Analytics … Analytics … A word that we
have been hearing quite a lot lately. So what exactly is Analytics? According
to Wikipedia, analytics is defined as the discovery and communication of
meaningful patterns in data. If that what analytics is defined as, then what is
Web Analytics? Is it as simple as the discovery and communication of meaningful
patterns in data on the web/Internet? According to one of the Web Analytics guru,
Avinash Kaushik, web analytics is the analysis of qualitative and quantitative
data from a website and the competition to drive continual improvement of current
and potential customer’s experience.
Web
analytics is usually part of customer relationship management analytics, or
short CRM analytics. The Web Analytics software tracks every instance and
action that is happening on a website and it is recorded in real-time. The
analysis can include items such as re-designing the website to make it more
personable to frequent visitors/customers; monitoring purchases and volume by
specific customers or group of customers; determining likelihood of a customer
re-purchasing a product; exploring the demographics of customers, such as what
are the regions from which least and most customers visit the site; predicting
what items are customers more likely to purchase in the future; and so on.
All this
is mind-boggling isn’t it? Where is this technology going? We can track and
review everything? You know when Facebook suggests some sites for you, like all
kinds of shoes and clothing sites on my FB page of course? I used to wonder,
how does Facebook knows what I like, why is it showing ads where I will most
likely spend all my money onJ? Now, thanks to this week’s class I know how
Facebook and other sites do it. All my actions on the web are tracked! Hmmm, this
could be good or bad … And I will talk more about the bad side of Web Analytics
in a bit.
Next,
since we now know what Web Analytics is and what it can do, lets focus on Web Key
Performance Indicators or KPIs (note: the list is not exhaustive). First of
all, to avoid confusions, we should define KPI so some of you are not thrown
off by the word. KPIs are measures that help an organization track its successes
and failures in accordance to the organization’s already defined objectives.
·
Conversion Rate – proportion of visits that
result in goal achievement. For example, if Google’s goal is for a web user to
click on an ad campaign, then you will calculate how many visits on the Google
site result in achieving that goal, which is the conversion rate. This metrics
is very valuable KPI as it steers the organization’s focus on Objectives.
·
Task Completion Rate – percentage of visitors that successfully
completed a specific task on the site. For example, if Business Insider’s goal
is site visitors to download an article then the Task Completion Rate will be
the percentage of visitors that successfully complete the download of articles.
This metrics will show how easy is for visitors to perform actions on the site
and it will give suggestions for web re-design, on how to make it more
visitor-friendly.
·
Average Order Value – monetary value of sales per
conversion. For example, if Fabletics’s visitors click on yoga pants and buy
them, what is the revenue Fabletics gets from each conversion? AOV goes hand in
hand with the conversion rate - it will help an organization more clearly understand
why the revenue is down when the conversion rate is high and vice versa.
·
Exit Rate – The percentage of visitors that
leave the website from a particular web page. The exit rate is calculated for a
particular web page. For instance, the percentage of visitors that leave the
New Yorker website after visiting the Business web page.
·
Bounce Rate – Percentage of visitors that leave
the website from a particular page after a visit to a single page. It is based
on visits that start with a particular page (i.e. Business section) and they
leave the website completely.
·
Days & Visits to “Purchase”
(it can be any outcome) –
The days and visits that lead to “purchase” measure the true customer behavior
on a website, or how long and often it takes a customer to make an outcome on
an organization’s website. This measure has a lot of bearing in terms of
perfecting the marketing messaging on the organization’s website.
·
Share of Search – Percentage of searches that
leads to a website visit. This metrics also allows an organization to see specific
keywords that lead to the website. For instance, for Southwest Airlines it may
be cheap flights, free checked-in baggage, top ranked airlines, flights, etc.
As I noted,
this list is not exhaustive … There are many other KPIs that an organization
can use that will help better measure the objectives set for by the company.
And now
as promised, I want to share few thoughts on the dark side of web analytics
which is mostly based on a recent article I read. Are you ready?!? Well, here
you go … As of November 2015, FireEye, a cyber security and malware protection
organization, has identified about 14 websites that hosted a profiling script
that was collecting and extensive information from the Internet. What does this
mean? The backbone, is that threat actors with support from the Russian government,
used web analytics to gather information about desired victims and computers
owned by the victims in order to track, profile and infect the computers with
specific malware. As per FireEye, the attackers are interested in gathering
data from diplomats, executives, government and military personnel from US and
Europe.
As a
finish … Web Analytics is a about collecting data on visitors on an
organization’s website and understanding what they are doing on the website in
order to improve the design of the website which will lead to ACHIEVING the OBJECTIVES set by the organization!
Hope you
enjoyed this week’s blog choice and of course blog content!!!
References
Kaushik,
A. (2008, September 16). Six Web Metrics / Key Performance Indicators To
Die For. Retrieved from Kaushik.net:
http://www.kaushik.net/avinash/rules-choosing-web-analytics-key-performance-indicators/
Staff, F.
(2015, November 16). Russia-led cyber attack campaign shows the dark side
of web analytics. Retrieved from FirstPost:
http://www.firstpost.com/business/russia-led-cyber-attack-campaign-shows-the-dark-side-of-web-analytics-2508552.html
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