time.<\/p>
When it comes to web analytics, there are numerous numbers to consider. However, the most important metrics to monitor are listed above. If you can grasp these, you will have a basic understanding of what web analytics is.<\/p>