It’s starting to sound like a broken record: “The Economy is in a Recession!”, “The Housing Market is abysmal!”, “Gas Prices are Ridiculous!”. Yes, our country’s economics have seen much better times, and once upon a time, our gas prices used to hover around $2 / Gallon. However, I believe that we are definitely NOT in a period of Recession, and we are definitely not, as I’ve already read somewhere online, about to be in “The Second Great Depression”.
If our economy is Oh, so bad, then how is something like this possible?:
The answer: Google Analytics. If you keep up with the MoreVisibility Analytics & Site Intelligence Blog, you already know that I love talking about Google Analytics and all of its different reports and features. What I don’t normally speak about is how great Google Analytics is when our economy is struggling to move forward, like it is at the time of this writing.
I have a Baker’s Dozen list of reasons why GA can make the difference between closing up shop and expanding your business in 2008:
- Google Analytics is Free! – I don’t know how you can get a better deal than that for an easy to use web analytics program with close to 100 different reports.
- GA synchs with your Google AdWords account – Clicking on two checkboxes. That’s how easy it is to synch up AdWords and Google Analytics.
- Track PDF, WMV, MP3, or any other types of downloads from your website – All you need to do is install a bit of additional tracking code to the links that people click on, and you’re good to go.
- Track Ecommerce Revenue, Transactions, and Products Sold – Keep track of how your online sales are doing, just like my image above.
- A customizable dashboard – Add, remove, and move reports around your Dashboard at will.
- Email Reporting – Email your favorite reports to your colleagues and your boss every month, every week, or even every day if you wish.
- Track non-Google Marketing – With some extremely simple additions to your destination URLs, you can track your Yahoo Search Marketing, Microsoft AdCenter, ASK Sponsored Listings, your banner ads and your email marketing campaigns all within the Google Analytics interface.
- View Industry Benchmarking figures – View industry averages, and compare them to your own website’s statistics.
- Advanced Path Analysis Reports – Learn how the visitors to your website are navigating about.
- Site Search Analysis – Learn how your website’s visitors are interacting with your internal search function, and how they are responding to search results.
- Shopping Funnel Visualization – See what the sticky points are in your shopping or your conversion process, and learn where your customers are jumping ship.
- Custom Conversion Points – Set your own Conversion Points on your website, and Google Analytics will track their performances
- Assign User Access, Write Custom Filters, and create up to 100 separate profiles – Build and modify your Google Analytics account to your own liking.
All of this information is incredibly valuable information and is available to marketers. Of course, you will need to install the necessary tracking code on your website’s pages.
Don’t despair during rough economical times. Be positive, stay sane, and open up a new Google Analytics account. The information you collect will allow you to better understand what the visitors to your website ultimately want from you and your business. By this time next year, when our economywill be doing much better, you’ll look back at the middle of 2008 and say “Yeah, that wasn’t so bad after all!”
