Developing a website that is both visually appealing and accurately represents your brand is no easy feat. The production process, from concept ideation to coding, can take weeks or even months. You might feel relieved once you’ve launched your website, but the work isn’t over yet. It’s crucial to monitor your website’s performance regularly to avoid downtime and hiccups in the customer journey. How can you measure performance? It’s Addison Clark’s answer to everything – data!

 Every website we build comes with a small piece of backend code to record traffic and other metrics. We analyze this data through Google Analytics, a tool which provides useful information about how people interact with your site. You can learn everything from how a user came to your site, how long they stayed and which pages they visited. Google Analytics can also tell you if a user viewed your site on a mobile device or desktop, or which country they’re from!

With all of this data at your fingertips, it can be difficult to know which metrics are important and how they impact your business. Here are the top four metrics and reports you should monitor on Google Analytics, and why:

• Average time on site: Just like it sounds, this measures how long users spend on your website. A higher average time means users are enjoying and engaging with your content. Conversely, a lower average time might mean users aren’t finding what they’re looking for on your site.
• Bounce rate: This represents how many users visit and immediately leave your site without taking any action, like clicking a button or watching a video. A high bounce rate indicates that users don’t find the content on your site to be relevant or engaging.
• Acquisition: This report on Google Analytics shows where your users are coming from online. Whether it’s organic search results, paid advertising or from another website, knowing how and why users land on your website can help inform your other marketing strategies. For example, if only a handful of users are visiting via organic search, it might be time to consider new SEO techniques.
• Goals: Out of the many reports you can generate through Google Analytics, the goals report is the most impactful to your bottom line. Goals are actions that you want users to take on your website, like clicking to call or filling out a form. Once you set goals in Google Analytics, you can see how many users completed your goals and even assign a dollar amount to them!

Tracking your website’s performance might feel like a daunting or confusing task, but it doesn’t have to be. The time you spent building your website might be wasted if your efforts can’t be measured. As always, Addison Clark is here to help with website optimization and analytics reporting!