The quality of a website can make or break a business. When you invest in great design, strategic copy and a compelling user experience, you expect results – as you should. However, many business leaders are left wondering how to measure those results.
One critically important, and relatively easy to measure, metric is how you rank in search. As important as search engine ranking is, it’s far from the only indicator of a successful website. Your company needs to set goals for your website that are tied to your overall business goals. These are some of the ways a business can measure success.
7 Metrics for Measuring Website Success
- Traffic Sources
Undoubtedly, a strong SEO strategy should increase your search engine traffic. However, you should closely monitor traffic from other sources as well. Measure direct traffic, social media traffic and referral traffic. You might discover unexpected ways in which your site attracts qualified leads.
- Bounce Rate
No matter how many visitors find your site, you want them to take further steps toward conversion. Bounce rate shows you how many people leave after viewing only one page. As you adjust your website strategy to give visitors what they want, you should see that rate decrease.
- Click-Through Rates
Your website should lead a customer through the sales funnel, from awareness to purchase. You can follow along by looking at click-throughs. This analysis will give insight into the text, placement and usability of your CTAs. Make sure the experience is what was intended.
- Form Fills
You can, and should, measure all kinds of conversions but one particularly valuable type to watch is a form fill. When someone fills out a form, whether to request information, a consultation or a call back, they express a clear interest in your brand. A well designed form also captures information that teaches you more about your target audience and builds your email list.
- Gated Content Downloads
When a visitor is willing to trade their contact information for a valuable piece of content, they signal a strong interest in your brand and open the opportunity to market to them more proactively. Put a plan in place to nurture these leads through the funnel to a sale.
- Cart Abandonments
When a user puts a product in their shopping cart only to abandon it, treat this as a valuable learning opportunity. Your site metrics can provide clues as to why they left, while a remarketing campaign can allow you to re-engage them.
- Blog Interaction
Look at how people get to your blog, what they read and where they go next. Track whether learning something new on the blog translates to browsing your products or requesting more information. You might also set up your blog to allow comments or social sharing; these actions provide valuable data as well.
Your success metrics will vary from your competitor’s, just as your marketing strategy and tactics vary. And, you will adjust them over time. A great digital agency partner will help you to develop meaningful measurements, comparing them month-over-month and year-over-year. Together you will likely improve your search engine ranking for important keywords, but you should see positive change in other metrics as well. Above all, choose success metrics that are meaningful to you and your business goals. What you measure, you can improve.
Kevin Hourigan is the President and CEO of Bayshore Solutions and for over 23 years, his company has provided clients with digital solutions that grow their businesses. To contact Kevin, please email [email protected].
