Introduction
Today’s consumer
behaviors are changing quickly in the digital and online environment. As
channel and device choices proliferate, it is more challenging than ever to
understand their activities and interests. Analytic approaches from the past no
longer provide the depth and breadth of relevant information marketers, brands
and organizations need to address the increasing customer expectations and
interaction points (LaLonde, 2013) . Most marketing,
e-commerce and service professionals have a fragmented understanding of their
customers at best, so it is often difficult to extract insights or prioritize
actions that will have the fastest and most effective impact on business
results.
A holistic
understanding of customers is the foundation for engaging them in relevant and
rewarding ways, ultimately growing share of wallet and winning customer
loyalty. Optimizing today’s online customer experiences requires both
quantitative and qualitative digital analytic capabilities. To effectively
understand what is taking place in the digital environment there also needs to
be an operative blend of art and science in an effort to build strong
engagement and comprehend what consumers want. For brands and marketers the
ability to manage successful campaigns requires strong data analysis through
both human and technological capabilities (IBM, 2014) . It also involves a
level of creative value added content and communications that a brand or
organizations audience desires.
Building Insight
Digital analytics,
social engagement and search engine optimization can provide quantitative
insight by capturing web site and mobile interaction data. These factors provide
interfaces showing visitor activity including purchase funnels, real time sales
data, website traffic flow and conversion metrics and targets. Achieving digital
marketing goals can maximize customer use of features and layout that drive
site visits, while high value website content deepens customer engagement (DeMers, 2014) . Measuring and
building upon these factors can be part of a healthy digital marketing strategy
as the web, social and mobile continue to evolve.
The term Big Data is
used quite often in today’s business environment. It is loosely defined across business,
marketing and technology sectors as “data sets whose size is beyond the ability
of commonly used software tools to capture, manage, and process the data within
a tolerable elapsed time” (Hamel, 2012) . The concept of web
analytics, social engagements and search engine optimization can theoretically
be placed in this definition and as a result need to be collated in a manner
that can be collectively interpreted by marketers brands and businesses to
holistically exploit their relevance and interdependencies.
Principles of Web Metrics
A strong online
presence can play a significant role in the success of an organization, product
or brand through improved access to consumers and a better understanding of
engagement, preferences and behaviors. The web is becoming more of a factor and
more of a central element in the lives of people and consumers and measuring
their engagement can provide a direct impact on an organization’s on line
presence and success (LaLonde, 2013) .
Web
analytics tools provide organizations with data that delivers additional
clarity around the results of web activity. Web analytics also assist marketers
in understanding their efforts and the results of marketing activities and campaigns (Reed College,
2016) .
Among the many factors that play a role in the success of a business is
increased exposure and better communication with potential and current
customers. Web analytics give businesses insights on where and when customers
and prospects participate and behave as they do on an organizations website.
These factors often involve gathering quantitative data on website user
activity and can provide detail on visitor flow and depth of engagement (Peterson,
2008) .
Reporting and Interpreting Web Traffic
Effectively using
website monitoring systems can produce analytical data which can yield a wide
range of information. Simply knowing how much traffic a website is generating can
provide tremendous insight on the health of a website and whether it is
providing value to its customers and its target audience (PA, 2016) . Uncovering other
data such as historical web traffic information can create benchmarks that give
organizations insight on how they are performing and which direction their
website may be heading. Analytical systems can tell organizations which regions
and geographies visitors are originating. This sort of data can often open up
important new questions and possibilities for a business. For example could the
organization appeal more to these geographies with more region specific
content?
There are a number of
effective tools available today to track and measure website user engagement
and activity. One of the most common web
analytics packages is Google Analytics. This platform is popular because of its
general ease of use, comprehensive features and it is also free to all users (Kaushik,
2010) .
There are also a number of other website analytics platforms available in the
marketplace most of which are obtainable at a cost. For the majority of small
to midsized organizations, the free tools available in the marketplace are
often sufficient. Most of the web analytics packages available track users in a
similar manner. This is primarily accomplished by placing a piece of tracking
code on each page of your chosen website. This code enables the chosen
analytics package to monitor and follow visitors as they enter the site,
navigate through the pages and as they exits the website. In most cases placing
the tracking code on the web pages is a simple task but in other cases the
website owner may need assistance from a web developer or IT provider (Kaushik,
2010) .
There is a multitude of
meaningful factors which can be measured on a website. Before engaging in
measuring deep metrics on a website, however it is important for a brand or
organization to establish goals and objectives surrounding what they are
looking to accomplish (Kaushik,
2010) .
Depending on the site website objectives, goal measurement can be set under a wide
range of criteria in most web analytics systems. For example if the website is
a blog factors such as time on site, returning visitors, and new visitors can
all be meaningful goals for a site designed to attract readership.
For other sites designed
to sell products and services typical e-commerce goals can include page views,
time on site and of course measuring conversions and goal flow with a
particularly critical eye on abandon rate (Jones, 2016) . In building new
users and engaging with existing users on a website, particularly a blogsite,
it is generally a good idea to have relevant and attainable goals to
consistently build followership. By establishing goals for a website or other
digital property owners can track if users are doing on the website what marketers
are expecting them to do (Kaushik,
2010) .
Basic Website Metrics
Once an organization establishes its goals the metrics available
in web analytics packages can be put to use to start measuring against those
objectives. One of the basic metrics in understanding web site user behavior is
the session. A session is the period of time a user is actively engaged with a
website, app or other digital property. All usage data such as views, events, and
e-commerce are associated with a session (Google, 2016) . Another key metric
in website analytics is the website user. These include all website visitors
that have had at least one session within a selected date range. Users are
often defined holistically and include both new and returning visitors.
The session and user metrics are critical to understanding the
engagement visitors are executing on a website and can directly denote the
health of a website and whether it is meeting its engagement objectives. These
metrics can also delineate the number of total visitors by counting each visit
to the website, even if the same person has returned more than once. Metrics
surrounding users can also define unique visitors. This figure filters out
repeat visits, as each person is only counted once (Google, 2016) .
A pageview is triggered when any page is loaded by any visitor to
a site. Pageviews are an important metric in understanding the popularity of
specific pages. Inside the analytics systems pageviews are the total number of
pages viewed and repeated views of a single page are included in this count as
well (Oberoi, 2015) . As website marketers begin to analyze
pageview metrics they can develop an understanding of what users are looking
for on their site as well as establish what pages may not be so popular and
why.
Other basic metrics in website analytics include pages per session
or average page depth. This metrics is the average number of pages viewed
during a session and also counts the number of repeated views in a single page.
Average session duration is another key measure as it defines the length of
time a user is spending on a site. This metric can provide a significant
understanding of the depth of engagement website visitors are undertaking.
Another basic metric is the bounce rate. This is the percentage of single-page
visits in which the person left a website from the entrance page without
interacting with any other pages (Google, 2016) .
In the case of the blog site
objectives and the quest to build followership there are generally multiple behaviors
and pageview flow that website visitors could execute which help to create a
better understanding of what visitors are looking to accomplish. From this
perspective tracking how many people are executing specific actions, including
understanding metrics such as referral source and measuring the page view flow
provides both qualitative and quantitative factors that deliver valuable
insight (Valk, 2014) .
Goal Setting
Goal setting functionality in
Google Analytics is designed to track a wide range of website objectives and
conversions that might be considered by a website or digital property owner as
a win or advancement of engagement with a site visitor. These can include micro
conversions such as submitting a contact form for more information or signing
up for a newsletter. These can also include primary conversion objectives such
as making a purchase directly on an e-commerce platform. One of the easiest
methods to set up goals is to create what is called a destination goal. This is
a goal that will track every time a certain page on your site is reached. For
example a “Thank You” page can be set up to populate once a user executes a
micro or primary conversion activity (Google, 2016) . Other simple
conversion goals can include understanding factors such as average session time.
As figure 1 illustrates the number of users per day who spent more than two
minutes on the site is a measured goal. The depth of data also reveals the
referral source and percent of two minute engagement by each source.
Figure 1 Google Analytics Conversion Goal (Session Time Greater than
2 minutes)
Web analytics tools provide
organizations with data that delivers additional clarity around the results of
web activity. Measuring website activity provides invaluable insight in
understanding who is visiting your website, how they got there, what they did
once they landed there and where they went afterward. Web analytics also assist
marketers in understanding their efforts and the results of marketing
activities and campaigns (Reed College, 2016) . Measuring website
activity gives marketers an understanding of what users like and do not like by
analyzing the popularity of pages, the flow of page views visitors are
executing, where site visitors might be bouncing out of a site and factors that
might be preventing or hindering conversion, e-commerce or other goals a
website marketer may have. These metrics also provide insight on improving site
design and the user experience. With the help of website analytics, it is easier
to find out how users interact with a website and gain insight on how to improve
page design and functionality (Sharma, 2016) .
Basic Principles of Search Engine Optimization
Search engine optimization (SEO) is the process
of affecting the visibility of a website or a web page in a web search engine's
unpaid results. SEO is often referred to as "natural,"
"organic," or "earned" results (Fleischner,
2016) .
SEO is a marketing discipline which is focused on improving visibility in
organic non paid search engine results. SEO is also an art and a science in
terms of combining technical activities with creative elements in an effort to
improve a websites natural search engine results (Fishkin, 2016) Search Engine Optimization can be
categorized into two major segments which include on page optimization and off
page optimization.
On Page Optimization
One of the most important aspects to understand
about on page optimization is website marketers are in control of the on page
factors that can improve a websites position in search engine rankings. From a
technical perspective this can include organizing the sites content, link
structure, title and headings, Meta tags, images and keywords (Fleischner,
2016) .
Keywords are a critical element in developing on
page website optimization and often introduce the effectiveness of creativity.
To identify effective keywords website marketers should develop a comprehensive
selection method. Keyword research is often an effective method to identify and
refine effective words and phrases for a website. Keyword research teaches
marketers that one phrase or a very small group of related phrases can
represent high volume, high relevancy for a websites primary keywords. One
method many marketers use to identify and extract effective keywords is by
utilizing the keyword planning functionality on the Google AdWords platform (Fleischner,
2016) .
Using this tool provides an understanding of high frequency, high value
keywords and keyword phrases. It also helps identify the most valuable words
and phrases to include in your website and how other competitors might be using
them.
Other technical aspects of on page optimization
include Meta tags. Meta tags are snippets of text that describe a page’s
content. This text does not appear on the page itself, but only in the page’s
code (Fleischner, 2016) . Description Meta
tags are important because search engines such as Google might use them as
snippets from the websites pages. Titles are also a key component in on page
optimization. Titles can identify the key themes surrounding the page and can
appear as a highlighted title directly in search engine results (Google SEO,
2010) .
Website content and format can also play a
significant role in website on page optimization. Structuring a websites pages
is an important component in how effective a search engine can crawl a website
to find the relevant content that helps a website rise in search engine
rankings. Effectively placing site navigation and other page framework enables
search engines to more easily find relevant content (Fleischner,
2016) . Other factors such as sitemaps, an effective
URL, image tags and internal linking all assist in helping search engines in
indexing a website of its organic content to better identify its purpose and
ranking it effectively.
Off Page Optimization
Off page optimization can be concisely defined
as building and increasing a websites authority. Off page
optimization provides a website with the opportunity to build its following and
increasing its position in web search engine rankings. One of the major
differences between on page and off page optimization is the control in which
the site owner has over each. Off page optimization is manipulated to a much
lesser degree by the site owner than their ability to influence on page
optimization. One of the keys to
building off page optimization is building links to your website from other
sites (Fleischner, 2016) . Link building
provides a website a key attribute search engines look for when calculating
their rank algorithms.
Site Authority
Site authority focuses on websites
that have established a substantial degree of trust and denotes expertise with
search engines as a result of elements such as its age, quality, and size. Within
this premise one of the primary success factors of off page optimization is
building inbound links from sites that have as good or better website authority
than your own (Fleischner, 2016) . An authority
site is a very high quality website that is respected by knowledgeable people
in its industry. It is a website that has content on it that is of high quality
and makes the site users almost grateful
they found it (Google, 2016) . Authority sites
publish trustworthy information and link to other trustworthy places on the
web. Their audience implicitly trusts them to share high quality links, which
is why obtaining links from authority websites has positive influence on your
website’s traffic.
The Future of SEO
Now that Facebook.com
has overtaken Google.com as the most used website on the Internet, there are
now questions surrounding the significance of whether search engine
optimization will be relevant in the future (Ingram, 2015) . As users become
more immersed in their social channels the question centers on the use of
social networks to find news, information and referrals and whether this use
will serve to displace search engines as the primary source for digital news
and information. As the dynamics continue to change and evolve in the digital
environment marketers need to stay abreast of trends and phenomenon. Marketers
also need to be nimble and open minded about strategies and objectives
surrounding their digital properties and be willing to adjust when conditions
change.
Social Channels in Marketing
The social media
environment provides brands, businesses and organizations with an opportunity
to engage with their customers, prospects and their target audience. Social media's
potential for customer interaction and customer retention is also significant.
Today's consumers are now engaging directly with brands and businesses openly
on a multitude of social media channels. Customers and prospects are also consuming
and sharing content, information and opinions in new and unprecedented ways.
The traditional notion of consuming content directly on the creator’s website
has morphed as social media and the ability of users to share and post content
directly in the digital environment has been extended through social media
platforms (Kaushik, 2011) .
One of the factors to
consider when operating in the social media environment is the rate of
engagement and dialog a brand or business may expect and its relationship to
the amount of generated posts and communications an organization may
anticipate. In social media both of
these factors are important and a business can and should expect to be active
in both (Brown, 2014) . Along with these
engagements social media marketing offers opportunity to improve search engine
optimization through factors such as posts, comments, likes and shares. These
interactions and engagements create an opportunity for search engines to pick
up social signals surrounding a brand, product or website. These signals
indicate chatter around an organization and that engagement is active (Zadro, 2015) . Search engines
incorporate these signals into their search algorithms and often reward
websites, brands or businesses with improved search engine optimization and the
ability to rise in the search rankings.
Along with the ability
to improve search engine optimization brands and businesses can also take
advantage of directly marketing on social platforms. For example Facebook
presents a robust Pay-per-click marketing program. With a global audience over
1.5 billion monthly active users Facebook presents a massive audience
opportunity (Chris, 2015) . Users on social
sites often provide information about their personal characteristics including
age, geography, education and other demographic features. The platform also
collects psychographic data through user posts, likes and shares. As a result
this environment delivers massive data insight which provides a highly targeted
platform in which marketers can deeply segment to reach their exact target
audience.
When an organization
becomes active on social media it can provide a significant opportunity to
establish brand identity and build a breadth and depth of awareness (Keller,
2011). Effective social media engagements build affinity, following and loyalty
for a brand or product and acting effectively in this environment can be a
significant part of a balanced marketing communication program.
The key to success
however is understanding and harnessing the interdependencies of the most
effective digital segments. Optimizing and leveraging web activity and
analytics together with social media engagements and measurement along with
building and maximizing search engine optimization can greatly assist marketers
in gaining insight on the customer journey, improve the customer experience and
deliver improved revenue and retention.
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