Without Metrics, There’s No Chance of Success
Monday, March 20th, 2006Metrics. We’ve all seen them. Long print-outs showing how many people came to the site, how long they stayed, what the most popular pages are. The top sites that referred traffic to your own. The top keywords.
Most of us, even if we understand the metrics, don’t have time to sit down, do the analysis, and determine what they mean. But if you do, you have a wealth of information for improving your online results. Consider this:
• It’s trivially easy to find which sites are referring traffic to yours—suggesting venues for advertising or partnership.
• It’s also simple to see which keywords are driving traffic to your site—suggesting natural or paid search programs.
• And, with a little extra effort, you can track individual banners and keywords right through to sale or lead—so you know what is working, what isn’t, and where to redirect campaign spend.
But metrics go far, far beyond the site. Consider:
• Competitive Intelligence. All the same metrics you get for your site (keywords, referrers, what’s working, campaign spend, etc), you can also get for your competitors’ sites. With the knowledge this competitive intelligence generates, you can counter your competition’s most effective keywords, venues, and tactics.
• Buzz Monitoring. Want to know what consumers are really saying about your products? Now you can monitor the blogosphere, to see how pundits (and everyday users) really feel. This offers you the opportunity to craft brand messages that really resonate with your audience, rather than falling flat.
Every online program can be measured, so there is absolutely no mystery which campaigns are performing, and which aren’t. Metrics are the key to ongoing, rising success in a closed-loop model.Leave out the metrics, and online success becomes merely a matter of chance. Will you roll those dice?
