Thanks to Mashable and all their amazing reporting on all things social media, I found out that this is International Technology Upgrade Week.They posted an article on research conducted by Skype, Norton by Symantec and TomTom.
The survey commissioned by Skype indicates that nearly 40% of consumers in America, Britain and Germany don't update their software when first prompted. According to the press release, "...approximately one quarter of those surveyed said they don’t clearly
understand what software updates do and an equal percentage of consumers
don’t understand the benefits of updating regularly."
Check out the infographic below featuring all of the results from the Skype survey.
Web Metrics and Social Media
Thursday, July 26, 2012
Monday, July 9, 2012
PUMA Uses Google Analytics to Kick Up Orders
Web analytics, as we know it, is part of every digital
marketer’s arsenal of tools. If it’s not, then s/he is not a real digital
marketer. Companies are investing more resources – both human and technological
– to get actionable information from web data.
According
to eConsultancy, roughly 48 percent of companies who responded to the Online
Measurement and Strategy Report 2010 are planning to increase the number of
employees they have dedicated to web data analysis ("Companies spending
more," 2010).
What’s even more assuring is that “87% of companies surveyed are using Google
Analytics for online measurement. Of these firms, 38% are now
using this tool exclusively, while 49% are using it alongside along with
another measurement tool” ("Companies spending more," 2010).
That said, I thought it would prove useful to review how a
big name brand leverages Google Analytics (GA) for its insight. Thankfully,
Google provides a repository of case studies on some of the biggest name brands
on the market.
PUMA Integrates Google Analytics, Increases Order Rate by 7 Percent
According to the Puma
case study provided by Google, the brand’s goals were simply (Puma kicks
up, 2011):
- Gain insights into content and product popularity to drive strategy
- Understand which content is engaging customers and contributing to sales within each region
- Improve conversion and customer experience online by optimizing the web site
Puma’s primary challenge was to keep up with an evolving
market just as fast as its products are evolving across various product
categories. Its global reach also presented a challenge since engagement varies
depending on the geographic region. In other words, they want to keep a unified
and distinct web presence no matter what part of the world visitors are viewing
the website from, or what product categories visitors are interested in (i.e.,
PUMA Running, Golf, Football).
PUMA Overcomes Challenges With Google Analytics, Viget
It doesn’t take long for brands as big as PUMA to make a
change and see results. With the help of Viget, an agency that develops digital
products, they created the right formula for success.
Through Custom Variables in GA, which segmented visitors
based on test variations, PUMA compared “how each test variation affected
visitor ability to complete a variety of goals and the micro-conversions along
the way”.
But the web analysis didn’t stop there. The brand used
profiles and filters to create a 360-degree picture of PUMA.com as well as
separate, targeted views of each category site. To gather further insight into
the behaviors visitors were having with the site, PUMA developed Event Tracking
to measure interactions with dynamic page elements (i.e., social sharing
widgets, search boxes, multimedia) and Advanced Segments to track how visitors
from various regions interact with the PUMA site.
Making Something Out of Web Metrics
The data digital marketers gather is only useful when put into
use. Through testing various website elements, a variation was found that “increased
online orders by 7.1 percent”, according to the case study. When coupled with
other insights from GA that led to changes to the website, the results have led
to more than twice the amount of time visitors spend interacting with PUMA
brand content (news, videos, images, etc.). PUMA has also experienced “47% more
traffic from growing regions such as China and India.”
What About Social Media Metrics?
Every marketer faces a challenging question on a daily
basis: What else can I do? In truth, there’s always something. Without knowing
the full details of what other tools and metrics Viget provided PUMA with, I
recommend applying a variety of social media monitoring tools that can be
coupled with its current website analytics monitoring efforts.
I will be the first to say that I love it when Google comes
up with new tools to track even more aspects of the behavior between a website
and its audience. The following is a slew of features Google has given us,
known as Social
Interaction Analytics, which can be found on GA.
- Tracking Social Actions: Through the use of simple code, every social action (likes, tweets, shares, pins, +1, etc.) can be tracked in order to measure and compare what social actions PUMA’s audience prefers, as well as which pages receives the most social actions.
- Monetizing Social Actions: Of course, every brand wants to see the “ROI of social media”. GA provides conversion reports that enable social media marketing accountability. In other words, the report shows conversion rates and monetary value of conversions that occurred due to visits from social networks.
- Knowing Which Social Networks Provides High-Quality Traffic: Inclusive of the aforementioned are other components of tracking social with GA. is the ability to see the number of social platforms refer the highest quality traffic to the brand’s website. GA has broken down social into its own referral traffic source, thereby giving digital marketers the ability to: see which networks send traffic; visualize visitor flow from social networks through the site; and identify which content is popular
- How Social Media Affects Conversions: The power of social media lies in its ability to influence a conversion. Google’s Assisted Conversions and Assisted Conversion Value track sales and conversions where the social network assisted. In other words, you can see when someone visits your site, leaves without converting, and then returns later to convert.
But What is Social Media Saying About Us?
While every effort to measure online activities – both within
a website and around its brand in social media – is important, we can’t forget
about how the general public views the brand.
Social Media monitoring is an important part of every
digital marketer. If a brand’s general influence is low or negative, then no
amount of advertising will help gain business. Platforms like Radian6 or Sysomos
measure a brand’s online health and position against its competitors.
These listening tools measure how people engage with one
another when mentioning your brand, your competitors and/or your industry. With
this information, brands can paint a clear picture of what their audience looks
like, what they’re saying about you and more importantly, how you can tailor
your integrated marketing efforts.
References:
Companies spending more on web analytics: survey.
(2010, June 09). Retrieved from http://econsultancy.com/us/blog/6045-companies-spending-more-on-web-analytics-survey
(2011). Puma kicks up order rate 7% with insights from
google analytics and viget. Google Analytics. DOI: PUMA Kicks Up Order Rate
7% with Insights from Google Analytics and Viget
Using google analytics social reports to measure your
website content and engagement in google [Web log message]. (2012, April 23).
Retrieved from
http://analytics.blogspot.com/2012/04/using-google-analytics-social-reports.html
Monday, July 2, 2012
Goals, Funnels and Filters: Interpreting Key Measurement Tools
As digital marketers, one of our pain-staking jobs is to report, measure, analyze and provide insight on the successes of websites. And
one of our biggest tools of the trade, Google Analytics (GA), provides the
various components to measuring that success.
This week, I explored the various ways of segmenting traffic
and how their behavior is affected by the various tactics being implemented.
Some key tools are Goals, Funnels and Filters.
In case you didn’t know, here are brief descriptions of the
various components of GA I will be discussing:
- Goals: Web site page that helps generate conversions for your site (a ‘thank you page’, purchase confirmation page, an ‘about us’ page, etc.) (Wells, 2012)
- Funnel: This represents the path you expect visitors to take on their way to converting to the goal (Wells, 2012).
- Filters: These are applied to the information coming into your GA platform. This allows users to manipulate data so you can breakdown and segment your audience based on a variety of parameters (traffic from domains; traffic from IP addresses; etc.).
Now that we’ve
discussed the components, let’s get down to business. Since the blog is meant
to function as a channel to disseminate content, goals were developed to
account for traffic visiting any blog post for a given timeframe. As you can
see from the screenshot below, the blog has had 76 pageviews with visitors
spending well over four minutes during each visit, leading to a zero percent
bounce rate. This, of course, is due to the small number of visitors the page
has reached (17 visits).
For the blog, the following goals were set:
- Visit Duration: two goals were set measuring time on site – one minute and three minutes
- Pages/Visit: a goal was set to measure a goal met when a visit accounts for viewing more than 2 pages
Since the blog’s purpose is not to generate sales
(eCommerce), a value was not given to these goals. This doesn’t mean that a
blog has to sell products/services to have a value.
Measuring ROI can benefit some bloggers greatly in how they sell their blog to media, PR professionals, etc. Case in point, a popular blogger wants to sell content space on his blog and must show that there is value in his content, which generates traffic, to get advertisers to buy media space.
Measuring ROI can benefit some bloggers greatly in how they sell their blog to media, PR professionals, etc. Case in point, a popular blogger wants to sell content space on his blog and must show that there is value in his content, which generates traffic, to get advertisers to buy media space.
Evaluating Goal Conversions
Based on the data
accounting for the last 30 days, the blog only converted two goals a total of
four times. This largely correlates to the goal’s standards being set too high
for a blog with little traffic and fewer than 10 blog posts. It is unlikely for
the average consumer of digital media to spend more than three minutes on a
site, given the average length of the blog posts. Further, since the blog has
fewer than 10 blog posts, it is unlikely for the average visitor to view more
than two pages.
As you can see from the Goal Flow, visits came to the blog
and of the total visits, only 5 managed to stay on the blog for longer than
three minutes (both returning and unique visitors). Of this 5, they managed to
view two pages: the index page (homepage of the blog) and a blog
post about referral sources.
The benefit of measuring goals is to set actions you want
people to take and identify areas of improvement. “Every time your user takes
one of these actions, it’s a conversion. A visitor becomes a subscriber, a
subscriber becomes a customer (sometimes, a visitor becomes a customer), and so
on ("Tracking your blog," 2012). And various goals can be created,
from newsletter sign-ups and downloads, to blog comments or RSS Feed followers.
With that said, I added another goal to track completions
after one minute. This should increase the quantity of goals being converted
without giving up quality. This will also give me a better picture of how
people are interacting with the blog, and if traffic is coming from other
sources where I share my content on (i.e., social media sites).
Tracking Conversions through the Funnel
That’s right; there is a funnel in GA. As mentioned earlier,
the funnel breaks down the path visitors took to convert a goal. Since the
goals were set rather high, the funnel has little depth. Less than 12 percent
of visits converted goals. With the creation of the new goal mentioned above,
an improvement in goals will likely occur.
Another key takeaway of goals is to track events occurring on
a site. Events represent important actions on a website – in this case, my
blog. Events are directly tied to elements on the blog and not reaching a
certain page. So on my blog, I would be tracking sign-ups to RSS Feeds and/or
downloads of any documents posted on the blog.
To date, my priority has only been to track various pages
being viewed and from where those interactions are coming from. As traffic and
overall audience size grows, I will add specific events to track key interactions
that will further align my efforts.
References:
Tracking your blog goals with google analytics. (2012). Retrieved from
http://unstuckdigital.com/tracking-goals-with-google-analytics/
Wells, M. (2012, May 21). Lesson 6: Successful approaches
in google analytics . Retrieved from
https://ecampus.wvu.edu/webct/urw/tp0.lc5116001/cobaltMainFrame.dowebct
Labels:
Bounce Rate,
events,
filters,
funnel,
goals,
Google Analytics,
page visits
Location:
Miami, FL, USA
Tuesday, June 26, 2012
Referral Sources is Key to Measuring Success
Why Traffic Sources Matters
A brand’s traffic source directly correlates with its health
and position across a variety of channels. For starters, referral traffic (a
traffic source from another site) and direct traffic (URLs typed or bookmarked
which visitors use directly to your site) have are two indicators of how a
specified campaign or how much organic reach a brand has.
As Kaushik puts it, “Direct traffic contains visitors that
proactively seek you out, everyone else you have to ‘beg’ to show up on your
site!” (Kaushik, 2010). He makes a
strong point in that people who directly visit your site are:
- People who are your existing customers or past customers and have bookmarked your site
- People who are familiar with your brand
- People driven by WOM (Word of Mouth)
- People driven by offline campaigns (TV ads, OOH ads, etc.) and typed the URL directly
In other words, we want direct traffic because these people
make up some of the strongest brand influencers who were motivated to visit
your site directly over other competitors.
But let’s not forget about referral traffic. This, too, is
an important part analytics. Referral traffic is a measurement of how a brand’s
efforts are being voiced across third party sites. Users will come across some
form of content, click on it and visit a brand’s site.
According to B2C, Referral
traffic accounts for almost 70% of all traffic for blogger Andrew Glasscock.
He goes onto say that each of your top
referrers can potentially be tapped for better referrals and higher traffic
counts. “If you receive a lot of traffic from Google, perhaps you should
advertise with their services and boost those numbers.”
Where Search and Social Come Into Play
Search is still, and will probably always be, the number one
reason why people interact with the Internet. Having the right mix of SEO
techniques and paid advertising campaigns is important in creating a consistent
flow of search traffic. None of this is possible without attaining high
rankings on a mix of keywords.
GA’s search traffic tool identifies what keywords people are
using most to visit a brand’s website. This information can be helpful in
identifying how best to increase reach on those keywords while identifying
areas of opportunity on keywords a brand wants to be known for.
The goal of Google, and all search engines for that matter,
has been to deliver the most helpful and relevant information to users.
According to Martin Wong, “Google’s success came from taking an approach that
was radical in those early days: to curate for content
quality by measuring the number of links to a page” (Wong, 2012). In other
words, the more inbound links a page received, the greater their authority.
This leads to a page having stronger content. Social media, however, evolves
that mindset by incorporating social media into the mix. Tweets, Facebook likes
and +1 vote are factors of how a page will rank against its competitors.
Considering this and the importance of social, GA has made
social its own traffic source, tracking social interactions and which social
media channels they are coming from. According to Google, “The social web
connects people where they share, critique and interact with content and each
other. Social analytics provides you with the tools to measure the impact of
social.” In other words, there is a high probability that a brand that is
socially active and engaging will generate greater amounts of traffic and rank
higher, over its competitors.
Knowing which social channels your audience interacts with
is key for producing socially-driven campaigns. For example, Pinterest has been
growing in popularity accounting and is now among the top
referral sites, beating out Twitter, YouTube, Google+ and Linkedin (Crook,
2012).
This drives brands to build a Pinterest campaign in order to
drive traffic to their site.
Traffic Sources are Socially Impacts
Referral sources, simply put, are the culmination of all
traffic visiting a brand’s site and knowing where they came from. This allows brands
to identify and develop the right tactics that will lead to goals being met
(lead acquisition, ecommerce transactions, etc.).
With social media having such a strong impact in how people
search for information, Google has made great strides in taking into
consideration the importance social media has.
GA’s latest efforts to push Social into its own referral
source is reason enough to pay attention to how social affects a brand’s reach.
A brand’s social impact directly correlates with: (1) which pages and sources
people engage with; (2) what information is being shared and leads to an
ecommerce transaction, when applicable; (3) measuring what social engagements
are occurring on your website (likes, shares, etc.); (4) and what kind of
traffic patterns are directly related to social.
References:
Crook, J. (2012, March 8). Retrieved from
http://techcrunch.com/2012/03/08/pinterest-now-generates-more-referral-traffic-than-twitter-study/
Glasscock. (2012, June 10). How to gauge your best
referral traffic in google analytics. Retrieved from
http://www.business2community.com/online-marketing/how-to-gauge-your-best-referral-traffic-in-google-analytics-0189880
Kaushik. (2010, September 20). Excellent analytics tip 18
make love to your direct traffic. Retrieved from http://www.kaushik.net/avinash/excellent-web-analytics-tip-analyze-direct-traffic/
Wong, M. (2012, February 29). How social media drives
search results. Retrieved from
http://www.marketingsmartt.com/social_drives_search/
Labels:
Google Analytics,
Referral Sources,
Search,
SEO,
SERPs,
Social Media
Location:
Miami, FL, USA
Wednesday, June 6, 2012
It’s a Growing Ad World Thanks to Google and Facebook
The ad world is growing, rapidly.
According to mobiThinking,
mobile ad spend worldwide is predicted to reach $20.6 billion by 2015,
primarily driven by search ads and local ads. Google alone is the main
recipient of mobile ad spend, accounting for $2.5 billion in annual mobile ad
revenues ("Mobithinking," 2012).
Lest we forget about the growing beast
that is Facebook. In 2011, Facebook
ad spend grew 1600%, based on brands who utilize Nanigan’s software to
manage their Facebook ad ecosystem (Eler, 2012).
eMarketer predicted that by the end of
2011, social network advertising will account for nearly 11% of all online ad
spending in the U.S. When we think about it, social media advertising is
distinct from other ad platforms in that they are highly targeted based on
information its audience provides (demographic, psychographic, interests,
likes, connections, etc.)
We all know that reach is key to
advertising success. The greater the reach a site has, the greater the
potential for turning an impression into a click. Facebook reaches 51 percent
of all Internet users (one trillion pageviews per month), whereas Google
reaches every Internet user at one point or another. Google’s display
advertising network reaches over two million websites with 180 billion ad
impressions per month (Flosi, 2011).
Given my experience with ad buys in
Google and Facebook, both have their benefits and setbacks. Ultimately, it’s up
to the marketer to make the right decision, based on their goals, to see where
they should invest their ad spend.
Facebook Vs. Google within the Ad Realm
Both platforms offer a strong position
with internet advertising; however, there are some key differences advertisers
should consider before aiming their budgets one way or another.
- Overall Reach: While both companies maintain a strong reach, Google clearly dominates with its ability to reach more unique visitors around the world, whereas Facebook can only reach those 900 million or so users at any given time.
- Ad targeting: Facebook is still developing its mobile advertising platform and is only testing some basic newsfeed ads within its mobile platform. Google, however, offers all of these and more, including keyword-based targeting options for a mix of ad types.
- Ad formats: Facebook recently launched five new ad formats, which include: ads that appear in news feeds; ads that run on the right-hand side of the homepage; ads within the news feed of your mobile device (not available yet); ads that appear when you log out; and offers. The new ad formats are either text and image-based ads or video ads, which can also be larger than the standard size ads. Google, however, maintains a strong dominance with a variety of formats, including: text ads, image ads, flash-based image ads, drop-down ads, mobile ads and in-video ads.
Ultimately, Facebook advertising is
the only form of advertising allowed on the social network giant, whereas
Google’s Display Network allows advertisers to make strategic media buys across
multiple sites.
The following infographic shows a
detailed breakdown of Facebook Ads versus Google Display Network.
References:
Eler, A. (2012, February 1). Report:
Facebook ad spending grew 1600% in 2011. Retrieved from http://www.readwriteweb.com/archives/report_facebook_ad_spending_grows_1600.php
Flosi, S. (2011, November 28). comscore
releases october 2011 u.s. online video rankings. Retrieved from
http://www.comscore.com/Press_Events/Press_Releases/2011/11/comScore-Releases_October_2011_U.S._Online_Video_Rankings
Mobithinking. (2012, June). Retrieved
from http://mobithinking.com/mobile-marketing-tools/latest-mobile-stats
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