Articles related to Web Analytics.

RIP Universal Analytics, long live the new Google Anaytics 4

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With what it had cost you to get used to the inferficiency of google Analytics and how long it took you to learn the new features. Well wing! New program, new criteria and new interface. Alas, to create new slides for my classes! (for three years I have been teaching the subject of Digital Analytics in the career of With what it had cost you to get used to the inference of Google Analytics and with what it had taken you to learn the new features that are appearing in the menu marked as Beta March 30, 2022

March 30, 2022

The truth is that he had already warned us more than a year ago. And furthermore, we know that cookies will disappear in 2023. So it is normal for Google to retire this tool that has been with us for so many years… (I confess that when I have been at the foot of the canyon directing digital companies, I never went to bed without looking at how it had been web performance during the day and planning some changes for the next day).

The truth is that he had already warned us more than a year ago. And furthermore, we know that cookies will disappear in 2023. So it is normal for Google to retire this tool that has been with us for so many years… (I confess that when I have been at the foot of the canyon directing digital companies, I never went to bed without looking at how it had been web performance during the day and planning some changes for the next day).

What should I do with my old Google Analytics?

What should I do with my old Google Analytics?

In short, when GA3 stops working, if you didn't have GA4 beforehand, you won't have a history of your website's performance. The sooner you install GA4 the better. In the GA3 configuration menu you will find the instructions.

In short, when GA3 stops working, if you didn't have GA4 beforehand, you won't have a history of your website's performance. The sooner you install GA4 the better. In the GA3 configuration menu you will find the instructions. counts as interactivity In short, when GA3 stops working, if you didn't have GA4 beforehand, you won't have a history of your website's performance. The sooner you install GA4 the better. In the GA3 configuration menu you will find the instructions.

In short, when GA3 stops working, if you didn't have GA4 beforehand, you won't have a history of your website's performance. The sooner you install GA4 the better. In the GA3 configuration menu you will find the instructions.

Well… there are several reasons why Google has changed the way of tracking. The first is the fact that many companies have websites and mobile applications. With GA4 you can have different data entry flows and, therefore, it allows you to measure the performance of the web and that of the app in the same tool. This is already a great what!

The second is the one I mentioned before: Chrome will stop using Cookie technology sometime in 2023 and GA3 was based on this technology. In this way, it distinguished users from visits, knew if they were new or recurring, calculated the bounce rate, the time spent on a page, etc. All this is over. We will have to use another type of technology to continue obtaining this type of data... although on the internet now the “time spent on a pageThe second is the one I mentioned before: Chrome will stop using Cookie technology sometime in 2023 and GA3 was based on this technology. In this way, it distinguished users from visits, knew if they were new or recurring, calculated the bounce rate, the time spent on a page, etc. All this is over. We will have to use another type of technology to continue obtaining this type of data... although on the internet now the “

Those of us of a certain age still remember what life was like before Cookies and before google Analytics… we also remember the hassle of managing the logs to make the analytics programs of that time work. But wow, we passed user sessions through the URL and learned as much as we could about user behavior on our website with the data we had. I think this is one of the reasons why Google has lowered the weight of the URL in the algorithm… it is preparing for really long URLs. In Search Engine Journal discussed one of these days the weight of URLs in the algorithm. They are still a ranking factor, but not with the weight they used to have. You can read the article here: URL as a ranking factor

URL as a ranking factor URL as a ranking factor.

URL as a ranking factor

URL as a ranking factor

The disappearance of cookies will affect, above all, advertising. If you have carried out a campaign lately, you will see that Google is already beginning to advise you to have other data sources to monitor your campaigns and to control their ROI. It seems that the trend will be to leave in our hands the uploading of customer lists and leads (like the look-a-like service that Facebook already offers). Artificial intelligences will also have more weight in the analysis of possible market segments that can become our clients. Google already has users and their behavior tracked, there is plenty of data to do all kinds of analysis. I am sure that you can already predict our intentions when browsing the internet without having to use cookies.

In any case, it will be interesting to see how technology changes throughout this year to adapt to the new environment of 2023.

In any case, it will be interesting to see how technology changes throughout this year to adapt to the new environment of 2023.

I hope this article has been useful to you.

A big hug.

How to go to Google Analytics 4

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January 13, 2021

Its arrival brings new reports, new ways of measuring and the disappearance of certain old metrics. All its functions are not activated yet (for example, it does not allow connection to Search Console yet ...). But since we are at the beginning of the year, it is important that you make the change as soon as possible, so you will have all the data for 2021 in the two Google Analytics.

The old Google Analytics codes are called by Google Universal Analytics codes or (GA3 codes for other people). The old codes begin with "UA-", the new ones are called Global Site Tag and begin with "G-" ... I say this so that you recognize when you are in front of some or in front of others.

January 13, 2021

For Google Analytics 4 to work, you must change the codes that you are now using on your website. To do this, go to Settings of your Google Analytics (the gear icon at the bottom left), and once inside, in the central column you will see a note that tells you to click there if you want to switch to Google Analytics 4.

Activate a new Google Analytics property 4

The first question it will ask you is if you want to create a new property or do you want to connect it to an existing GA4 property. You want a new one… it doesn't ask you if you want to connect it to your old GA3, it asks you if you want to connect it to another GA4. So click on create new.

Review your property settings

Hit the button "see your configuration" (or whatever you put according to the language) and click on tag installation or "tag installation". You will see that once done, it tells you that it has not received data in the last 48 hours. This is because you still have the old codes. My advice is don't take out the old ones, include the new ones, and keep both. Why do I advise you this, because with GA4 you start from scratch and there is no historical data, you will not be able to compare your 2021 data with the 2020 data ... also you may miss some metrics and from time to time you want to enter the old one. You can keep both, without any problem.

Activate advanced measurement

Activate this function to better know what visitors are doing on your page. For example, you will know if they scroll or not, if they download a pdf, if they use your search engine, what links they have clicked to exit the web, etc. a whole series of actions carried out on your website that you will be interested in knowing. You will find them all described if you click on the admin of this function (the gear on the right).

Install the new codes

Now that you have the correct configuration, it is time to install the new codes. Click on "Global site tag" or whatever you have written in your language (it is just below the advanced measurement) and there you will find the code that must be included in the "Head" header of your website.

Include the codes on your website or in your WordPress

If your website is made by hand, include the codes by hand in the “head.php” file. If your website is built using WordPress or any other content manager, use a plugin to do it. Ideally, you should use the same plugin that you already had to put the old codes, just paste the new code below the old one. In some cases, the templates (or “themes”) already have a space for the codes. See if this is your case. To find out if you put the GA3 codes with a plugin or from the template, check the installed plugins and see if you have any that speak of Google Analtyics. If there isn't one, you probably put the code somewhere in your template settings. In an emergency and you can't find the old codes, it's okay, download a new Google Analytics plugin (this one is fine Google Analytics plugin). Finally, if you used a plugin in which instead of pasting the entire code, you only had to paste the UA - in that same plugin you will find the option to put more code by hand. Look for the corresponding box and paste the whole new code (not just the identification, all the code) that's it. You will have both codes at the same time.

Final step: enter the new Google Analytics

If you click on the "home" icon in the side menu, you will automatically enter the new version. If you go back to the general list of properties, you will see that you now have a new one. The old one has the code that begins with UA, the new one begins with G. Better that you change the name of the new one and give it GA4 so that it is easier to recognize.

Okay, this is all.

If you have any problem when making the change, indicate it in the comments area and I will look to help you. You'll find various videos on Youtube that explain to you what I have explained to you in writing... I say it in case you prefer to do it visually. When I have a moment, I'll create a video myself and embed it in this article.

I go all right

A hug

Montse.

What is "purchase intention" and how to measure it on the internet

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What is "purchase intention" and how to measure it on the internet

Purchase intention It is the probability that a consumer buys our product or hires our service, in a given period of time. And it is a basic metric for our conversion funnel.

Let's look at an example of purchase intent:

  1. A user enters our website for the sale of electronic products.
  2. Discover the category of single-use cameras
  3. Enter the product sheet

How likely is he to buy that camera? –> this is the purchase intent.

We need to know what percentage of the users who see this product sheet end up buying the camera… in the same way, we need to know what percentage of visitors to our website are potential camera buyers.

Why is it important to measure “purchase intention”?

The path that a consumer follows from discovering our brand on the internet, until they buy our product or hire our service is tortuous and complicated. In each step of the conversion funnel of our company, it is necessary to discover what the set of users who are part of the target audience of each step of the funnel will be like. The “purchase intention” is usually found before the final phase of our funnel and we must be able to measure it.

At the beginning of the funnel, to measure the interest in a product, we have metrics such as the "reach of a publication" (how many people have seen it on our website or on our social networks) or a little further down the funnel, the "interaction with one of the our publications” (also on our website or on our social networks) for example, people who have “liked” or people who have “shared”. But with these two metrics (reach and engagement), we still can't be clear about how many people have "purchase intent"...

How to measure “purchase intention”?

The "purchase intention" must be measured at the moment in which the user is faced with a real possibility of purchase. That is, in front of a product sheet. This will normally happen on our website, although if we have sales on Facebook or on another platform, we can also measure the "purchase intention" there.

Metrics to measure it

  1. Clicks to product sheets -> our website
  2. Clicks to the list of physical stores where our product is sold -> our website and social networks.
  3. Use and redemption of discount coupons -> redemption on our website, distribution of the coupons by the Influencers with whom we work.

Creating the Sales Funnel

With what we have commented, we could already create a simplified version of our funnel:

  1. Interest in our brand (measure: scope of publications)
  2. Interest in our products / services (measure: interactions)
  3. Purchase intention (measure: clicks on product page + store list + coupons)
  4. Purchase Initiated (measure: clicks in the shopping cart)
  5. Purchase completed (measure: effective sales)

I hope these tips have been useful to you. What is your funnel like? How many steps does it have? What do you measure in each step? Do you want me to take a look at it? We follow the conversation in the comments.

If you want to know more about metrics in social networks, here is this article in which I explain the 10 things you should measure.

Here you will also find another article that may interest you: I explain cHow to improve the conversion rate of your website.

If you still want more information, here is another article, this one written by Neil Patel about how to create a customer journey map, which will help you understand and apply the concept of a sales funnel.

I hope you find this information useful.

we keep talking1

A hug.

How to Make a Benchmark

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Yesterday I had the pleasure of teaching the first session of the new edition of Digital Marketing Course for Cultural Industries organized by the SDE (Servei and Business Development, the Catalan Institute of Cultural Industries).

One of the points that we saw was Benchmarking and I explained to the students that Marketing cannot be done without taking the market into account and therefore it is essential that we know what our position is with respect to the companies with which we compete or with respect to companies similar to our.

How to make a benchmark?

This requires defining the variables we want to analyze, to know what our position is based on these variables, see what the position of the competition, then, is ideal capture it all in a positioning map.

The variables that I propose in my classes are as follows:

Benchmark technical level:

  • How many pages indexed in Google have a website? (: (Without quotation marks and domain name who wish to analyze) in Google this information looking for "nombredominio.com site" is obtained).
  • What authority does a website have? (obtained from the Google bar, any SEO plugin or from an online tool).
  • How many pages are linking to the page you analyze? (I recommend obtaining these data from which Alexa.com offers). Later note: Alexa stopped working in 2021. We now use SEMrush (www.semrush.com)
  • What position does that website ranking in Alexa.com? Later note: Alexa stopped working in 2021. We now use SEMrush (www.semrush.com)

Marketing Benchmark level:

  • What is the target audience for that enterprise and which segments attacks through its online communication?
  • What is your value proposition?
  • What Digital Marketing actions have detected that performs this company? (This can see watching who linkea to page [online news, blogs, directories ...] and looking for his name on Google [see social networking profiles, quotes, articles, etc.]).
  • What features we would highlight their website.

With this a good record for each of our competitors and also for our own company is obtained. And these data will help us know where we want to be, where we want to go and how we will do it.

The positioning map that I use is a graph showing bubble techniques 3 variables: the PageRank (the radius of the bubble), the position in the Alexa ranking (egComo hacer un benchmarkand abscissa) and the size of the page (vertical axis).

The attached image is of one of these maps, the other image corresponds to a record of competence (in this case corresponds to a theater).

Yesterday I promised the students would write this post and would hang up Excel I had created from the websites of some of the companies attending the class, so that you have sample and was not needed to start it from scratch (the graph it is complicated to make, the axis scales are logarithmic, the axes are reversed so that the best position appears on the top right, and definitely not a chart by selecting data from a table is displayed by pressing a button ... of Hence recommend students to use mine as a basis for their work).

Anyway ... here goes the Excel worksheet for creating the graphic benchmarking.
Excel Chart "How to Make a Benchmark” to serve as a base.

(If you do not see the graphic good or bubbles are not 3D is because you are using an older version of Excel. Although I have saved the file in .xls format so that everyone can open, you are actually created using the .xlsx )

I hope you find it useful and now already know cow do a good benchmark.

If you attended the event and want the complete slides of the entire Digital Marketing for Cultural Industries course, remember that the SDE will send you an email with a link to their servers from which you can download them.

A hug.

Difference between codes Google Adwords and Google Analytics

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Today I started to teach my classes in the Master Search Engine IDEC-UPFSo I start to get interesting questions in the forum of students. I think some of them may also be of interest to people outside the master, so here's one: the question student at the user level, what is the difference between codes Google Adwords and Google Analytics, and where can find.

Conversion codes Google Adwords

Conversion codes Google Adwords You are provided this service and should be included on the final page of what you consider to be a conversion. For example, if you have an e-commerce, must be codes on page: "gracias.php" ie last page of the checkout process, in which you thank you for purchasing.

Thus, when a user who has entered your site from an Adword, completes a purchase, Google Adwords knows why not perceived this, the user activates the code and Adwords account that can offer it as a sale, which makes statistics on how many customers have achieved through ads and how much it cost you to get each of them ... without this code can only tell you how many visitors you had and how much it cost you to get them.

The conversion code you find Google Adwords Adwords menu under Tools -> Conversions.

Google Analytics codes

On the other hand, are codes google Analytics. Estos deben incluirse en todas las páginas del sitio web, de esta manera, Google puede ir haciendo el seguimiento de qué hacen los usuarios en ella. Los encontrarás en Administrador –> Propiedad –> Información de seguimiento –> Códigos de Seguimiento.

Para conocer las conversiones de tu web desde Google Analytics, no hay códigos especiales, debes ir a Administrador –> Ver –> Objetivos–>Crear objetivo y allí le indicas que el objetivo es llegar a la URL “gracias.php” y así Google Analytics sabe cuántos usuarios han llegado allí y por lo tanto, cuántos clientes has tenido. También sabe de dónde venían, por donde han navegado antes de iniciar la compra, y si tienen una sesión de Google abierta, puede saber si son hombres, mujeres, la edad y sus intereses… un montón de cosas, vaya.

As you can see, the two systems are different but have similar goals, although one is oriented control of ROI in advertising campaigns and the other not.

Google Tag Manager

To simplify a bit the whole issue of putting the codes, Google created a few years ago Google Tag Manager. A system that once installed on your website, allows steps which codes you want to put it through a friendly form found on the website of Tag Manager. This has greatly simplified the life of marketing agencies and marketers of companies in which the web carries a technical department, which is not always a priority to include a couple of labels that has asked the marketing department. If this is not your problem, the tag manager does not offer much more ...

I hope the answer has been helpful.

A hug

Montse.

Find out why Google Adwords and Google Analytics show different results

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These days I'm giving my classes in the Master Search Engine IDEC-UPFSo I have a lot of students asking questions about Google Adwords, SEO and Google Analytics.

One of the recurring questions is "why when I check the results of a campaign Adwords these do not match the data provided by Google Analytics me".

Well ... I'm not going to write an article on why reaching forth since Google already has done for me :-)
Here is a link that Google explains each of the parameters that differ in control Adwords campaigns about Google Analytics and why they differ.

Document: Why Google Adwords and Google Analytics show different results.

I hope you find it useful.

A big hug.

The importance of branding online

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If your website is aimed at getting business contacts and if you sell your company are not products if no services, branding online should be your priority.

What is branding online?

we call "branding online” or “online branding"Management of brand reputation / person Internet, using the tools of digital marketing.

Why online branding so important? (Especially for service providers)

When you want to sell is not a tangible product, the customer must decide based on the information available on this service, either on your website or is in third. The reputation you create around your company is what will end up deciding the sale.

The online branding and the basic techniques of digital marketing.

SEO

More than 90% of searches in the Spanish internet are made from Google (Source: Global Stats) So the main tool for managing your online branding is SEO (natural search engine rankings).

Find your brand, your company name, the name of some of your managers and manages well the image you are offering in Google.

Orients the website to customers, not products

I mean, this is one of the principles of relationship marketing, customer orientation, as opposed to product orientation. To do this, divide your customers into 3 or 4 market segments, and on your website, create a zone for each of them. In these areas, use their vocabulary, images that you can feel reflected and talk about their needs and concerns. Explain how your services or your products can solve.

Example 1: www.dell.es -> Seen as separate private companies.

Example 2: www.tnc.cat -> Create sections for notes as "schools", "business", "university", etc.

Testimonials from your customers

No matter what you say about your brand, anything said by one of your customers has much more credibility. So using customer testimonials that have fidelizados to convey the brand image you want to show your future customers.

The testimony can post on your website and social networks.

Public relations are useful

Use them to:

  1. To improve SEO. A link to your site, published in online media, improve your search engine positioning. So do not forget to include links to your website in the press releases you send to the media.
  2. To improve branding. Creates "a section of the typewhat the press says about us"And every time you publish something about your company, cítalo in this section and linkea the source. As in the case of testimony, the press is much more credible than anything you can say you anywhere. Also post on social networks.

Social networks and online branding

Uses social networks to transmit your brand values ​​and get your website to display statistics "followers”, “likes"Or whatever ... (if they are good :-)

Make a good benchmark before starting

It is important to know what your competition is transmitted, how it does it, and what results they are getting.

Here you will find an article I wrote about "How to make a benchmark". It can be of great utility.

Google Analytics will also help

Check the bounce rate on your homepage (you will see in Google -> Reports -> Behavior -> Site Content -> All pages). The ratio of rebound of a corporate website should not exceed 35% of visits. If you get through it, reviews the design, usability, site speed and content of the home page. Do not give up until you get 35% or less.

(He Rebound ratio indicates the percentage of users who enter our website and leave without browsing any page. Here you will find an article on how to lose Rebound Ratio of a website)

Take control of managing your brand's reputation (whether it is your company as if it is your personal brand), and not let it be the chance to decide what image you project.

Tempers!

We talk to each other.

Connecting Google Analytics with Google Webmasters

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Every day I meet my students have trouble connecting these two services Google. The truth is that most of Google Analytics features are very well explained, but instead activating this connection it is not.

So to facilitate the work, here's this video that explained the advantages of having this connection and how we do it.

I am responding to questions through 3isic Youtube channel, The Research Institute that I have the pleasure of directing, but if you have any questions in particular can also raise it through a comment on this blog post and will look to answer you as soon as possible.

I hope you find it useful.

A big hug.

How to lower the bounce rate of a website

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This morning is participating in the forum of my subject in the Master in Finders taught at IDEC (Pompeu Fabra University) and I saw that some students were not clear what the Rebound ratio a website and what might be the causes that lead us to exceed the number that would be logical.

It seemed to me that the answer was worth it to be shared in this blog in addition to the student forum. So here goes:

What is the bounce rate of a website and how to bring it down

He rebound ratio or bounce rate is the number of people entering the site but not navigate the, divided by the total website visits.

That is, reflects views that do nothing on our website, maybe ... but read (although the latter can not be sure). If not they clicked on any part of our website, Google Analytics (or analytical system you're using) can not calculate how long they have been on the site and also counts as the rebound.

Our bounce rate should never exceed 40% (for a corporate website or an e-commerce) ... if exceeded this figure is that something goes wrong. The causes can be:

  1. Visitors who come to our website, not part of the segments of our target audience and therefore are not interested in our ... and go -> users coming from a poorly made or fraudulent advertising campaign would be in this subset but here users would also be arriving by SEO done without clear objectives.
  2. The prices of our products are beyond market, and therefore users the look and leave.
  3. The web is too slow ... and therefore endure downloading a page but I think 2 times before going sailing.
  4. The usability of our website is terrible and users do not know what to do to keep browsing or read more information.
  5. Users are browsing on a mobile device and have no version for these devices or our website is not responsive (That automatically adapts to any screen resolution).
  6. The design is unprofessional and therefore, the image conveyed by our company as well. Users do not take us seriously and go.

This applies to corporate websites. For a website type blog, the bounce rate may be somewhat higher (60% approx.) And not pass anything because many users are recurring visits (visits have been other times) ... may the user reach the website , read the new blog post and leave. They will not read more because they have read the other information.

In a blog type website, we should review the bounce rate of new visits, and get interested in these other related items, or the most read, the most shared, etc. In the case of the new, the bounce rate itself should be below 40%.

How to improve the ratio of rebound of a website

Noting the causes we can intuit how to reduce Rebound ratio:

  1. Before raising our our SEO and online advertising campaigns (SEM and the rest) we must be clear who is our target audience, Which segments comprise it, how are the people who are part of the segment, which will search Google, which websites visited, etc ... that is, we must do a good marketing analysis before executing any action.
  2. Before raising any action we make a good analysis of competition. We must know what the prices are competitive, their value proposition, what sets us apart from it ... Thus, although our prices are higher can argue why users should buy our products and not those of our competitors.
  3. The website should be tested by someone. The problem of speed and usability problem could have been detected with a beta-tester (someone try our website before publishing the final version). With a good testing also we would detect lack of persuasion, or lack of realization of the goal of the website. So it is 100% recommended that four or five people who do not know the web, testeen before us and we can observe what they do it, how they navigate and what are fixed.
  4. At the moment it is out of place not consider having at least one web responsive. We would be losing almost 30% of visits (depending on the sector in which we move, in tourism, we would be losing a lot more).
  5. A corporate website should reflect a professional image 100%. Today, with the large number of inserts of payment for WordPress, Joomla, Magento or any other manager and content, there is no excuse not to enjoy a professional design on our website.

So now you know ... check out these 5 points and make sure the bounce rate of your website That's the right one.

I hope these tips will be useful.

A hug.