Using analytics is collecting a report and analysis of web data to understand and optimize web usage. Businesses use analytics to evaluate and improve the effectiveness of a website.Analytics is the data you need to track in order to know what your online community wants, develop engaging content, support the community, and meet your goals.It is used to see the reach and engagement, audience type and size and responsiveness. It’s an amazing tool that offers incredible improvement in your online presence. Monitoring your social media analytics can make the difference between the success or failure of your social media existence.
There are two categories of web analytics; off-site and on-site web analytics. Off-site web analytics refers to web analysis regardless of whether you own or maintain a website. It includes the measurement of a site’s potential audience, opportunity, visibility, and “buzz” (comments) that is happening on the internet in general.
On-site web analytics, the most common type, measure a visitor’s behavior once on your website. For example, which of the pages lead to engagement, online purchases, etc. On-site web analytics measures the performance of your website. This data is typically compared weekly or monthly and is used to improve a website or marketing campaign’s audience response. New tools are developing that provide further types of information, including heat maps and actual replays of site visits.
Analytics will answer many questions that can be overwhelming you while coming up with content and developing social media presence. Which of your online marketing campaigns, anything from news to videos to promotions, are the most successful in terms of bringing traffic and conversions to your website? Where are most of the site visits originated from…your emails, website or from search engines? Where are most of your followers based? Analytics can get specific, depending on your needs. Common methods include number of clicks, click paths, new visitors, page time viewed and geolocation of visitors.
First, determine your needs as a business. A company’s needs, perceived or actual, will be based on their size, complexity of information, budget, analytical manpower etc. For most businesses, the mail goal is for the sites to generate leads and potential sales.There’s a difference between knowing what the statistics show and knowing which ones are meaningful.Knowing what data matters, and what doesn’t, is critical to creating a social media analytical tracking system.
As you are growing your audience you need to make sure you have the right audience profile. Research your followers. For example, on Twitter, you can run a report to see what categories of people are part of your profile. For example, they may be entrepreneurs, marketers etc. They could be in your target area or across the world. While using analytics, you are developing a deep understanding of your group of followers, their journey, and how to optimize the path to leads and sales.On a weekly basis assess your audience growth and compare this with your competitors. Also assess the people that are unfollowing you where possible.
Now, what to do with the data collected from analytics?Data collection and management with analytics provides a single, comprehensive view of the customer that can be customized to your needs and shared across the organization. Put your data together in a way that’s easy for your team to understand. Add to a working document with weekly or monthly reports.
On a regular basis, you should be analyzing your content to see what’s working and not working. For example, are videos, images or text updates working best? And are you getting engagement on your questions? And most importantly, how can you improve your social media performance?
Whether you want to boost sales or find more users, analytics has the features you need to improve your business across your sites and apps. It also provides an insight into critical areas in your website that may require improvement and accordingly create opportunities for attracting greater online traffic.
