Google Analytics

Definition

Google Analytics is a free web analytics tool that provides statistics and basic analysis for search engine optimization (SEO) and marketing purposes.

The service is available to all users with a Google account. In Google Analytics you can measure the results of individual campaigns in real time, compare the data with previous periods and much more.

Google Analytics shows you data from all the channels that drive traffic to your website. These include organic search, paid search (PPC), social media, referrals(backlinks) and direct traffic.

Functions

By being able to monitor all channels, you can check what’s working well and what’s not in terms of advertising. Since the data is all stored in one place, it is possible to easily compare the different channels.

Conversion Tracking

It’s good to know how many users have visited your site and where they are coming from. More importantly, do they really convert? Google Analytics allows you to set goals that are tracked when a user takes a specific action on your website. Regardless of how many users each channel directs to your website, you should know how many of those users actually took a desired action.

Analysis of customer engagement

Interaction metrics such asbounce rate, pages/session, and average time spent are key indicators for the performance of a website. Analytics offers a number of features that allow you to analyze how users interact with your website and content. These metrics monitor various aspects of the customer journey and show user behavior on your site. The statistics can be displayed for individual pages. This will give you a better idea of which pages are working well and which need to be optimized for a better user experience.

Device Overview

With Google Analytics you can see which devices visitors to your website are using. This will give you information on how well your mobile site is performing compared to the desktop version.

If you’re getting a similar number of visitors from each device type (but different conversions) this may indicate a user experience issue with that version of the site.

For the optimization of marketing campaigns and effective online marketing, Google Analytics can be linked with Google Ads. By linking the two tools, it is possible to analyze which ads convert well with which keywords and which do not.

In addition, Analytics can be linked to Google’s Search Console to see what search query users entered on Google to get to your site.

For which websites is Google Analytics suitable?

Analytics by Google is targeted at small and medium e-commerce websites. The tool has limitations that make it less suitable for more complex websites and larger companies.

For example, the system collects data via a JavaScript tag that is inserted into the code of the pages where data is to be collected. The page tag acts as a web bug to collect visitor information. However, because it relies on cookies, the system cannot collect data from users who have disabled them. Google also uses only samples of collected data in its reports, rather than analyzing all available data.

Data protection

Privacy experts regularly raise privacy concerns about Google Analytics. The Google Analytics dashboard allows users to collect information about individuals whose websites are linked to social networks such as Facebook and Twitter without the individuals concerned being informed or giving their consent.

Relevance for SEO

With Analytics, you can capture many important Key Performance Indicators (KPI) that cover all aspects of your website’s performance. Through analytics, you’ll gain insights into the effectiveness of your online marketing strategies, on-site content, user experience, and device capabilities.

The statistics show you what works well and where there is still a need for optimization. Google Analytics provides you with the information you need to improve and optimize your website.

Google Analytics insights are also almost invaluable for evaluating your SEO. The platform answers a number of questions, such as how users find and interact with your website:

• How much search traffic does your website get?
• Which of your landing pages gets the most visitors?
• With which search queries do visitors come to your website?
• What is your website’s bounce rate for visitors from different sources?

Data and information also offer great potential in SEO. The more you know about your website visitors, the better. Google Analytics is a platform that provides a lot of data. If you access the right reports and evaluate them correctly, you can increase the ROI (return of investment) of your SEO measures.

Conclusion

With Google Analytics, you get insights into the effectiveness of your online marketing strategies and can optimize your SEO measures.