measuring social media with google analytics
DESCRIPTION
Produced and presented by Graeme Benstead-Hume and SiteVisibility for the Brighton Digital Marketing Festival event.Measuring social media with Google Analytics covers campaign tracking, advanced segments & traffic filters.TRANSCRIPT
Measuring Social Media with Google Analytics
Graeme Benstead-Hume
@mrgraeme
Introduction
We will be looking at 3 different ways to segment our Social Media traffic:
•Social Campaign Tagging•Advanced Segments•Profile Filters
and looking at the best metrics to measure and compare against our other traffic channels.
Campaign Tagging
Campaign tagging gives us an easy way to track how well a single campaign is performing
What is Campaign Tagging?Campaign tagging allows us to add a small piece of tracking code to our URLs.
This code allows Google Analytics to tell when someone clicks a link even if it is not on our website.
Why Tag your Campaigns?
• Measure specific campaign performance
• Compare Campaign Performance
• Group campaigns together
URL Builder
Campaigns Report
Campaign Tagging Tips
• Segment your traffic by campaign
• Identify the best time to participate in certain channels
• Find out which pages your campaign traffic favors
Advanced Segments
Advanced segments allow you to view & compare reports for
traffic from social channels.
What is an Advanced Segment?
Google Analytics allows us to segment our traffic by many different dimensions and metrics.
Using this tool we can segment our visitors by who is referred to us via Social Media.
How to create an Advanced Segment
Building an Advanced Segment
facebook.com|twitter.com|linkedin|del\.icio\.us|delicious\.com|technorati|digg.com|hootsuite|stumbleupon|netvibes|bloglines|faves.com|aim.com|friendfeed|blinklist|fark|furl|newsgator|prweb|msplinks|myspace|bit.ly|tr.im|cli.gs|zi.ma|poprl|tinyurl|ow\.ly|reddit
Segmented Report
The benefits Advanced Segments
• Compare engagement metrics against other traffic sources
• Segment traffic by engagement goals, traffic source, campaign, keywords etc.
• Measure social traffic share
• Acts Retroactively
Limitations of Advanced Segments
• Harder to track user behavior across content
• Unable to segment the Funnel Visualisation report
• Trickier to share across user logins
Advanced Segments Tips and Tricks• Compare goals and ecommerce conversion
rates against other traffic
• View visitor loyalty reports to measure the quality of social traffic
• Focus on the social channels which drive the most traffic
• Identify potential advertising opportunities by geography
Traffic FilterFilter in your social traffic before it even reaches your reports
What is a filter
A Filter changes how Google Analytics gathers its data before it is even processed.
This allows us to specify exactly what and how we see our reports.
Traffic Filter Warning
Applying a filter to a Google Analytics Profile will remove ALL filtered traffic with no way of retrieving it afterwards.
Always create a new profile for filters.
Creating a new ProfileNavigate to the Analytics Settings screen where you should see your existing profiles.
Creating a new FilterOnce you have created the new profile return to the Analytics Settings screen and find the edit button by the new profile:
Scroll down to the filters box and click the add new filter link.
Referring Traffic Filter
Social Media Medium Filter
Full Referral Path Filter
Traffic Filter Benefits
• Works on a page view level
• Works in funnel view
• Easy to share across accounts
• Opens up 20 new goals
• Cannot compare against other traffic sources
• Doesn’t work retroactively
Traffic Filter Disadvantages
Engagement Metrics
Metrics to watch and measure the quality & engagement of your traffic.
Bounce rate
Bounce rate is a great indicator of the quality of your traffic.
Do some campaigns and refers have lower bounce rates?
Avg. Time on SiteHigher average times on site can indicate a more engaged user base. Which pages are your visitors spending their time on?
Visitor LoyaltyUsing the visitor loyalty report we can identify whether visitors are likely to return to your site.
If not you should try to provide more reasons for your social traffic to return.
Goal & Ecommerce Conversions
Social Media is as much about engagement as the bottom line.
Compare the conversion rate of each of your traffic channels
Spikes in traffic
Spikes in social media traffic can help you identify which campaigns & activity are performing most effectively.
The new social plugin for Google Analytics allows us to measure & segment ‘Socially Engaged’ traffic.
Google Analytics’ push into engagement
Already works for onpage Google+ buttons!
For other channels we can start to use an alternative to event tracking:
_gaq.push(['_trackSocial', 'facebook', 'like', document.location.href]);
Instead of
_gaq.push(['_trackEvent', 'facebook', 'like', document.location.href]);
Social Plugin overview
Google Analytics Social Plugin
Search for: google social plugin
Thank you!
@mrgraeme
Resources available at sitevisibility.co.uk/blog