It is possible to measure the quality of your website visitors using Google Analytics. This is a free tool offered by Google to enable website owners to analyse the volume of traffic received by your website and provides a wide range of metrics including those that can be used to measure the quality of your visitors.
Many website owners may be wondering what they need to know about their website traffic and how to improve it. Google Analytics gives them the answers. It reports on data including where your visitors come from, what search words they use, which pages they view on your site, how long they stay and much more.
Why does the quality of your website traffic matter?
A website’s traffic is its lifeblood. If you do not have traffic, then your conversion rates will be low and your site won’t be growing. Many businesses invest heavily in their marketing to generate traffic, but if people do not actually visit the site, then all of that effort is lost.
The quality of your website traffic matters because it affects your conversion rates and growth.
There are a number of ways to analyse the quality of your website traffic, but the following are the most widely used and the most important:
Engagement metrics – time on site, pages per session, exit rate
Conversion metrics – conversion rate, form submissions, goal completions
Relevance metrics – bounce rate, user geo-location, new and returning visitors
So, let us take a closer look at the information available from these metrics:
Engagements Metrics
Time On Site – The duration of time spent on a page is one of the most important metrics. It not only tells website owners the average amount of time spent on each page, but it also shows how engaged users are.
Pages Per Session – A page per session is a measure of how many pages a user views during their session (visit to your website). You can also use this information to measure the progress of your visitors as the move around your site.
Exit Rate – The percentage of visitors who leave your website without completing a task – usually entering their details or purchasing something. You can use this information to analyse why visitors do not complete a task on your website and then make changes to your layout and text to improve your conversion rates.
Conversion Metrics
Conversion Rate – A ratio of how many visitors convert into your desired action such as a sale, sign-up, email or whatever. You can use this information to identify pages that are not converting as well as highlight pages that convert well.
Form Submissions – This metric tracks the number of forms submitted to your website. Other metrics include how many people sign up to your newsletter, how many are added to your mailing list and how many people buy something.
Goal Completions – Goal completions are activities performed when a visitor reaches a specific page of your website. This could include e-book downloads or case study downloads (to name a few).
Relevance Metrics
Bounce Rate – Your Google Analytics bounce rate is the percentage of people who visit a site and then leave without visiting other pages. The higher the bounce rate, the less engaging the content on your site is.
User Geo Location – The user geo location metric is a useful way to see how many people are searching for a certain service or product in a particular area near you.
New And Returning Customers – This metric tracks the amount of returning customers and the number of new customers. Once you have set up your goals and metrics for your site, you will want to make sure you’re using the right strategy to reach your goals.
In conclusion, if your website visitors are engaging with your content or purchasing products on your site, then you are doing an excellent job of providing them what they want. If they are not, then you can make changes to try and fix this.
Engagement, Conversion and Relevance metrics are different ways to measure the quality of your website visitors using Google Analytics. By using these three metrics, it is possible to determine the behaviour of your visitors and compare that to other websites in your industry. The insights that these metrics provide helps you understand the audience that is visiting your site, what they are doing while there, and other factors that might influence their visit behaviour.
Read more about how Google Analytics can help to improve your Search Engine Optimisation results. You may also wish to watch the following video, courtesy of Stewart Gauld, to understand more about the benefits of using Google Analytics on your website.
