Geeky, sure. Essential, absolutely! Google Analytics works silently in the background of your website, tracking who did what, when, and where.
Now I realize that you’re not likely the kind of person who curls up on the sofa at night practicing your html skills, so we’re going to keep this article focused on what you can learn from Google Analytics to help your dance studio. Our goal is to inspire you to use it more often or, if you’re not already using it, get it installed!
Where they live
If you’re marketing to several towns and surrounding areas, it’s helpful to know which of those areas is driving traffic to your site. This could help you identify towns that need extra marketing outreach, or confirm that you’re reaching the audience you most want. It can also help you create more targeted facebook ads because you know where your current traffic is coming from.
What time of day they visit you
In the chart example above, this studio has the most activity between 7am and 9am, a blip before lunch and a peak at 4pm. Visits drop off after 8pm. How can you use the time of day information to your advantage?
- Post content in advance of peak visit times
- Coordinate your social media posts to peak times
- Run flash sales and promotions during peak visitor hours to get maximum engagement
Another way to look at this same data set is by day of week. In the sample below you can see that most of the site traffic is coming in Monday through Thursday, so important content should be posted on those days rather than over the weekend.
Naturally, your times and days of week may be different. But if you had this extra bit of insight, you’d be that much more powerful with your limited time and energy.
Whether they are mobile users or desktop users
This is a very important data point. If the majority of your customers are visiting your site on mobile devices but your site isn’t mobile friendly, they are not going to have a great impression of your business. It will feel old and dated and they will resist using it. Google Analytics can either give you peace of mind that you’re meeting customer needs or give you the push to update that website to be more mobile friendly.
Which content they spend the most time with
If you’ve ever wondered whether the content on your site is useful, or even being read, this report view is for you! There are two ways to look at the data. First, which content is looked at the most and second, which content people are spending the most time with.
Here you can see that the home page (the one with the /) gets the most views, followed by the registration page, calendar, recital tickets and blog.
When looking at the amount of time people spent with content, you gain two valuable pieces of information. It tells you which content is popular (obvious!) but it also tells you which content is potentially problematic. If you have a page that you think is simple, but people are spending a lot of time there, it might be worth your time to revisit the page and see what you can to to make it easier to understand.
What other web content they are interested in
This is a really juicy tip! Google Analytics looks at the customers coming to your site and their web browsing behaviors on OTHER sites to create a set of markers called affinities. These affinities provide interesting insights into the attitudes and behaviors of your audience.
In the sample above you can see that this customer base is also heavily bargain/value oriented, reads family oriented content, needs to do meals fast (on the road and at home) and they love their pets. You can use all of that information in creating content and promotions for your dance studio!
- A shared Pinterest board of 30 minute meals
- Favorite 30 minute meal of the week
- 10 choices from X Fast Food joint that won’t kill your diet
- Special offers, discounts and bonuses
- Pet costume contest for halloween
- Sharing pets in tutus on social channels
- Use these things as conversation starters in your private facebook groups
- A fundraiser cookbook of Dance Mom’s favorite 30 minute meals
- SO MANY IDEAS!
We’ve just scratched the surface of what Google Analytics can do.
Some of our other favorite questions:
What keywords did they use to find my website?
How many times do they have to come to my website before they do ______?
How did they get to my site in the first place? Search, social, yellow pages, Yelp?
Next Steps & Resources
Learn more about using Google Analytics from the free Google Academy
Find someone at Fiverr or our gal pals from Compucoach or Websavant to install it for you
So what do you think?
What questions do you have about Google Analytics? What Google Analytics topics would you like to see us cover next? Share your thoughts in the comment box below or shoot us a note.