Welcome to the seventh edition of The Search, a weekly recap of all the interesting articles from the areas we deal with most: paid search, social media, web development, web analytics, SEO, display advertising, email marketing and mobile marketing. Check back each week to stay on top of the latest and greatest techniques in online marketing so that you can improve your skills and better serve your clients. Enjoy!
Do you know what the most expensive keywords are in Google AdWords? That is just one of the topics covered in these great articles regarding Paid Search and PPC. Check them out!
What is happening with Google and SEO? These articles are just what you need to learn more about what innovations are happening on the largest search engine.
New to the Search is Display Advertising. This week we take a look at different sources, publisher placements and how digital channels interact with traditional TV advertising. Take a look!
Just like last week, much of the buzz for social media still revolves around Google+. Take a look at the article from Search Engine Land or one of the other articles surrounding all things social.
Time to get back to the basics with web analytics? Want to measure social media engagement? Check out the article from Luna Metrics? Lead value? Try Future Now’s post. Or learn from your analytics and start optimizing your website with Zimana’s advice. Check them out today!
Zimana Blog: Outdated Website? Try These Six Starting Points For Website Optimization
Mobile
Every week there is a new prediction with where Mobile is currently and where it is headed. With these articles, you’ll learn more about where it is headed and whether it is poised to overtake TV advertising spend.
What do you think of these posts that we have shared with you? Do you agree or disagree with the ones posted? We’d love to hear your thoughts, and invite you to leave us a comment or tweet us @threedeep.
Welcome to the first version of What’s Hott, a weekly recap of all the interesting posts from the areas we deal with most: paid search, social media, web development, web analytics, SEO, project management, and mobile marketing. Check back each week to stay on top of the latest and greatest techniques in online marketing so that you can improve your skills and better serve your clients. Enjoy!
Earlier this week I was invited to lead a discussion for #NPTalkIRL (non-profit talk in real life) about the topic of Google Analytics. Since it was a very open ended topic area, I chose to talk about how to more effectively use Google Analytics and to gain insights into your website (in this case non-profit website). The format of the presentation was very informal – no powerpoint or computer allowed. Just an intimate group of non-profits interested in getting better at web measurement. And a great group it was!
Normally I post slides to my presentations on the blog for people to see, but since there were no slides allowed, I normally wouldn’t have anything to post.
Fortunately one of the attendees of the event, @coien, was “live tweeting” my tips for everyone to enjoy. I rounded up all of his tweets and included below. Thank you, @coien, for making me sound much better than I likely did IRL.
* Blessing and curse of Google Analytics: it’s free and easy. So easy that you get into the habit of not doing anything w/ it.
* Add custom tag to the end of your URL so you know if ppl visit site site from Twitter, etc. Otherwise may turn up as direct visit
* People who visit your site from social media behave completely differently from people who come in from search or typing in URL.
* See a Google Analytics report that you like? Click Add to Dashboard to access it easily.
* Ask yourself early and often: what is the goal of this website?
* Your top 10 searches are probably all for your specific brand name. Getting beyond that is how to build search traffic.
* Book recommendation: Web Analytics: An Hour a Day, by Avinash Kaushik. Another rec: taking the Analytics IQ test.
* If someone hits a “Thank You” page, that’s usually a goal. Create a funnel to see how many make it past each step to get there.
* Twitterfeed can integrate with Google Analytics URL Builder to get you custom data. Sweet!
* Don’t aim to arbitrarily increase traffic if that extra traffic doesn’t meet your website’s goals.
* Got a blog? Look at PostRank Analytics for some next level analysis beyond Google Analytics
* Another next step: site surveys like 4Q that can ask visitors if they accomplished their goals, and to rank their experience
I also enjoyed interacting with @jjmillard, @shayspeed, @nomadic_mind, @nonoah and @aokolue, and wanted to thank @jlbraaten for making the introduction and @SocialNicole for doing great things with #nptalk.
Over the years I have attended many conferences spanning a variety marketing of topics, including the MIMA Summit. At each of these events, my role was quite simple: attend the most relevant presentations to my area of interest, take copious notes, and apply the learned tactics and techniques in my day to day work. If our team feels ambitious enough, we will even post the notes on our blog and share reactions for the world to see (like our Google Analytics Summit and Online Marketing Summit notes from 2009).
This year’s MIMA Summit was different, because this would be my first time presenting at the conference. While I had blogged earlier this year about my goal to be a presenter at a marketing conference, I never imagined that it would actually happen. That is, until I met Betsey from Sugarbeet Creative and she gave me the opportunity to have my voice heard!
Continue Reading My MIMA Summit Experience: From Audience Member to Presenter →
Here at Three Deep, we are constantly thriving to provide actionable insights for our clients. For those who are unfamiliar with our company, we are a very data-centric organization. The name Three Deep actually refers to our discipline of looking past surface-level data, and digging three levels deep into the data at hand to provide the highest quality feedback possible.
We have recently developed a way to tightly integrate phone conversions with web analytics data to paint a more accurate picture of our clients’ marketing efforts, right down to the ROI.
The idea was sparked when we identified a disconnect between the online and offline conversion data of lead generation clients in our home improvement vertical. Nearly every lead generation website (regardless of industry) includes a phone number as a point of conversion, but we never really had a concrete way to tie this to online metrics.
Continue Reading Integrating Phone Calls with Google Analytics Data →
Last week I came across a great slide deck put together by InsightR consulting that compares two free web analytics tools: Google Analytics and Yahoo Web Analytics (formerly IndexTools). While we haven’t had much experience working with Yahoo! Web Analytics, the results from this study are quite intriguing, and favorable for Yahoo! in many areas.
As a GAAC consultant, this really does not change anything when it comes to our preferred choice of tools, but I do think that it proves Yahoo Web Analytics to be a true competitor in this space. Competition is good!
Continue Reading Yahoo! Web Analytics vs. Google Analytics →
The Mad Analyst is happy. Why you ask? Because I’m now using some of the latest Google Analytics features and it makes my life easier, particularly the Advanced Table & Report Filtering function. The release couldn’t have been more timely, considering a recent client request.
I was asked to look at the content of their site to determine “choke” points within the navigation. Now the site doesn’t have a lot of page depth to begin with so I wondered how I might look at where people are falling off. Previously, you could look at page data and only sort by the headers – so if I sort by Exit% or Bounce Rate, I either get the pages that are performing well or I get the pages that have super high bounce rates (100% !) but only 2 visits. What do you do? Export all 2,346 rows and then apply a filter in Excel? Not anymore.
Instead I utilized 2 semi-recent functions and the very recent report filtering to easily export a nice little analysis identifying the pages that need attention because they’re losing visitors.
First, I created a custom report that showed me the key metrics I wanted by page:
As marketers, we all know that there is a fair amount of turnover throughout the dynamics of the client/agency relationship. This post series covers solutions to many common problems that may arise while inheriting a Google Analytics account.
One of the key objectives in value added Web Analytics is answering the question “what is the point of this website” and “what do we want visitors to do when they visit.” The metric we use to determine success is a conversion occurring during a site visit.
This is a pretty elementary aspect of web analytics, and a fundamental foundation for a solid analytics install… or is it? From my experience, this is often overlooked. The fact is that most web analytics installations do not have even the most basic fundamental configuration elements in place.
Continue Reading Google Analytics: Inferring Conversions with No Goals →
A few weeks ago, a small group of “Three Deepers” attended Google’s annual Authorized Partner Summit at their headquarters in Mountain View, California. This four-day event provided excellent coverage of their industry-leading marketing products, including Google Website Optimizer (GWO), Google Analytics (GA), and Urchin.
The information presented was an excellent blend of product training, use cases, deep-dives into new capabilities, and breakout sessions with the product managers and engineers themselves. The following is a brief overview of the event and the knowledge that returned to Minnesota with us.
Day One – Google Website Optimizer
Continue Reading 2009 Google Analytics Partner Summit Recap →
As marketers, we all know that there is a fair amount of turnover throughout the dynamics of the client/agency relationship. At many levels, turnovers are a part of normal agency operations.
As the web analytics industry matures and more specialists emerge in the field, I have noticed that turnover is a result of clients reaching out to specialists in order to get the most out of their data. This effect can be credited to three simultaneous events occurring in the online measurement space:
The shift in the web analytics industry from an IT function to a role in marketing.
As marketers, we all know that there is a fair amount of turnover throughout the dynamics of the client/agency relationship. This post series covers solutions to many common problems that may arise while inheriting a Google Analytics account.
