The other week I mentioned setting up goals in Google Analytics. I mentioned this to a client and he asked me the logical question of ‘but how do you know what amount of that came from PPC?’ I paused. ‘Well you just set up advanced segments and select Paid Traffic only’. Silence. ‘Oh yer ok’.
I realised I had done it again. Assumed that what I thought was obvious, was…well obvious.
So advanced segments.
With all the data you have in Analytics, you can split it by a number of verticals. Some more useful then others. I am going to discuss the best ones to consider and what trends you may notice.
Where are they?
Top left then click the segment you are after.
All Visits – Everyone who has visited your site. Name kinda gives it away!
New Visitors – Again kind of obvious. Trends to note though is that this gives you an insight into how people navigate your site for the first time. If you have a bounce rate of 90% on your homepage, consider that something is awry, that people are leaving at a certain page. Obviously factor in if you are just running PPC, most of this new traffic is PPC so you can change landing pages and content.
Returning Visitors – Should be good statistics. They already know they want your website and should have an idea how to navigate it.
Paid Search Traffic – PPC only. This is an important one. You are paying for this traffic so you want it to be good. You want people to be looking around the website and converting to your desired goals.
Non Paid Search Traffic – Organic traffic. High proportion is most likely brand related – dependent on how established your website and rankings are. Bounce rates should be lower then PPC – brand most likely also encompasses returning visitors.
Search Traffic – This is both PPC and non paid – so everything from Google, Bing or Yahoo.
other options are:
Direct traffic – People who had typed www.yourwebsite.com into their browser and boom. Enter. Arrived. As with returning visitors, you would assume the users knows your website and definetely wants it.Good stats.
Visits with Conversions / Transactions – Good one for keyword research. If you identify a organic keyword which converts well but has a ranking position of say 6, get it in the PPC. Have two listings on every page for your keyword. Also identify areas which are working well through this. Maybe its the ‘savings for children’ area – add more verticals, grandchildren, godparents.
Mobile traffic – Important one. Obviously consider if you have your PPC running on mobile traffic first! If you have loads of mobile traffic think about creating a mobile website, dedicated PPC campaigns just for mobile traffic and advertisements. Or if the mobile traffic stats are great, build out the PPC to have mobile specific campaigns, capitalize on it.
Non Bounce Visits – Good for keyword research. Shows you all sources and referrals which have looked at more then one page on your website.
All this juicy data is in your account. Use it and use it wisely. If you read it correctly you can improve your traffic and your website.
