You might think that you are an expert in search engine optimization (SEO), but you don’t know much about Google Analytics (GA). This post provides some fascinating insights into the powerful tool that few marketers fully embrace or integrate into their marketing efforts.
Google Analytics offers GA as an analytics service. This analytics tool focuses mainly on website marketing data. Site owners and marketers can use this data to create various reports and measure the performance of their website.
GA is a complicated set of tools that can be difficult for beginners. One can easily get lost with the many features that are part of GA. You can learn how to use GA effectively with patience and practice.
GA offers two versions to its users. The free version is for small and medium-sized businesses.
Large enterprises who require more detailed analysis of their websites may opt for the second version, which costs $150,000 per year.
Nearly everyone working in digital marketing knows the basics of GA’s report generation capabilities. But there are other things Google Analytics can do that you don’t know.
These are just a few:
1. Measuring Social Media Engagement
It was previously believed that Google Analytics could not measure anything other than website activity. However, this belief has been disproven. GA has eight types of reports that can measure social media engagement and performance.
- Overview Reports
Overview reports inform the GA user about conversions that were made through social media posts. These conversions can be directly related to engagement on social media platforms, or through your website. This feature reports both of these indicators.
- Data Hub Activity
The Data hub activity report displays the number of people who are engaging on your social media platforms, and sharing your content. This aspect of your social media accounts can be measured by specific indicators, such as how often your URL has been shared.
- Referrals
Referral reports from networks provide insight into which social media platforms have higher ROI, so you can target your efforts to that platform.
- Landing Pages
This report will show you how engagement is on each landing page of your website.
- Trackbacks
You can track who is linking back to your site (the influencer who shares your content) and then direct your efforts towards them.
- Plugins
This report is very informative and gives insight into your clickthrough rates for social sharing buttons. You will also find out which content received the most shares using each of these buttons.
- Conversions
This report will show you how many of your social media posts convert. This report is especially useful for social media marketing agencies as they can directly measure the effectiveness of each campaign.
- User Flow
This report also shows the user’s journey on your website from their point of entry to their exit point. This is relevant for social media engagement. It can help you see the effect of a social campaign that you are running on your visitors.
2. Use a Unique User ID To Check Multi-device Activity
Google Analytics allows you to enable user ID. This will allow users to be tracked on all devices.
These data will allow you to understand your visitor’s thought process and the device that you are converting the most.
You can view the activity of users with this alpha-numeric identification across their desktop and cell phones, whenever they switch between them. These tracking data can be used to market your products at the most important touchpoints.
3. Track Cart Abandonment Through GA
Over 75% of people who visit a website abandon it after they have filled up their carts. Google Analytics will give you data-driven reports on how many people left the website after they initiated the sale.
The cart abandonment rate can be simply described as the ratio between successful purchases and users who abandoned the site after filling out their carts.
Google Analytics tracking data can give you a better view of your website’s abandonment rate. You can see how many people left your site after filling out their carts in your e-store.
4. Keep Track Of Your Top-selling Products
It is difficult for e-commerce companies to track top-selling products and revenue accumulation. It is nearly impossible to track which products perform well and which ones need more.
GA is able to produce reports on a product’s sales volume which will help you determine your bestsellers.
This will allow the business to focus its marketing efforts on top-selling product categories and not waste resources on products that aren’t performing well.
5. You Can Track The Changes To Your Website In Real-time
This is a unique feature in Google Analytics. Google Analytics allows users to track every change a website makes after a new attribute is added. This is a significant feature because most performance depends on A/B testing.
GA is a tool that can help you see the results of changing product descriptions on your website to be more keyword-centric.
This feature allows you to test various variables in real-time without having to wait for data accumulation.
6. Benchmark Your Website’s Performance in Your Industry
Benchmarking allows you to compare your website with other key industry players. Google Analytics allows you to track individual website performance using different metrics and reports. You can also share data from your website with other websites for comparison. This feature encourages healthy competition between businesses in the same industry.
7. Keep Track Of Your Top-performing Web Pages
Google Analytics allows you to track which web pages perform well and which need to be restructured.
Analytics reports will provide a detailed overview of how a page performs across various metrics. This will enable you to monitor the performance of a page across different metrics and to test it continuously with other variables to improve its performance. This allows you to easily modify the structure and content on the sub-performing web pages.
8. Save Time By Setting Up An Email Alert
It’s easy to get lost among the multitude of data available on Google Analytics. It’s difficult to understand the data reports and you might be spending more time with GA than you should.
GA allows you to set up email alerts to save time and energy for any change on your website. You or your analyst will not be stuck at the computer for hours.
You will receive an email alert whenever a change is made.
9. Grab Your Search Term Reports
Normal circumstances will not require you to go through every page on your website in order to find the right page. Instead, they want to access the information on the page that is already there. What is the best way to do this? You can search the website by entering a query.
GA is a great tool. This tool can identify the search terms that each user entered on your site. This data can be used to improve the SEO strength of your site by using customer-driven search keywords and building content around these terms.
You can also use search terms to help you promote the products that users have searched for.
10. Comparing Sales between Hand-Held Devices & Laptops
Google Analytics offers the option to create a Mobile overview report. To track your sales of mobile phones, tablets, and desktops, you can set your goals easily. These data can all be used to determine which devices convert more leads.
It is clear that mobile usage is growing, especially when it comes to online shopping. It is essential to focus on mobile friendliness when designing your website.
You won’t be surprised to see that smartphones have replaced desktops if you take a look at the Google Analytics Mobile Overview report.
Bottom Line
Google Analytics offers a unique combination of search features that can be used to unlock hidden treasures for businesses. Although the tools are not easy to use, the reports can be difficult to analyze. GA’s data-driven reporting is crucial for supporting your SEO efforts. Google also tends to regularly update its analytics services. You should never stop exploring if you want the best out of this incredible set of tools.
This post was written by Kristian D’An. Kristian is the owner and SEO Specialist at Lux Digital Marketing, a St Pete SEO company. Kristian has been optimizing websites successfully for over 7 years. He has helped his clients achieve the #1 position on Google in several different industries.
