My First Blog Posting
Filed under: Analytics on Wednesday, December 19th, 2007 by Joy BrazelleMy first blog, hello! Being the new guy around here my December has been pretty hectic with work leaving pretty much no time for gift shopping. So I decided 2007 would be the year I would do all my shopping online. Or at least try.
Borrowing some advice from Seth Godin circa 2002 (The Big Red Fez), which is still just as true and important as it was back then, if you have a website where you hope that visitors do something; sign up for a newsletter, buy something, request pricing, whatever it is, do yourself a favor and pretend that you are a new visitor to your site and try it for yourself. You may be surprised.
It is December 19th, 6 days before Christmas, and I have no shopping done. And it is really not my fault. Okay, it is my fault for leaving all the shopping until December, but last weekend I really did try. I spent hours online only to be met with strange error messages, lengthy registration requirements and the worst, sites crashing when I tried to enter my billing info or my credit card security code.
So why do I bring this all up on my first blog posting? What does this have to do with website analytics? A lot. First, you need to find a way to track the progression through a ‘conversion’ process on your site.
But even before that you need to figure out what you consider a conversion. Sure, if you’re an ecommerce site a sale seems like the logical conversion. But there should not just be one conversion. Don’t burn bridges. If something happens to your cart, or if me or other visitors just can’t figure it out, don’t prevent us from buying. Send us a follow-up email with other ways to purchase. Who knows, I may call you and buy.
Once you have a few conversions in mind figure out how to track them in your web reporting and then pay attention. What you should see is that once someone is engaged in the process the percent who proceed should increase, not decrease. For example, if you are an ecommerce site you may have a conversion funnel similar to this:10 - 20% of all visitors - See product detail and/or add to cart 20 +% - Start checkout process 70% - Step 2 of checkout
80% - Step 3 of checkout
90% - Confirm order and complete
The numbers may be higher or lower, but they should always be increasing. If you see a dip at a certain step, especially deeper into the process, that is a pretty clear sign of a usability issue or maybe even a problem with a page. Try to figure it out yourself. Or if you don’t see it, have someone you know who doesn’t spend a lot of time online try to place an order. The problem should become obvious. Then you can get if fixed and make everyone happy!
Well, that wraps up my first blog. Happy Holidays!
joy
