By Peter Wood, The Wall, January 13th 2012 

Facebook insights. Dear oh dear. I’ve got to come out and say it – I’ve found their new and “improved” suite of analytics entirely perplexing, lacking in usefulness and extremely complex to explain, aggregate and apply to the real world.

I’m pretty sure I’m not the only one in the industry who has been using the old Insights page to report back successes to clients. I’ve been living in hope that they’ll never switch it off , but the time has come – the old insights page is still an option, but it’s not recording new data. I haven’t felt this down since I said goodbye to my Bebo account…

What are my gripes about the new Insights page and why do they matter? [Read more →]

Hussein Ebied, SEO Manager, Steak

Web analytics can be a bastion of data, the answers to every digital marketer’s little (and big) problems. But to others, it’s data overload: TMI from the tech geek world; more info than some site owners know what to do with. How can you find the needle in the haystack, that juicy nugget to set your data free?

Meet Hussein Ebied – one of Steak’s venerable SEO managers with five analytics-crushing years of digital marketing experience. Hussein joins us from Steak’s sunny New York offices to explain analytics options, best practices, and how to use your analytics tool to  not just run web reporting, but develop eye-popping analysis and insights

Before we delve into strategy, let’s review basics.

Google Analytics is a free tool offered by Google that reports key statistics about visitors to a website, used primarily by marketers. One study notes that Google Analytics is used by 81.6% of all the websites, whose use of traffic analysis tools is known. This sample is 52.4% of all websites. (See market share of all analytics tools.) GA can track visitors from search engines, display advertising, pay-per-click networks, e-mail marketing and side materials such as links within PDFs.

The difference between Google Analytics (GA) and other analytics tools lies in cost, usability and expanded features. There are many free and paid analytics tools that allow you to track site traffic, keyword success and KPIs. Tracking these results allow you to shift your campaigns according to detailed metrics.

Other paid analytics tools have similar or more robust features, discussed below.  But tracking your website and keyword rankings does not tell a marketer about missed opportunities. We’ll discuss how to create web reports that provide analysis your clients will love.

What are the advantages of using Google Analytics (GA)?

Hussein Ebied: Google Analytics’ strengths are clearly its usability, accuracy, zero-cost and advanced features. Companies without a large budget for analytics, or advertisers who are new to the digital ad space would like GA for its quick elevation of key metrics and easy integration into any website.

GA also has a lot of features that come automated right out of the box, such as segmentation of paid and organic traffic and even tracking, which you might have to manually configure on other analytics tools.

What are the advantages to using paid analytics tools?

HE: Paid tools like Webtrends and Omniture’s Adobe SiteCatalyst could provide an advertiser with greater insights and segmentation features.  Until recently, multi-channel conversion tracking was not available on GA (currently in beta) but other paid tools have been doing it. Paid tools have a more robust integration with social media channels. Some tools have exclusive partnerships with large social properties that allow them to pull in unique data sets. Some paid tools are starting to combine analytics and campaign management under one platform.

What are the drawbacks of paid tools?

HE: Some analytics tools can come at a hefty price (in the thousands), which vary by packages and levels of customer service. If a web team does not budget for a higher level of service and does not know the tool, they could be in for a surprise. For example, Omniture, which powers Adobe SiteCatalyst, offers different types of platforms and service levels.  Implementation is also an issue.  While these tools are very powerful, it takes a serious commitment and resource level to ensure they are implemented correctly.  You’re definitely going to have to earn that increased level of insight.

What are the drawbacks of Google Analytics?

HE: Perhaps accuracy, but with any type of analytics solution your numbers will never match reality, even when compared to the accuracy of paid products. Also, you’re giving the people that create the keyword pricing direct insight into what those keywords are worth to you.  While Google has clearly stated that they don’t share data between AdWords and GA, it’s something to be aware of when making a decision on providers.

A Google Analytics Dashboard

What do marketing managers typically report with analytics?

HE: At the most basic level, marketers typically report KPIs (key performance indicators). Obvious KPIs like site visits and click-through-rates are compared on a month-over-month or year-over-year basis. Some agencies use this data to create custom reports showing easy-to-read metrics.  These reports, though, may not provide actionable learnings or recommendations.

Typical reporting also includes user actions or conversions. It’s important to not only look at the number of conversions, but also your conversion rate, which is the number of conversions over the number of visits to your site.

OK, we got the basics out of the way.  Let’s let’s get into the Steak, err, the meaty stuff.

So what’s the difference between web analysis and web reporting?

HE: The difference is that web reporting alone can be death-by-data – pages of info with no clear conclusions – while web analytics provides insight, actions and impact on the company.  (For more, read what the godfather of search and analytics, Avinash Kaushik, outlines in his colorful blog on real web analysis.)

Say you launched an SEO campaign for your website that sells the best, albeit most expensive, winter coats in the world.  When measuring on a year-over-year basis to account for seasonality, you might notice the following winter that your website saw an increase in traffic, but a dip in year-over-year sales. What went wrong? Now analysis becomes vital to the survival of your online business. A comprehensive web analysis should uncover several possible causes for this dip in traffic.

Step 1: Market Analysis

Your web analysis should question whether the previous winter was a special time for your business.  Was it the first time your coats entered the market? New product launches are susceptible to media buzz and word-of-mouth advertising. Monitoring your brand online is a great way to account for these trends.  Also, consider whether competitors’ discounts or economic factors have led customers to choose a more affordable product.

Step 2: Site Usability

If your traffic numbers are up year-over-year but your conversions (sales) and conversion rate went down, the problem could be usability and the conversion path users must follow on your website. Web analysis should help you pinpoint the sections of your site that experience the greatest bounce rate. Remedying design flaws on your website could increase the likelihood users will convert upon visiting.

Step 3: Search Trends / User Behavior

What if traffic did not increase, but your conversion rate improved year-over-year? A seasoned analyst might look at the actual keywords that drove traffic to your site but generated a lesser volume of traffic than the previous year. Using search engine tools, you may find there has been a general decline in search volume for those terms.

People may be less interested in searching for coats overall online.  Users may still be purchasing coats online, but rather than conducting generic, brand-neutral searches for “coats” on search engines, a great percentage of them now prefer to visit niche department stores or shopping aggregator sites, such as Amazon, that sell all types of brands including yours.

Web reporting - not analysis - despite the pretty colors.

How do some marketers provide reporting vs. analysis?

HE: Many agencies and in-house marketers overlook the importance of marrying the data in analysis to specific learnings and action items that could impact the overall goals of the business. A major part of any successful online marketing campaign is to ensure that your objectives are in line with the client’s business goals.

Some marketers don’t highlight causality.  Normal analytics tools don’t always reflect offline factors, environmental issues or shifts in consumer demand.  These tools can do the heavy lifting, but the operator must deliver the insights.

What factors should good web analysis include?

HE: You can’t just show that traffic has gone up or down. You have to uncover factors of why this increase or decrease occurred. If you examine offline factors, the possibilities are endless: facility changes, PR/ad campaigns, walk-ins, phone campaigns, public sentiment, etc.

Let’s say that one of your KPIs is conversion rate.  If the CR (conversion rate) has gone down, what are some of the related factors you should look at? Have impressions increased?  Has click through rates decreased?  What about the external factors?  Was there a price change on your site or on a competitor’s?  Did you get a mention in the press?

With online factors, however, you need to check what keywords drove traffic: Have they been changing over time? Are there major changes to the site? What changes have competitors implemented that could affect your company’s visibility?

Tailor KPIs to your clients

 On what level, or for whom, should you write reports?

HE: A web analysis should address the needs and concerns of all stakeholders across different departments, levels and understandings.  Reports should be tailored across different levels of management: Your contact may be concerned with traffic and conversions, while top management is concerned with revenue. It’s impossible to create a report for everyone, but pay attention to who your stakeholders are and who your audience is.

Also, make sure you speak in a language everyone understands. The hotel industry, for example, may track REVPAR (reservation per available room) while the retail industry may want to see same store sale volumes.

What should marketers avoid?

HE: They should be careful about data overflow, because the amount of information they can pull from analytics could yield endless spreadsheets of data.  But great metrics are useless if not analyzed.  You also want to start with an open mind.  Many analysts want to prove a hypothesis that they already have.  Instead, I urge people to look at the data and let it guide your thinking.  Otherwise you’re just creating a self-fulfilling prophecy.

What reporting do marketers often mistake for analysis?

HE: Rather than have a report full of graphs and numbers representing your conversions over time, you should supplement the report with a brief description of what the graphs means, how it affects the business, or how you can further improve your KPIs. 

Web Analysis Fundamentals Diagram by analytics guru Avinash Kaushik

What else should web analysis explain?

 Find reasons behind your metrics; connect the dots.  Marketers know how to present numbers, but not all marketers provide analysis.  Your analytics will tell you traffic has increased by 30 percent. What it won’t tell you is what online/offline factors contributed to this increase. These answers are always in the data; it’s just knowing where to look.

In summary, what key points should marketers use to ensure better analysis and less data-drenched reporting?

1. Determine the best analytics tools for your needs and resources.
2. Make sure your marketing objectives are in line with the client’s business goals.
3. Uncover factors that lead to increases and decreases in your performance metrics.
4. Tailor your reports across different levels of management.
5. Ensure that analysis includes insights, actions and impact on the company.

Google Analytics is reporting no data for many accounts for yesterday, 2nd November 2010. Here at Steak we are seeing this across some, but not all, accounts. There’s no discernible pattern between accounts.

We’re contacting Google (as everybody else is, no doubt – I’ve seen Twitter messages at Matt Cutts and the Google Analytics Twitter account; both may be signed off however as they are on the West Coast).

Hopefully Google will blog aout the issue on their GA blog soon – and we’ll post any updates here.

Data for today is coming through.

UPDATE: Google have stated it is a data processing issue and no data has been lost; expect it to appear (overnight I assume).