3 Reports Every Digital Content Specialist Should be Checking in Google Analytics
As a digital content specialist, you need to know the exact impact of social media on your business. Google Analytics is the prime place to start. Industry experts agree: If Google doesn’t see your blog or site, then it might as well not even exist. Google Analytics reports in particular can provide a lot of insight into where to invest company resources to get the biggest return.
Which Google Analytics Reports to Check
Google Analytics can be intimidating at first. You may want to start out slowly, by measuring one or two things to get comfortable using the platform and interface. Then, you can start using it on a bigger scale. Ultimately, your best toolbox of reports will include those that help you optimize site traffic, as well as do more with the traffic you already have.
Here are three reports for you to familiarize yourself with as you take the leap into Google Analytics:
1. Traffic
Traffic is referred to as ‘Pages’ in Google Analytics. The traffic report looks at the pages that get the most traffic on your site. It also shows metrics such as time on site and bounce rate.
- Go to Behavior > Site Content > All Pages.
- To expand the list of pages, change the number of rows displayed by going to “Show Rows” at the bottom left of the screen.
- Make sure the report covers a sufficient period, such as a quarter, six months or a year.
- Review the pages that get the most traffic, in order to ensure they include strong links and call-to-action features.
2. Navigation Summary
Navigation Summary tells you how visitors get to a particular page and where they click once they land there.
- When you are in the traffic report, click on any page. At the top, you will see an option for Navigation Summary.
- Just as you can with a traffic report, you can adjust the number of rows displayed.
- Pay attention to the Previous Page to learn which page someone visited just before they arrived on the current page. This offers context as to how people got to this page.
- The Next Page Path shows what visitors click on from that page when they are continuing on your website.
3. Conversions
Conversions are a critical metric in any content marketing program. These are the actions you want visitors to take when they use your site; for example, signing up or downloading something or attending an event.
- How you obtain this information varies and requires some manual work. Begin by setting up goals. Then, track them under Conversion > Goals > Overview.
- While the raw number of conversions is useful, what’s even better is the number of conversions divided by the number of pageviews. This results in your conversion percentage. The higher this percentage, the more likely a visitor to a page will convert. These are the pages you should share and promote.
For overall assistance, it also helps to bookmark the Google help page.
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