Are you tracking the right metrics for how to improve your site's conversion rates? Whether it's clicks, CTR’s, newsletter subscriptions, or just old sales. If you're running a search engine optimization (SEO) campaign, you need to track performance metrics to make sure your site is delivering the results you want. If you don't follow key metrics, you could find yourself pumping money into a strategy that isn't delivering a return on your investment. Head over to Google Analytics, add the code to your website, and you can start tracking some of these important metrics, today. Create an official account & configure your Google Analytics and search console, add the code to your website, and you can start tracking important metrics today. So what metrics do you need to be successful? Here are 7 key website metrics to analyze and build your strategy on it:
1. Website traffic
One of the top-level metrics digital marketers prefer is traffic, specifically the total number of visits to a website, and it's incredibly easy to track using Google Analytics. Your website traffic is a proper indication of how your website is growing, stagnating, or maybe declining. For example, if you experience a huge spike in traffic after posting a blog or changing the content of an existing page, it indicates that you should be doing more of the same or vice versa.
The total number of visits can be divided into new visits and repeat visits. Unique visits tell you how well you are attracting new visitors, while repeat visits tell you how well you are retaining visitors.
2. Traffic sources
Along with knowing your top-level traffic numbers, you also need to know where your traffic is coming from. This data is available in Google Analytics. Google Analytics divides your traffic sources into the following categories:
- Organic search: traffic from search engines
- Referral: traffic from another website
- Direct: traffic typing your domain into the browser
- Social: social media traffic
- Paid: paid ad traffic
- Email: traffic from email marketing
Each traffic source will provide you with some important snippets of information about your website. Even though SEO is less prevalent than before, organic search traffic will give you an idea of how your website ranks in the search engines. With around 40,000 searches per second on Google, search engines will still be a big source of traffic, and this metric will tell you how effective your SEO strategy is.
3. Page Timings
This is the load time of each of your pages - the faster the better. Indeed, Google includes the loading times and the speed of the pages in their SEO ranking. Google Analytics will tell you the average load time of your site, then tell you how each page is performing against that average.
4. Conversion rate
Most businesses follow the conversion rate because it tells them how often someone who visits their site ends up buying or enquiring about a service. This is one of the most valuable metric to track and make sure you are meeting your business goals. Conversions can take many forms. You can aim to get people to buy your products or register for an event. Your form of conversion depends on your business and your goals. Either way, tracking your conversions is the key to see if your SEO efforts are effectively helping your business grow.
4. CTR
One of the most important web metrics is click-through rate or CTR. The CTR measures the number of people who saw your listing in search results compared to the number of people who clicked on the same listing. This statistic is one of the most important Google Analytics metrics because it tells you whether people find your listing relevant to their query. You want to achieve a high CTR because it indicates that more people are finding your listing relevant to their search query.
5. Your SERP ranking
SERP stands for Search Engine Results Page. Your ranking is where you show up when someone searches for something that is relevant to you. You can check your SERP ranking for relevant keywords in a tool called, Search Console or webmasters. It is one of the clearest indicators of your website's performance. If Google likes it and references it a lot, you're doing it right. Try looking for different combinations to see which of your pages are showing.
6. Top pages
If you go to the Behavior section of Google Analytics, you will be able to see your top-performing pages in terms of traffic volume. Analytics displays the number of pageviews and their appearance as a percentage of the total pageviews on the entire website. Knowing which pages are getting the most traffic is extremely important because it gives you real data showing what your audience is reacting to. If you're experimenting with different types of content, this is where you can start to analyze what works and produce more content that your readers enjoy.
7. Bounce rate
Another important metric, which impacts SEO, is your website's bounce rate. The bounce rate metric, displayed as a percentage, tells you how many visitors are leaving your website immediately after they arrive. The lower your bounce rate, the more visitors who stay to enjoy your website and make conversions.
However, if you make changes that continually improve your bounce rate, you're headed in the right direction. It doesn't tell you why they're leaving - you'll have to dig a little deeper for it. However, common reasons for a high bounce rate include slow load times, broken websites, poor first impression (poor website aesthetics), and poorly targeted keywords. With these reasons in mind, you can improve bounce rate by making sure your website looks good, performs well, and your content is of high quality.
Final Thoughts
If you’ve never tracked website metrics before, all of those numbers, charts, and percentages can seem intimidating. Most of the tracking software presents the data in relatively straightforward terms, meaning anyone and everyone can easily understand it. The metrics themselves may sound sophisticated, but in reality, they are tracking quite a simple set of behaviors. When you track metrics you get the true picture, rather than just preparing your campaigns on the basis of assumptions. This is why everyone should be tracking these website metrics.
If you can work & improve any of the metrics included in today’s list, you are making real and noticeable improvements to your website. Trying to optimize your site to improve those metrics can be an overwhelming task. If you don't have the experience or time to optimize and improve your site to boost these data, DigitalCrafts can help. From implementing strategic changes to tracking your most important web metrics, we do it all.
Send your enquiry to us [email protected]
