I wanted to post about a topic that has been on my mind so much lately, especially because (lately) I have been working on gaining even higher conversion rates on mine (and my clients websites). I am talking about web analytics and what they can do for you and your business. On 97th Floor there was a recent post about a new analytics company that gives a detailed report of step by step browsing through your website to show you exactly what visitors are doing, and I have talked before about analytics companies like Crazy Egg and Tape Failure which lets you record sessions of exactly what paths (viewing the mouse moving on your site) visitors are taking, as well as analytical statistics, and tracking too.

I have used programs out there that are free like Google Analytics (and still do), but have found accuracy problems with them, and really with they had more features that were useful, and tools that worked 100% of the time. The only web analytics software I have used that has been flawless, and perfect in every way is from Omniture. It is a paid analytics software, but by far the most superior.

When you can find out things like the exact paths that your website visitors are taking, you can figure out what is being viewed the most, what is working and what is not. You can find out what products people are viewing the most, but not buying and then adjust to try and increase the conversion rate (maybe your prices are to high and need adjusting). How important do you think it would be to find out the pages that people leave from the most? (so you could change it, and try to keep them longer) What could you do with information like, what are the hot spots on your site, where are people clicking the most, behavioral targeting, and are they clicking anywhere near where you really want them to be clicking?  You can really improve your search engine marketing 100 fold with proper web analytics.

When you find out information like this it could help you improve your navigation which we all know will help us with our Google rankings, increase conversion rates, more sales which leads to more money in your pocket. Taking the time to understand website analytics could mean the difference between success and failure.

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