Get Ahead Of The Analytics Game
Here are our top four tips for using analytics and getting ahead of the game in doing so.
1) USE IT!
When launching a site, most companies do set up a Google analytics account but are often discouraged by the confusing data sets, but the only way to learn how it can best serve your business is by playing around with the site (plus the useful fundamental GA course by Google Academy).
Once mastered, it is a great tool to see how your content is performing, learn ways to manage your budget and drive conversions.
2) Exclude Internal Traffic
You probably visit your website for various reasons, but what you may or may not know is that google analytics is collecting this data and your visits could be skewing your information.
To prevent this, if you have a static IP address you can exclude the traffic by following these steps; – Go to Admin panel within your GA Account – Under ‘Account’ select ‘All filters’ (note: if you do not have full user permission you will not be able to access this – find someone who does!).
There will be a red button labelled ‘+Add Filter’ – Once selected, add a name for the filter (e.g. Internal traffic), select your filter type as ‘Exclude’, your source or destination as ‘Traffic from the IP addresses’, and select expression as ‘that are equal to’
Finally, apply the filter to your website data and Save. and hey presto, data collected now excludes your internal traffic.
3) Compare Statistics And Use Longer Date Ranges
By default, Google analytics displays data from the past 30 days. This view is good to monitor the website based on recent activity. However, sometimes it’s easy to miss content that is attracting attention at a certain time until you see the actual data.
To get a better scope of what is going on and to notice any trends in your data, set your date range for longer periods of time and/or compare them to the previous year.
This can help you identify which content you can capitalise on, which marketing channels are bringing you the most traffic, which geographical locations to target and so on.
Having this information readily available enables you to make better-informed recommendations based on any spikes in data (or lack of!).
4) Check For Device Differences
Is your audience coming to your site via your website or via mobile?
We are more connected than ever, and more people are accessing the internet on their mobiles or tablets. Mobile users visiting a website which isn’t compatible with their device on average will spend less time browsing your site and are less likely to convert.
Given the complex customer journey, consumers do their research before making a final conversion. Google Analytics enables you to dig deeper and see any device differences when it comes to mobile.
To locate the mobile report within Google Analytics, click on the audience section on the left-hand side panel.
Once selected, you will be able to see which visitors are using what device, page specific metrics, geographical metrics and other related metrics.
We all know how complicated Google Analytics can be and some companies struggle to make use of the data that they have, but once you have grasped the fundamentals it is a goldmine.
Are you struggling to turn your data into insights? Call us on 01803 203387 or email hamish@hra-global.com.
