Amazon A-to-Z

Amazon.com, Inc. (Amazon) is an American online ecommerce company headquartered in Seattle, Washington. While Amazon started strictly as an online bookseller, it has since branched out to offer DVDs, CDs, downloadable content, software, video games, clothing, home electronics, food, toys, and innumerable other sundries. Additionally, Amazon produces its own e-reader (the Kindle) as well as compatible e-books. Lastly, Amazon has launched its AWS web services to provide enterprise hosting of cloud computing services. Amazon is certainly a company that offers everything from A-to-Z.

For the better part of its existence, Amazon could not even finish a year posting a profit. “Amazon has a tendency to polarize people. On one hand, there is the ruthless, relentless, ferociously efficient company that’s building the Sears Roebuck of the 21st Century. But on the other, there is the fact that almost 20 years after it was launched, it has yet to report a meaningful profit.” (Horowitz, 2014).

 

In 2013, however, “Net sales increased 22% to $74.45 billion, compared with $61.09 billion in 2012. Excluding the $1.28 billion unfavorable impact from year-over-year changes in foreign exchange rates throughout the year, net sales grew 24% compared with 2012.” (Amazon, 2014).  This increase in profits is not based on pure happenstance or lightning in a bottle. Every decision and every strategy plotted out of Amazon headquarters is based heavily on big data. Since its founding, very few companies outside of Google have kept as much analytical data as Amazon. The company’s use of analytics has lead to intelligent and responsible growth during a down economy, making Amazon one of the most powerful and influential companies in the world.

A-to-Z Data Collection

When it comes to collecting data, Amazon collects nearly everything imaginable. From the moment a consumer arrives on the website to the moment they exit, Amazon collects every single action a user makes. David A. Steinberg, digital marketing expert and founder of Zeta Interactive, states that Amazon collect and analyzes even the most granular level of data. “[The company] looks at everything consumers do transactionally, and also looks at what shoppers have looked at. Amazon then folds this info into its algorithm and whenever you buy something, it'll tell you that 'people who bought this also bought x, y, and z.' ” (Carlozo, 2013).

Amazon use of an item-to-item collaborative filtering algorithm is based on behavioral data and creates product recommendations to not only help consumers, but to increase sales. The behavioral recommendation algorithm has certainly been a successful use of analytics for Amazon and Fortune.com credits much of Amazon’s recent growth to this item-to-item collaborative filtering algorithm.

But not to sit on their laurels after finding one successful technique, Amazon is always plotting its next big move. One such move was the implementation of the “One Click Buy” feature for which the company received a patent. (ESpacenet, n.d.). This idea was fantastic, but the genius part was being able to get a patent for something seemingly so simple. As Bernard Marr states, Amazon has combined their, “strengths in data analytics and it’s instinct for patenting key features to obtain a patent for what it calls: Anticipatory Shipping.”  (Marr, 2014). Which leads us to the next big thing for Amazon.

The Next Big Thing 

Amazon continues to push ahead of the analytics game with its forward thinking. Today the company is embarking in its most ambitions strategy yet. Amazon’s latest patent is the process of shipping an item to a customer in anticipation that this customer will order that product. Essentially, Amazon trusts its big data insights to accurately predict what a consumer will order next, and when. Marr states that the primary reason for this patent is that Amazon wants to deliver products faster. This is also why it Amazon now offers Sunday deliveries and is toying with the idea of utilizing unmanned drones for future deliveries. (Marr, 2014).

While traditional retailers often use predictive analytics to guarantee that items are in stock, Amazon is taking the concept to a new level. They are using their algorithm to predict the items a specific individual may purchase, as opposed to using the formula to stock the items that larger populations may wish to buy.

H. Donald Ratliff, Ph.D., executive director of the Supply Chain and Logistics Institute wrote that, “Supply chain and logistics optimization is neither easy nor cheap, but it is the biggest opportunity for most companies to significantly reduce their cost and improve their performance. For most…operations, there is an opportunity to reduce cost by 10% to 40% by making better decisions.” (Ulanoff, 2014).  For a company the size of Amazon, a 10% to 40% in annual savings is no small amount of change.

So how exactly does all of this work? According to the patent, this predictive model uses data from a consumer’s prior Amazon activities such as time on the site, duration of product views, what links were clicked, shopping cart activity, and what items were added to a consumer’s wish list. If available, the predictive algorithm will also include data from real-world information collected from customer telephone inquiries, responses to marketing messaging, as well as other external factors. (Ulanoff, 2014).  To help clarify the process, Amazon included a simplified flowchart in its patent detailing the predictive shipping process might work.

Additional Tools and Strategies

While Amazon is certainly forward thinking, because it offers such a diverse product line there will always be room for improvements and innovation. One such business property that could use a little TLC is the company’s online video streaming service. The Amazon Instant Video product is an Internet video-on-demand service similar to Netflix or Hulu. . The service offers television series and films for rent or purchase. The service is free to customers with an Amazon Prime subscription and a la carte for everyone else.

    While Netflix is the undisputed king of online pay-per-content video streaming, Amazon Instant Video may be just as appealing to some. But for whatever reason, the service goes highly under publicized and remains relatively unknown.  Like Amazon, Netflix thrives on the use of its recommendations system. And like Netflix, Amazon Instant Video uses the consumer’s past viewing history and saved favorites to generate suggestions based on that person’s taste. The two products are similarly priced with Netflix coming in at about $96 annually and Amazon Instant Video coming in at $99 annually. But with Amazon’s service, you also get its free prime shipping service. So by watching the movies you were already planning to watch on Netflix, you will also get Amazon’s free shipping service to boot. This really makes the Amazon Instant Video service a great deal and a viable competitor to Netflix.

    As far as analytics goes, I think Amazon should start suggesting videos to purchase or rent based upon what books and DVDs Amazon shoppers are looking at or buying. By utilizing the same data the company is already collecting, Amazon could begin promoting this terrific, but under utilized service to a new wave of consumers.

 

Conclusion

Tracking big data one the web has become essential element in developing online marketing and business strategies. No company better exemplifies this than Amazon. Every element of the ecommerce giant’s website is carefully planned and implemented based upon analytical data. The data that Amazon collects not only helps the company to better identify what consumers what, but also what they may want in the future. Through important patents and concepts, Amazon is not only forecasting what consumers will want to purchase, but also the company’s future as an innovator and industry leader.

References

Amazon. (2014, January 30). Amazon.com Announces Fourth Quarter Sales up 20% to $25.59 Billion. Retrieved December 7, 2014, from http://www.marketwatch.com/story/amazoncom-announces-fourth-quarter-sales-up-20-to-2559-billion-2014-01-30.

Carlozo, L. (2013, December 23).  How Online Retailers Collect & Use Consumer Data. Retrieved December 7, 2014, from http://dealnews.com/features/How-Online-Retailers-Collect-Use-Consumer-Data-/938928.html  

ESpacenet. (n.d.) Method and System for Placing a Purchase Order via a Communications Network. Retrieved December 7, 2014, from http://worldwide.espacenet.com/publicationDetails/biblio?CC=US&NR=5960411&KC=&FT=E&locale=en_EP.

Horowitz, B. (2014, September 5).  Why Amazon Has No Profits (And Why It Works). Retrieved December 7, 2014, from http://ben-evans.com/benedictevans/2014/9/4/why-amazon-has-no-profits-and-why-it-works/.

Marr, B. (2014, February 5).  Amazon: Using Big Data Analytics to Read Your Mind. Retrieved December 7, 2014, from http://smartdatacollective.com/bernardmarr/182796/amazon-using-big-data-analytics-read-your-mind/.

Ulanoff, L. (2014, January 27). Amazon Knows What You Want Before You Buy It. Retrieved December 7, 2014, from http://www.predictiveanalyticsworld.com/patimes/amazon-knows-what-you-want-before-you-buy-it/.

Google Knows...

So if you Google “Google” the first result states, “Search the world's information, including webpages, images, videos and more. Google has many special features to help you find exactly what you're looking … (for)” (Google, n.d.). We all know that Google is the top-ranked search portal, that it manages a popular e-mail service, it offers a widely-used customizable home page, it provides a leading RSS feed reader service, it shares a free analytics product, owns the largest distributed ad network, and is the largest video content hosting site through its YouTube property.  We often hear how great Google is to work for, and how creative their workspace is. We know its Android OS is the most used system in mobile telephony and its stock is soaring to new heights every day...

We know these things about Google… Google’s successes are well established.

But did you know that Google is secretly and not so secretly collecting data from its accounts and services every day? Are we so brainwashed by the Google marketing machine that it is ok to trade in our privacy for shiny new toys? Have we sold our souls to the devil? That remains to be seen, be clearly Google’s free services are not so free after all. Google is mining your data.

According to Steven Rosenfeld of Alternet and Salon, there are four methods through which Google is destroying privacy and collecting our data. (Rosenfeld, 2014).

• Street View - After being sued by 38 states, Google admitted that its mapping cars were taking mare than pictures; they were collecting data from computers inside homes and structures, including passwords, e-mails and other personal information.

• Gmail - A class-action lawsuit states that GMAIL analyzes the content of email messages and sells the data to advertisers.

• Google Safari - The Wall Street Journal broke the story that its Google’s software was bypassing security settings for Apple devices using the Safari browser, exposing millions of hapless users to tracking without even knowing about it. The result was a $22.5 million fine from the FTC, the largest civil penalty ever levied by the commission.

• Android - ComputerWorld.com’s Michael Horowitz claimed that Google knows nearly every WiFi password in the world as a result of backdoor access to hundreds of millions of Android phones and devices.

According to PrivacySOS, an affiliate of the ACLU, “Google argues that it has the right to collect your most sensitive data, as long as it flows across an open WiFi network.” (PrivacySOS , 2014). So how do you feel about the fact that Google collects data from millions of its accounts every day? As a consumer married to my wireless devices, I greatly oppose this notion.

 

Clearly, mining data has become a virtual goldmine.  And Google was prospecting nuggets long before many of us realized the full business potential of this practice. As Robert Epstein of Dissent Magazine so aptly puts it, “On the surface, Google appears primarily to be an information provider, but it is actually a glorified advertising firm, with 97 percent of its revenues coming from advertisers. Users see only the surface, which they love, but would they be so amorous if they were more aware of what the surface was for?” (Epstein, 2014).

 

Should users care? Definitely.

Do users care? I don't think they understand enough to care.

Privacy statements and End User License Agreements are littered with legalese and confusing phrasing. The time it takes to read these types of documents is far more than consumers are willing or able to spend. Users blindly accept these agreements on the blind faith that Google can do them no wrong. This type of careless behavior is exactly what Google is counting on and they are laughing all the way to the bank.

From the outside looking in, Google appears to be a company that is environmentally, culturally, and ethically responsible.  The company participates in and researches efficient and renewable power, boasting that their data centers use 50% less power than a typical data center. (Google Green, n.d.). Additionally, Google continues to invest in alternative energies such as wind and solar power with plants located both domestically and internationally. Additionally, Google builds software and tools to aid in education and is bringing free fiber-optic Internet to communities across the nation. Each year Google donates $100,000,000 in grants, 80,000 hours, and $1 Billion in products to help tackle some of the world’s biggest challenges. (Google Global Impact, n.d.).

Google gives back.

But what does economic, cultural, and environmental ethics have to do with your privacy? Absolutely nothing.  Google has been assessed with anti-trust lawsuits around the globe. They have admitted to censoring user search data in favor of communist governments, and have been accused of “evil doing” in Kenya.

Knowledge is power, and Google has acquired far more knowledge and invented more ways to use it than any other company in history. Google has the ability to influence and control virtually everything the Internet touches. Google has the willingness and history to share your personal data and behaviors. Companies can know everywhere you go and everything you do on a daily basis.  Google is in your business, in your car, in your pockets, and in your homes. Google is single-handedly compromising your civil liberties.  Likewise, Google has the ability to hide or conceal search data in favor of data belonging to its investors or advertisers. Yes, I am as guilty as the rest of us. I am willingly handing over my personal data because I love my phone and free email.

Consumers like their shiny new phones and free email accounts, while seldom paying any attention to online privacy statements. While Google is collecting device information, login formation, location information, unique application numbers, local storage information, and cookies / anonymous identifiers, consumers continue to turn the other cheek when it comes to protecting their privacy. (del Castillo, 2013). To compound matters, it was revealed through Edward Snowden that Google freely shares its data with the NSA. (del Castillo, 2013).  So not only does Google know everything about you, so do advertisers and the Federal Government. In an effort to keep my tin foil hat on the shelf, I will keep this short by stating this is simply not a good thing for consumer privacy.  

At this point, there is little we can do to keep our data safe from Goliaths like Google unless laws are made to protect us. But in the meantime, The Onion does provide one solution that may work for all of us…

 

References

Del Castillo, M. (2013, August 15). 6 Kinds of Information Google Openly Admits to Collecting. Retrieved December 1, 2014, from http://upstart.bizjournals.com/news/technology/2013/08/15/6-data-categories-google-collects.html.

Epstein, R. (2014, May 9). Google’s Snoops: Mining Our Data for Profit and Pleasure. Retrieved December 1, 2014, from http://www.dissentmagazine.org/online_articles/googles-snoops-mining-our-data-for-profit-and-pleasure/.

Google. (n.d.). Google. Retrieved December 1, 2014, from https://www.google.com/.

Google Global Impact. (n.d.) A Better World, Faster. Retrieved December 1, 2014, from https://www.google.org.  

Google Green. (n.d.) A Better Web. Better for the Environment. Retrieved December 1, 2014, from https://www.google.com/green/.

PrivacySOS (2014, January 13). Google Says Anything Flowing Across Open WiFi is Fair Game. Retrieved December 1, 2014, http://privacysos.org/node/1299.

Rosenfeld, S. (2014, February 5). 4 Ways Google is Destroying Privacy and Collecting Your Data. Retrieved December 1, 2014, from http://www.salon.com/2014/02/05/4_ways_google_is_destroying_privacy_and_collecting_your_data_partner/.

MouseFlow Answers the Qualitative Questions

When it comes to measuring website analytics, there is little doubt that Google Analytics is the king. While it can be debated whether or not it is the best or most accurate tool, there is very little debate regarding its influence. With its name recognition and $0 price tag, Google Analytics is the most popular web analytics tool on the Internet. (Sparks, 2014). 

Google Analytics is great for helping web managers understand traffic patterns, popular content, referring sites, conversions, demographics, bounce rates, keywords, paid search statistics, and more. The data is as robust or simple as the web manager needs it to be. The greatest advantage for Google Analytics is that it is free and it is integrated with the Google’s powerful search engine to help provide additional data for paid search results, search terms, and the like. This is data that not every analytics tool can provide.

The interface is intuitive, but without a fundamental understanding of what information different statistics actually provide, digging for data can be intimidating. Where Google Analytics requires a scientific mind to fully understand, one competitor is perfect for the visual thinker. MouseFlow gives you the power to you record website visitors and export heatmaps showing where they click, scroll and focus their attention. Sure MouseFlow offers many of the same analytics that Google Analytics provides, but the data is displayed visually and intuitively. The heatmaps and live mouse tracking set it apart in the analytics world.

Google Analytics is great for providing analytics data, but one key area it lacks analysis in measuring the effectiveness of user interface (UX) design. This is where an analytics tool like MouseFlow comes into play. Some of MouseFlow’s features include: (MakeUseOf, 2010).

• Watch how your visitors are using your website – seconds after they visited.
• See all mouse movements, clicks, scroll events, key strokes and form interaction.
• Discover problematic parts of your website and learn how to enhance the user experience.
• Get a visual overview of the clicks received by your pages.
• Compare heatmaps from different periods to measure the effects of changes made to the website.
• See if non-links are clicked and consider turning them into links.
• Check the real bounce rate of your page.
• No installation files and recording scripts are hosted
• Just add a line of code to your pages and the recording will start.

MouseFlow offers a unique set of features that are unavailable through Google Analytics. These features can be categorized into two distinct offering types, Live Mouse Tracking and Instant Heatmaps. While Google Analytics offers live viewer stats and page flows, MouseFlow offers an intuitive, visual representation of how users physically interact with elements on a page. This is what sets the tool apart from the others.

Movements and Clicks

Google Analytics offers a variety of real time analytics figures as events happen on your website. The reports continuously updated as each hit is recorded. Some of the data you can see includes: (Google, n.d.).

·How many people are on your site right now,

·User’s geographic locations and the traffic sources that referred them,

·Which pages or events they're interacting with, and

·Which goal conversions have occurred.

While these analytics are great, MouseFlow intuitive recordings of real visitor behavior on your site.  Knowing where users click is one thing, but seeing how they control their mouse on the screen provides a whole new array of details. You will see what navigation elements or calls to action catch their eye. You can see what part of the screen they interact with or are drawn to. Seeing how and where a user clicks provides the qualitative question to the quantitative answer.

 

Click Heatmaps

One area that Google analytics is lacking in is a simple way to show how users flow from one page to the next.  Sure, the Users Flow tool diagrams the flow of users from one page to the next, but the question marketers should be asking is, “Why do users flow down this path?”

MouseFlow heatmaps help marketers and web managers discover patterns and gain a better understanding as to why users behave the way the do. Click heatmaps let you see where on a site that visitors click and don’t click. This includes everything from links, buttons, page content, and erroneous or incorrect clicks. By recognizing the hot and cool spots on the click heatmap, you will be able to determine what navigation elements are important or eye catching to users versus what navigation elements produce little or no interest.

 

Movement Heatmaps

When using analytics to measure UX success, Google Analytics offers very little. However, MouseFlow movement heatmaps will illustrate what areas of your design help or hinder the user experience. Through MouseFlow movement heatmaps, you can see where visitors pay attention on a page and determine weaker areas where design and content should be redesigned to improve the user experience. Since

Since studies show that there is an 84%-88% correlation between eye and mouse movement (Chen Anderson, & Sohn, 2001), movement heatmaps offer a unique report on what areas of a page are popular. Using MouseFlow’s movement heatmaps, marketers can realize the full potential of their web content. MouseFlow is all about UX analysis, and knowing where a users eyes are can help marketers increase conversions by utilizing hot zones or improving design is cold zones. 

The brief video below is a marketing video from MouseFlow. If you wish to get a better understanding of what MouseFlow is and how it can be beneficial, take the next 4:30 to watch and learn.

Or if you wish to try MouseFlow for yourself, check out the demo site. This site will record your mouse movement, clicks, scrolls, and more, then play the results back for you. It is really a great opportunity to take a closer look at the tool and see how intuitive it is to understand.

While this post is heavily skewed in favor of MouseFlow analytics over Google Analytics, this is a completely from a UX analysis approach.  For full disclosure, Google Analytics is an amazing tool that I use in every website I create. I have use MouseFlow in only one site.

References

Chen, M., Anferson, J, & Sohn, M. (2001). What Can a Mouse Cursor Tell Us More?: Correlation of Eye/Mouse Movements on Web Browsing. CHI '01 Extended Abstracts on Human Factors in Computing Systems, 281-282

Google. (n.d.) About Real Time. Retrieved November 24, 2014 from https://support.google.com/analytics/answer/1638635.

MakeUseOf. (2010, April 11). MouseFlow: Analyse Website Visitor Behavior. Retrieved November 23, 2014 from http://www.makeuseof.com/tag/mouseflow-real-time-website-statistics-tool/.

Sparks, C. (2014, March 11). 10 Great Social and Web Analytics Tools. Retrieved November 23, 2014 from http://www.searchenginejournal.com/10-great-social-web-analytics-tools/90629/.

What Social Media Network is Right for Me?

When embarking on creating your company’s social media strategy, it is not uncommon to go out and build accounts on every possible network to match your company name. This is a strategy I am full-heartedly behind. The worst-case scenario is that you have at least prevented your competition from grabbing your name.  However, at some point you need to step back and make the determination of what social networks you actually plan to market through. Should you adopt a single network as your primary social media channel or should you share the message across several networks? Social media requires planning and strategizing and should never be taken for granted.

So what social media network is right for you? I do not believe that there is a single best answer to this question. The answer ultimately lies on several factors ranging from where your target audience interacts, which network broadcasts the type of media that best fits your strengths and needs, and how the network affects your online reputation. 

Ultimately, your choice for a social network depends on identifying whether or not you will be able to build engaging conversations with your customers on that network.  If the answer is no, then that particular social network is probably not good fit for you. Determining the right fit can be complicated and overwhelming if you do not know what to look for. Every business has different needs from social media. In order to make your decision a little easier, consider the three questions below.

Is my competition on this social network?

One of the easiest tests in determining whether or not a social network is right for you is by determining what networks your competitors are utilizing. You do not want to avoid a network to later discover that your competition has been active on that site, building brand recognition and converting new customers. The last thing you want is for your target customers to discover your competitor’s successful social media presence and but find nothing of you. This is a loss that can and should be easily avoided.

According to a survey by Vocus and Duct Tape Marketing, “About a third of your peers are spending $845 a month on software tools to help them manage their social media exposure. This might not sound like a lot, but consider that another third of your peers are spending more than $1,000 on it. Of the remaining percentage, a large portion hire consultants to aid in their efforts or simply make it the mission of their marketing employees to handle.” (Ray, 2012). If it is important enough for your competition to budget for, then it should be important to you.

So how do you find your competition on social media? Just visit your competitions’ websites or blogs. Most will link directly to their social media profiles. Otherwise, you can always rely on searching Google or the social networks themselves for matches.

Is my audience on this social network?

Let’s face it; social media is useless unless you are able to build engaging conversations with your customers. One of the most overlooked, but easily determined factors in choosing a social network is whether or not YOUR audience is on the social network. One quick way to determine whether or not a social network is a good audience match relates to my previous point. Is your competition successfully building and engaging with customers on a specific social network. If this is the case, then you have found your target audience and social network.

If you are unsure who your competitors are or you are simply unable to find them, you can always rely on the search box found on each social media network to test if this network is a good fit. Use the search box to find keywords that specifically relate to your company or industry. If your search results return matches, then it is a safe bet that your target audience is on this particular social network. Be sure to search for more than just people on Google + and Facebook, search for places, interest and things as well. Lastly you can always rely on the tried and trustworthy Google search approach to see what keywords show on which corresponding social network.

But do not just take search results as fact. If you really want to know where you customers participate, simply ask them. Ask them as part of your business process. Ask them over email. Customers are usually apt to answer short surveys. Just ask.

Will this social network help my online reputation?

Sometimes people may be gun shy to join social networks because their business has reputation management issues such as rude and unsavory items on Google search results.  Many fear social media may be more of the same, but avoiding social media is a mistake because these networks can help by adding positive results above the negative natural content. In essence, you are using a tactic to cover up negative publicity that has the welcomed consequence of improved SEO. The 2013 Moz Search Ranking Factors study shows that pages with Google +, Facebook likes, tweets, and comments tend to rank higher than those without. (Crestodina, 2014).

When building a social media presence to combat negative online reputation, choosing the correct social networks is invaluable. According to BrandYourself, “LinkedIn is the best social network for rankings, while WordPress is the highest ranking personal site builder.” (Ambron, 2012). You can see by the infographic below, that Google plays favorites to certain social networks. 

In conclusion, when it comes to choosing which social media platforms you'll utilize, it is important to select ones that offer you the best potential for reaching your target audience. In order to create effective content and conversations, the media that the network broadcasts should be ideally suited for your company skills and goals. Because most companies can't be amazing on every platform; choose the best fit for you and your team. Actively participating across all of the primary networks takes a huge commitment of time and resources. So ask yourself the questions above, determine two to four networks that best meet your needs, and get involved.

References

Ambron, P. (2012, August 3). Want to Look Better in Google? Our Data Shows You the Best Ways [our first infographic]. Retrieved November 10, 2014. from http://blog.brandyourself.com/brand-yourselfcom/want-to-look-better-in-google-our-data-shows-you-the-best-ways-our-first-infographic/.

Crestodina, A. (2014, August). How Does Social Media Affect SEO?. Retrieved November 10, 2014. from http://www.orbitmedia.com/blog/how-does-social-media-affect-seo/.

Ray, R. & The SmallBizTechnology Team. (2010, September 13). Survey Says…Do Not Ignore The Power of Social Media!. Retrieved November 10, 2014. from http://www.businessinsider.com/survey-saysdo-not-ignore-the-power-of-social-media-2012-9.

So You Got A User to Your Site… Now What?

As a continuation to my previous post where I discussed the importance of looking at page views from a Qualitative perspective, I felt important to discuss the significance of landing pages. “What is a landing page?” you may ask, well according to the Web Analytics Association, a landing page is, “a page view intended to identify the beginning of the user experience resulting from a defined marketing effort.” (Web Analytics Association, 2008).  Essentially, a landing page is a page that a user lands on when entering your site. This can be driven by marketing efforts such as direct links from print, email, or social media links, or it can be a result of search engines picking up key words on a page and direct linking within your site rather than to your homepage. In the past, your homepage was THE landing page of your site, but with the evolution of search engine algorithms and online marketing, a landing page can now be located anywhere on your site.

Often times, website developers will create a page, send out links to it, and then have no idea what to do with the actual content on a page. You have to look at more than just page views to see success of a landing page, you must also measure bounce rate or conversions. This determination is based on what type of landing page you have created…

Unbounce is a software company that focuses on giving marketers an easy way to perform A/B testing on landing pages. They state that there are two types of landing pages, click-through landing pages and lead-capture landing pages. (Unbounce, n.d.).

Click through landing pages are designed to persuade a visitor to click through to another page (funneling traffic). These are probably the most common type of landing page. They will typically display some type of call-to-action button as the primary design feature on the page.   

Lead-capture pages are used just like they sound, to capture user data. This would include your typical newsletter sign-up page or a request for more information. The sole purpose of the page is to collect user information for your marketing and sales efforts.

So do you still need a reason to use landing pages? Consider this, you should optimize your landing pages because your competition isn’t. According to Pamela Vaughan at HubSpot, “44% of clicks for B2B companies are directed to the business' homepage, not a special landing page.” (Vaughan, 2012).  So what is the impact? Think of it this way, Cogswell Cogs and Spacely’s Sprockets sell the same product. Who will get the conversion if Cogswell Cogs sends out links to their homepage, while Spacely’s shares links sending users directly to a landing page catered around their Sprocket? Internet consumers are lazy with short attention spans. Don’t make then search your site to make a purchase.

Yes it is more work managing landing pages all over your site as opposed to just a homepage, but the advantages outweigh the disadvantages. Giving marketers the ability to specialize content onto these pages specific to marketing goals increases your chances of converting visitors into buyers, and that is the whole point of web marketing isn't it?

References

Unbounce. (n.d.). What is a Landing Page?. Retrieved November 3, 2014. from http://unbounce.com/landing-page-articles/what-is-a-landing-page/.

Vaughan, P. (2012, April 27). Why Landing Pages Are an Indispensable Part of Marketing . Retrieved November 3, 2014. from http://blog.hubspot.com/blog/tabid/6307/bid/32566/Why-Landing-Pages-Are-an-Indispensable-Part-of-Marketing.aspx.

Web Analytics Association. (2008, September 22). Web Analytics Definitions. Wakefield MA.

Hey Don't Look at THAT, Look at THIS!

In the world of web analytics, there is probably no other statistic that is more overused yet misunderstood than page views. According to the Web Analytics Association, a page view is, “the number of times a page was viewed.” (Web Analytics Association, 2008). At face value, this is an easy to understand quantitative value. However, a website’s success should not be measured in quantitative measure alone.  The results of page views are only significant when measured with qualitative values like KPI, Goals, Targets, and Conversions.

In my professional experiences, I cannot count the number of times a client has asked me, “How many hits did I get this month?” Sure, your site traffic is important. But what about which pages received page views?  What lessons do to take away from the reports? What strategies can be created to take advantage of the site traffic? Increasing your monthly hits does not qualify as a successful web engagement strategy if you are doing nothing with those hits.

According to Chris Lucas of Business2Community.com, forty percent of marketers say that they use intuition (not data) to make decisions. (Lucas, 2014). Rolling dice on your marketing strategy may work for you, sometimes… At least you think it does… But how do you know? Website design should be more than pretty graphics and gut feeling. This is your business and a direct reflecting of you! 

I do not consider myself an analytics expert by any stretch of the imagination, however, I am an experience web designer with a marketing background who has used Google Analytics since it launched in the mid-2000s. I understand the importance of things like determining cost-per-page view, or the significance of conversion rates. For me, counting page views is not a measure of success, but rather a starting point to finding success. The most important lesson that I have learned in web development, is that no matter how hard you try, web visitors will look for the information that they want, not what you think they should want. And for me, this is where page views come in handy.

I have a few focal points when I look at page views in a monthly analytics reports. This is where I take the quantitative data, and apply the qualitative meanings:

Quantitative: What pages are receiving the most page views?
Qualitative: Your qualitative lens should look at WHY are these pages receiving the most page views. Is this the content your customers are looking for?  Are these landing pages from search engine queries? Or are these just pages that are really easy to find because navigation is clear?  Determine the WHY, and you can then optimize the customer experience for these pages.

Quantitative: Are “important” pages being viewed as much as they should?
Qualitative: Your qualitative lens should look at WHY aren’t your important pages being viewed as much as they should? Are your key pages being lost because of poor navigation or a lack of keywords in your content? Are you not making conversions because no one can find your email signup form? Think about why pages are not being viewed and how to improve this.

Page views should never be used as a single “catch-all” for analytics success. Yes you want to increase your page views, but more importantly you want those views to happen on pages that matter. Your goal should be increased traffic to your landing pages, sales pages, or conversion points.  An increase in hits does nothing for you if you are not putting valuable information in from of your viewers and enticing with a call to action.

References

Lucas, C. (2014, September 23). 5 Key Takeaways From The Google Analytics Report. Retrieved November 3, 2014. from http://www.business2community.com/online-marketing/5-key-takeaways-google-analytics-report-01016399.

Web Analytics Association. (2008, September 22). Web Analytics Definitions. Wakefield MA.

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