The ongoing monitoring of web analytics to implement enhancements is a terrific way to squeeze ROI from your business website. We are all familiar with the phrase “if you build it, they will come”. And while that may apply to the brick and mortar world you’ll find that this phrase rarely holds up in the digital space. Building a new website that is tailored to your brand is a huge advantage. But you must have a pulse on the analytics of that website and how your visitors are interacting with the individual web pages.
It’s only when you apply ongoing analysis and the structured implementation of actionable improvements, will you achieve the significant results reserved and coveted by industry leaders.
These brands understand the power behind analytics and the interpretation of the data.
Analytics is the central way of identifying whether your business website is achieving objectives and providing users with value. And executing on specific tactics is how you achieve record ROI for your brand’s web product.
User insight
Giving your customers what they want is a must for a business to succeed. So why not empower your website to do so? You may have a strong understanding of who your customers are, but what if you also knew how they prefer to navigate your website or what content they were most interested in? Imagine having a grasp on their preference for consuming information or the entry points they utilized to access landing pages. Now imagine using this information to improve things such as average session duration and other engagement metrics by 50%. Or increasing phone calls, emails, form submissions and other conversion metrics by 30%? What value would your business place on such a significant increase in qualified leads for example?
Interpreting a company’s web analytics provides essential insight regarding visitors, customers and behavior. All of which may lead to new improvement opportunities. Your web analytics may validate your assumptions about your customers, or they may not. The data might force you to challenge some assumptions, giving you the actual evidence needed to advocate for necessary changes. The evidence may also lead to having management revisit critical site objectives.
Want your users to take specific actions? You can in fact direct users throughout a page and lead them to a certain area. You can also encourage a certain behavior that leads to an actionable item.
Measurable goals
If you want to make the most of your site and your business, measurable goals are required. Don’t fall into the trap of allowing your decisions to be purely subjective or ruled by gut feeling. Instead, decision making should be based on both qualitative and quantitative data.
While some decisions may be black and white there are often user experience decisions that must be made with a blend of hard data and creative inclination.
In addition to looking at the correct data points, you’ll also need to have the appropriate expertise and acumen to properly understand what to do with the information. Make no mistake, the data alone will not give you the answers, nor will they give you your next move.
Such tactical recommendations must be made from a deep foundation of expertise, user experience knowledge and years of results-driven application.
These days a full service digital agency will have SEO and online marketing experts that have been living and breathing these subject matters daily for several years. These individuals are able to provide optimal recommendations from the marriage of simple data and expertise. It’s this combination that leads to result producing solutions. And this is precisely the type of digital agency your brand will want in its corner when determining which tactics to implement.
For example, your company is operating an interactive B2B website and you cater to large and well-established brands with locations all over the world. You’ll want to understand the path of least resistance to that all important submission form. Or you’ll want to have clarity on the best place to have your white papers through A/B testing. Or how far down to put a call to action on a specific case study. These specific decisions make a big difference when it comes to conversion and are just a few of many ways you can enhance overall website effectiveness.
Implement ongoing enhancements
Never settle for flying blind with regards to how your business website is performing and meeting customer needs. Have the tools and the specialists ready to implement enhancements. Over time the benefits can be substantial. And it won’t take long before you start to achieve record ROI from your brand’s most important marketing tool.