Marketing Tom - Internet Marketing

Web Analytics - some interesting observations

I just downloaded a pdf entitled: 25 Real Stories of Better Results through Web Analytics, from the NetIQ site. Though it is obviously trying to promote Web Trends and its new WebTrends 7 product, it does have some interesting insights into how web analytics can help flagging websites. Though some of the functionality can be found from current statistics packages, other advanced features would have to be acquired through purchasing this product, entry level prices start at $495.

Here's one such story:

"We used to send a hint of the Tip Of The Week to our partners on Fridays, with a click-through rate of 23%. The landing page contains a full text of the Tip and a mini-survey checking how valuable, innovative and applicable the Tip is to the reader, providing us with useful input. Last September, after viewing our reports, we found that Mondays have more intense traffic than Fridays. We started sending the Tips on Mondays and almost doubled the click-through rate to 44%!"
Raphael Barki, Marketing Research, Senior Manager
RAD Data Communications

Looking at site statistics

Yesterday was the busiest day on my other Web site, Mad About Madrid, for many weeks. Ever since the dreadful bombings in Madrid a few weeks ago traffic has been down around 40% but is now starting to reach pre-attack levels. However, the reason for yesterday’s big spike in traffic was due to the memorial service held in Madrid’s Cathedral, the Almudena. Many people from all over the world heard or saw the news about this event on TV, radio and the press and so made a beeline to their search engine to find out more about this cathedral. As Mad About Madrid is number 1 on Google for these search words, many people clicked on the Almudena Cathedral link.

Using the statistics package that I have from Stat Counter, I have been checking the activity of the people coming in to the site, most who have come in have read the information and left. However, a small percentage have moved around the site and will hopefully be added to my 'returning visitor' list. This is a snapshot of how one referrer, from Italy navigated around the site. The final 3 results indicate that the person is carrying out a search using Google on the Mad About Madrid site.

Measuring Web site Success

It is very easy to think of Internet Marketing and act tactically. However, all your activities with search engine optimisation and email marketing should always be driven by Website/business objectives and this needs to be the subject of continual control. You may know where you want to go but how can you tell if you have got without some form of measurement.

Jim Sterne in his article 10 Steps to Measuring Web Site Success gives some interesting pointers on how you can make your website even better. In a nutshell it comes down to talking to the people who ultimately matter: the stakeholders and constantly measuring the success of your site.

Web Site Stats from Stat Counter

I just had to write an article about the stats package offered by StatCounter. I have been using the package for over 2 months now (on Mad About Madrid) and really can't find any fault with it. The package at its basic level, is offered free but still comes with some great features, including real time tracking, a breakdown of pageloads, unique, first-time and returning visitors, search engine/keyword analysis, to name but a few. You can even get stats reports sent through to your email address. StatCounter simply requires a piece of javascript to be inserted into your web page and what's more they are invisible to visitors. In short, a great package!