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14/06/2008 11:56:27
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NeilWarren
Posts 645
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I do suspect that all of us are going to get increasingly immersed in this rather baffling world wide web thing, e-commerce, leads generated by email marketing, virtual exhibitions, banner ads, pay-per-click and so on. Guess I wouldn’t be here if I didn’t! Anyway, startling fact of the month that I picked up browsing through one of my many click-throughs is that, wait for it…..
75% of all web traffic, anywhere, on any site, doesn’t really count!! So only 25% is real.
You’ll probably need to lie down now, for a bit, same as I did. What!? Three quarters of my visitor numbers are “wrong”? Yep, apparently so – and this is how it works. A “visitor” is someone that leaves a line of code on your server logs when the server creates the page for them to look at (assuming you’ve filtered out robots and spiders that crawl all over every page and clickable link on your site). Well that’s fine then, surely? No, not really, not if that visitor stays for precisely 00:00 mins/secs which is 75% - on average.
It’s a bit like having a shop in Bluewater or wherever, and counting as “visitors” to that shop anyone who flicks an eye in your direction as they walk past the front. So the sum total of all the “traffic” claimed by all the web sites is comparable to a shopping centre of 4 shops, round a square for example, saying that they all had 100 visitors, whereas in fact 25 actually went into each shop, and only looked at the other 3 shop fronts. On the one hand, you’d think 4 shops getting 100 “visitors” each = 400 visitors (or a good proportion of that), but you’d struggle to make it as low as 100, for the whole centre, on the other hand.
How do we know this? Simple. Google Analytics will tell you. They build in an automated count of the time spent on site, and then feature on their main dashboards (analysis pages) as a “Bounce” rate. So now if you really want to induce a migraine, consider also what the “Bounce” rate from your Pay-Per-Click campaign might be? And what are you paying – 50p, £1, £2, £3.75 per click? Yes exactly, because if 75% of those stay for 00:00 – that’s more like £15 a click – isn’t it?
Mind you, just so you know, I actually started this posting with the idea that I would extol the virtues of Google Analytics. We’ve had our own painful learning curve with Google AdWords, and I’m sure there are experienced practitioners and experts out there who can tighten up on your targeting and relevance to both get the price and the bounce rate down. But that learning got us into “tagged” traffic analysis firstly (don’t even go there) which is anyway a built in feature of Google Analytics. And then: -
1. Google Analytics is free
2. Almost everyone should have this running on their web sites in the future, so at least we can compare like-for-like.
So, have fun exploring all the wonderful, cost-effective methods of drumming up business through the web, but do spare a thought for trying to accurately gauge the real effect of what you’re doing.
(And yes, just so you don’t think I’m going insane by running down the value of all web traffic, ModernSelling.com “visitors” do anyway stay on this site at below those average bounce rates and our genuine readers, when they find something they like to click-though on, have a significantly better track record of staying on sites we link to, on the evidence I’ve seen so far).
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15/06/2008 11:04:05
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NeilWarren
Posts 645
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Ah - OK - straight out of "A little knowledge being a dangerous thing" bucket (but I'm still betting this is all news to a lot of you!), "Bounce Rate" under further research is not only the 00:00 stayers - Bounce Rate - Wikipedia, but includes those who only look at that one page. Might not be so bad if they just wanted to read one article, as in our circumstances, but could still constitute a big problem if you wanted them - via PPC for example - to land on an explanatory page and then go on and do something.
And going back to Analytics, you can also sort by amount of time stayed - and ModernSelling still has 17% of "visitors" finding us through generic search phrases who stayed for 00:00, before moving into the 00:02, 00:04, 00:07 and so on. On the shop analogy therefore, "Bouncers" also include those who hover in the doorway (sounds right) or maybe drift into the entrance area and hang around just looking at the Sale rack. And that still is 75% for the average of all sites.
The plot thickens.
edited by NeilWarren on 15/06/2008
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16/07/2008 10:34:28
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NeilWarren
Posts 645
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...and if you want to know how thick this particular plot can get, there's a link here which has an in depth article from an Analytics Expert about How to Measure Website Engagement - but you'll have to be quick because the full article is only free till July 21st.
If you miss it, the salient points are anyway that a lot of B2B sites rely on offline sales, generated more often by the serious visitors, so knowing how/where/when you are getting those is crucial (and most marketers are "in the dark - or a poorly lit room at best"). And some B2C can actually measure sales on the site, where the "bouncers" averaged 0.2% conversion to sales, and the more committed browsers were at 5%.
His "Engagement Formula" - just in case you thought this was simple stuff - is (Ci + Ri + Di + Li + Bi + Fi + Ii) / 7! The author, Eric Peterson, comes from Web Analytics Demystified Inc - in case you wanted the book or to know more.
I'll leave that with you then!
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28/08/2008 18:36:25
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KirstenMinshall
Posts 13
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Bounce bounce bounce 
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ppgfjo6IIf4
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30/08/2008 11:11:40
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NeilWarren
Posts 645
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Yes, that's very interesting Kirsten - thanks.
From the fact that that seminar appears to be for people spending comparatively serious time/money on their online presence, and yet yer man seems to be educating them in a basic, Google-supplied, built-in, main dashboard, measurement/metric - we're probably none of us as "evolved" as what we thunk we were. I think the last 10-15 years have probably only really got Joe Average company as far as actually building any kind of web presence/site, and maybe tinkering with a bit of email broadcasting, Google AdWords, generic search phrases and the odd banner ad or directory listing in search of hits/traffic/unique visitors. Albeit that, for some, that "tinkering" is running into £ thousands a month.
Now comes the hard part. Like are they the "right" visitors. Where did they land on my site? Did they stay, browse, take action? Why not? Which pages other than home page are attracting the most? Why? Do we have any kind of accurate measurement of our website? Indeed is there a point to all the time and money we've spent online? How are prospects who find us that way actually converting into enquiries (USA says B2B "mostly" generates offline enquiries from online activity), etc. etc..
I think the next 10-15 years might well separate out those that do answer these questions from those that don't.
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28/09/2008 15:53:44
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SimonR
Posts 27
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Okay, I take your point. You shouldn't be simply measuring visitors - that's a Motherhood and Apple Pie sentiment; actually what you should be measuring is not how long they stay, but whether they buy (either from the site or subsequently). That's your real sales metric!
How long they stay at your site is a clue about why they don't stay,of course. If they're there for 15 seconds and don't buy they probably didn't like your site. If they stay for 45 seconds and don't buy they probably don't like your offer. (Yes, of course I'm over-simplifying to make a point! )
Simon
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30/09/2008 18:22:18
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Posts
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The bounce rate will also tell you if your SEO/marketing/advertising is working; that is to say if the right people are being attracted to your site. For instance, if a lot of people come to your site and leave immediately/within a short time span, it doesn't mean you need to change your site; it might mean you need to change the way you attract people to your site. It's a common mistake to blame the website and spend a lot of money making changes you think are going to keep people on it only to find you are doing it for the wrong demograhic. Chasing tails if you like.
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18/02/2009 14:23:24
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NeilWarren
Posts 645
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Here we are folks - the latest - courtesy of SEO Maniac (you need to include your homepage link on there Jem - and you're the bloomin' expert!! - White Hat Media) sent as a twitter, on tweetdeck, for those of you who are keeping up with Sales 2.0: Too early to be useful? - which he found on a Google Blog, so it's "from the horse's mouth" so to speak.
The Official Google Blog - "Stop Bouncing" Tips for Website Success.
edited by NeilWarren on 18/02/2009
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