Gathering data from all different areas that have an impact on your eCommerce store is called web analytics. The collected data is used to understand the patterns in customer behavior and identify potential issues and areas for improvement. Thus data and analytics are quite important for your eCommerce business.
There are different types of eCommerce analytics that you can use to improve the quality of your business.
The audience is the key. The data analytics that focuses on your audience will give you information regarding their gender, age, location, technology, etc.
Also, data analytics of your audience will also inform you about the different devices your audience uses. How do they access your business; are they accessing it by smartphone or desktop?
Once companies know more about their audience, they can make sound decisions regarding their marketing and advertising techniques.
Also, they can alter how their content is displayed on different devices.
How did your audience find you online, and how did they end up scrolling your website? Data related to the customer acquisition will tell you that.
The acquisition data focuses on the types of online marketing tools and channels bringing more audiences to your platform. Furthermore, this type of data informs you of which channels result in the most sales and conversions and which do not. So, you can change your marketing strategy accordingly.
Data analytics must also be conducted on consumer behavior. This means understanding how people who end up on your website behave. Do they stay for some time on your website, or do they leave immediately? If they do stay, which page or product are they exploring? What goods or products are they purchasing? And also, on average, how much time are customers spending on your website?
Conversion analytics is also extremely important if you want to ensure your business moves forward. Conversion analytics will inform you when online users convert into actual customers and what tactics were used to make that happen.
To track conversions, you need to set specific goals and track them by triggering a web analytics event or configuring a rule in your analytics tool. Goals will vary depending on what you’re trying to achieve. Good examples include a placed order, new customer registration, and submitting a contact form. Also, most tools allow you to configure secondary goals (microconversions) allowing you to track customer journey in a more granular way. An example could be visiting a certain page prior to completing checkout or clicking on a certain design element on a page.
Another important area to consider is paid marketing data. This means keeping an eye on how much revenue or profit is generated from social media advertisements. Things to consider here are: Have your sales increased due to paid advertisements? Which type of paid campaign has worked the most? Is your acquisition cost per paid media customer higher than that customer’s LTV (lifetime value)?
Google Analytics is the industry standard for user tracking and analytics, but it is not the only one out there. To make the most value out of it you will need to configure your tool carefully and build reports that produce meaningful insights. That may take some time and effort but they will undoubtedly pay off very quickly.
Heat maps are a tool that adds context to your data. They help visualize how users are engaging with your website via color-coded overlays. The warmer colors indicate that the users have clicked often at a place, while the cooler colors mean that those areas have not been clicked often.
You can use session replays if you need actionable insights about your business. This will show how users moved from Point A to B and further display mouse movements, taps, and clicks. Also, you will know the challenges users face, like bugs or blockers, while using your website.
The traditional website analysis will let you know when the users exit the sales funnel. It will display the rate of cart abandonment and pages. You can use an on-site survey to understand why they are exiting your website without purchasing anything.
In the on-site survey, you can ask questions like what products you would like to see more on our website, did you find what you were looking for, what topics you would want us to write more about, and so on and so forth.
You can add feedback widgets to your website so that customers can share their concerns immediately. They can be used to study performance trends and better comprehend conversion rate fluctuations.
You will know exactly what to do to create a better user experience through the feedback widget.
Analytics is quite important and can be effective if you set goals and the right strategy. You can use it to create effective social media campaigns and paid advertisements to drive more traffic, sales, conversions, revenue, and profit. Thus, data and analytics are crucial components that every business needs to grasp for seamless growth.