Website analytics…a marketers’ boon and holder of a wealth of information.  But what makes them good?  A whole lotta things and we will cover a few of them in depth in the paragraphs to come.  In the past we did a general overview of why website analytics were so important to businesses that had a presence online and we would like to offer a review of a free website analytics tracker that is both fun to use and very informative: GoingUp.com.

General Overview:

Snazzy colors, easy sign up, multiple implentation choices (types of code you insert into your site code to start tracking), and a great looking and informative UI, make this website analytics choice very promising.  The presentation of information is logically sound and almost all ajax driven, which makes for a nice look and feel overall.  Information tracked is extensive and coupled with graphs, charts and maps, the information is easy to comprehend and use.

Other things of notice:

• Multiple websites can be tracked with one free account
• Many choices regarding how info is displayed and what info is displayed
• Bulk Domain Analyzer (allows you to compare the Alexa page rank and Google page rank of multiple domains)
• SEO and Ranking tools (very helpful in determining SEO stats for comparison)

Information gathering:

GoingUp.com collects information regularly from the sites you include in your account.  They are rarely real-time though so make sure to account for how old the info is when doing comparisons to other marketing info.  Information gathered is pretty standard info: visitor count, visitor time on website, visitor locations (city), visitor operating system, visitor internet connection speed, etc.  This info is pretty standard for analytics and there is quite a bit of it. GoingUp.com uses tabs and menus to divide out the info which can be somewhat confusing.  Their information layout though is pretty easy to work with and that is what makes this anaytics option shine.

Website Performance:

So far GoingUp.com‘s service has not really affected my site load time.  The only complaint I have is that while the page is loading (for the first time) it has a small advertising link that shows up at the top of the page.  It is there for all of about 1/2 a second or so, depending on the connection, but I did notice it.

The Interface:

As mentioned before, the interface offers alot as far as ease of use and eye-candy are concerned.  With bright bold colors and many ajax affects, it looks great and is fun to use.  One thing to consider, it does take a zippy connection to get the full benefit of the analytics info GoingUp.com gives you.  This is mainly because of all of the ajax loads and the sheer amount of information loading at one time in the UI.  If you don’t have a fast internet connection, it can get downright annoying waiting for the GoingUp.com’s UI to load up.

Ending Thoughts

Overall, I likey.  The information presented is useful and presented in a way that makes it less boring to interact with.  With many options for changes in how information is displayed, you can bet that you will find a configuration to make you happy.  The perks are numerous with the SEO tools that are easy to use and pretty quick in their analysis of submitted pages, tips for improving SEO for sites that are registered in the system and the wealth of information that analytics offer in the first place.  The only thing I didn’t like about GoingUp.com was the load time of the backend UI with a less than optimal internet connection.  If you have a speedy connect and you want great analytics info at your fingertips, feel free to check out GoingUp.com.

Please feel free to leave your comments, suggestions, rants and raves by submitting a comment to this post.

Thank you and as always, for help with all of your web needs (websites, marketing, search engine optimization)  always think of Big Cloud Media.

Big Cloud Media

Hey folks. As your Arlington based Website Design / Marketing company, we want to make sure and keep you in the know with tips and things to watch out for so you can start improving your company presence online and your marketing efforts overall.

Today we will discuss tracking because if you can’t measure it, you can’t use it.  This is a simple concept that is often skipped over when going through the day to day activities of running a business and that is tracking information. I’m not talking about tracking sales and profits and all that. I am talking about tracking the events that cause your sales and revenue to go up. Now regardless of whether or not you have a service or product you are selling, you need to be sure to track the events that cause your sales so you can then capitalize on them and generate even more business.

So how do I track events?

There are several ways of tracking events online including website analytics and the built in analytics programs many email blasters and online advertising systems have built in. These numbers and figures are often over-looked but oh so important as they tell you what happened when and where specifically for those marketing efforts.  This info is crucial for determining whether or not that marketing effort (SEO, advertising online, directory listing, mass-emailer, etc.) is worth continuing.  Once you know what is effective, you can then try to duplicate that effectiveness across the board.

Tracking offline is often more difficult to keep up with but also just as important.  It could be as simple as asking the new clients that phone in where they found you or including it in the conversation when you meet with them.  For those selling products, you can include the “where did you find us?” question in the shopping cart sign up (online) or just ask the person buying from you and write it down.

Tracking does not need to be high-tech to be effective at giving you a bigger picture of where your marketing is working and where it isn’t.  Often times, asking your clients where they found you or how they heard of you can be great for tracking and conversational.

The point is folks, if you don’t track, you are losing out on bundles of info that you can use to get the edge upping the ROI from your marketing efforts.  Ultimately, if you can’t track it, you can’t tell how effective it is and then you end up with money spent ineffective marketing without the expected return.

I hope this post has been helpful for your business and I encourage you to start tracking as much as possible as soon as possible.  Here at Big Cloud Media we specialize in tracking.  We also specialize in installing tracking tools online, analyzing website analytics, comparing real-world numbers with online and offline marketing results and much more.  This is our passion so if you feel you don’t have the time to do it or the know how, we can help.  Once tracking is in place, you can then start seeing the benefits of it in the more effective marketing and the increased sales and client numbers that result from it.

Thanks for reading and contact us today if you would like to have a consultation about your online marketing and how to make it more effective.

Big Cloud Media

ps.  feel free to leave a comment about this topic or send it to someone you think will benefit.

Return on Investment. It’s what we are in business for and ultimately, what we expect out of our investments at the end of the day.  So why not expect the same out of our online investments, such as our websites and online marketing efforts? The Return on the Online Investment is often ignored in the rush to achieve online web presence and to start establishing a basis for being found online.  What represents your business online?  Your website does and it does a fine job of it.  Is it sending the right message though?  If you send 10,000 people there will it result in sales?  If it is not selling your product or bringing in more customers now, it probably wouldn’t do so with a crazy increase in traffic.  Unless you know where you are at, with your website, you can’t hope to get where you are going (except by luck maybe).  Knowing the return you currently get on your website is the stepping stone to planning what you would like to have as the return on your website and how to get there.  I hate to say it but if your business website is yielding no return (either in clients or sales) than something must be done because you have wasted money or time and your potential biggest asset is not doing the job it should be. It is time to get back to the nitty gritty of what your online purpose is.  This is the new focus of Big Cloud Media as a web-design and development / marketing company.  Get back to the roots of why businesses are online in the first place and re-engineer the experience and the presence to maximize and reach that reason.  Through a unique combination of website analytics analysis and the analysis of both online and offline marketing, we can establish what works and what doesn’t, where the problems are and where the excellence lies, and ultimately, where the money has been spent and where it needs to be spent, in order to get the greatest ROI. A business’s online presence is an investment.  Plain and simple.  It can also be the most awesome marketing / sales tool, ever, if done correctly.  Think of it as an extension of your business to the masses that have never heard of you or met you.  You can communicate through it to your customers and potential clients.  You can customize the user experience to maximize the comfort and ease of use for your customers.  It can be used at all hours at any time of day and the space is yours to do with what you please.  You build it, nurture it, keep it in good shape and it will, in one way or another, continually return the money put into it.  It is the face of your company online, the first sales person an online visitor meets, and a great marketing and communications tool that never sleeps, never eats and costs little to maintain.  Therefore, your website should be at the forefront of your marketing program, not the backend.  Especially considering you can send people there at any time of day, with relatively inexpensive marketing and have it work its magic over and over again. I guess my point is this, businesses need to adopt the idea that their website is an investment.  Only then will the website and online presence really start working for the business.  Once this idea takes hold, it can be adopted into themarketing plan to keep the website at the forefront of marketing efforts and therefore, keep the always-working, never-stopping, creative-as-you-want-to-make-it marketing engine, that is the website, in the shape that it should be in, to really compete with your competition online and start getting a Return on the investment already made online. If you have any questions about how to turn things around and start doing more with your website or online marketing activities, or you haven’t taken that vital step yet to get your business online, please contact us today and we will be happy to talk to you more about your situation and what can be done about it.  Realizing the issue exists is the first and most often, hardest problem.  Do something about it and start on the road to a more successful online presence.