A Customer-Based Real-Time Option to Google Analytics

In the past few weeks we’ve been exploring the capabilities of Google Analytics (GA). GA offers a tremendous amount of insight to help improve the form and function of a website. There are some shortcomings to GA. We’ve discussed several in this class, including bounce rates, the refresh rate of GA real-time statistics, and the complexity of learning GA. GA may be one of the most popular analytics tools, but it’s not the only option.

Bounce Rates

If a user only visits one page of a website, GA counts that visit as a bounce. GA can’t measure the time spent on one page or what a visitor responds to on that page unless the visitor takes another action, for example loading another page or clicking a link on the landing page. In GA, if I spend 15 seconds on one web page or 15 minutes on that web page without completing another action on that site, my visit is counted as a bounce. If time visitors spend on one page is important to your business, you may want an analytics tool that can distinguish between a long visit to a single page (a good bounce) and a short visit to a single page (a bad bounce) (Melaugh, 2014b).

Real-Time Results

GA does have a real-time statistics feature (https://developers.google.com/analytics/devguides/reporting/realtime/v3/), but it’s not part of the standard reports and can be complex to set up. Once the feature is installed, GA doesn’t have many options to drill down into details of the current visitors. GA can show you how many people are on your site, but it functions more like a counter than a tool to reveal insights of your real-time visitor’s behavior on the site. GA has a delay between showing the real-time visitors and showing the demographics on those visitors (Blankenspoor, 2014).

Complexity

For the web analytics novice, like me, GA can be overwhelming. The training videos are easy to follow and are very helpful, but I think I could spend hours reviewing these training videos and still have many questions. If an analytics tool is too complex, will all the departments in a business who should be using website analytics actually use them? Probably not, unless there is an analytics guru in each department.

Alternative Analytics Tools

There are many alternative analytics tools to fill GA’s gaps in reporting and user experience. When researching analytics tools this
week, I searched for tools that offered real-time results, could 

match visitors with customer profiles, had the ability to distinguish a 

good bounce from a bad bounce, and allowed easy tracking of 

conversion goals. The level of complexity varies based on the user’s 

experience level, so although I’m interested in how easy (or difficult) it is 

to use the alternative analytics tools, it wasn’t my chief concern. The 

analytics tool that I’ve chosen to review is Woopra (www.woopra.com).

            I’m a visual learner, so the clever incorporation of the infinity symbol to represent the double O in the Woopra logo was what first caught my interest. Woopra was first introduced in 2008 with the goal of being the analytics tool for every part of a business – marketing, sales, customer support and products. In 2013, the company introduced the new logo shown above to symbolize the continuous customer lifecycle (Khoury, 2013).

            Woopra is a real-time customer analytics tool. It shows who is on your website right now and allows you to track the individual users. As with other real-time analytics options, Woopra provides the following functions:

• ·      Funnel reports – the ability to track multiple steps to conversion and review drop rates at each step;
• ·      Queries and segmentation – the ability to track a customer through specific actions;
• ·      Individual user profiles – the ability to see what visitors are actually doing rather than just getting a count of pageviews; and
• ·      Retention analysis – the ability to track the effects of changes on your website to changes in customer behavior (Melaugh, 2014a).

Woopra allows users to sync customer data with web analytics to build detailed customer profiles tracking web, mobile app, email, and support interactions between individual customers an your business.

Example of Woopra customer profile

                      Image source: https://www.woopra.com/platform/#customer-profiles

The detailed customer profiles allow you to segment your customers based on exact interactions and to adapt those segments as customer behaviors change throughout the customer lifecycle.

Example of Woopra customer segment

Image source: https://www.woopra.com/platform/#customer-profiles

The segmentation feature allows Woopra clients to easily specify and change the actions, time frames or members of customer segments.

            Woopra’s customizable funnel analytics reports, allow clients to determine if there are roadblocks that are causing customers to abandon their exploration of the website and allows for easy changes to test the effects of revisions to any roadblocks to customer experience. The funnel analytics also allow marketers to see conversion rates by marketing channel, using real-time data. Woopra allows marketers to easily customize the funnel reports. On the sample funnel analysis by channel below, we see that 75 customers who found the site via search completed a purchase compared to 157 completed purchases through direct marketing (www.woopra.com).

Sample Woopra funnel report

Image source: https://www.woopra.com/platform/funnel-analytics/

            Another key feature of Woopra is its integration with third-party apps like LiveChat, SurveyMonkey, Adwords, etc., through a feature called AppConnect. Using AppConnect, Woopra users can connect with third-party apps with only a few clicks. There is no need to add programming code to the website. For example, Woopra users can set up actions that will trigger a LiveChat invitation based on the pages a customer is viewing in real-time. Below is a sample of third-party apps available through AppConnect. Note: Some are only available through the premium pricing package.

AppConnect third-party apps that integrate with Woopra

Image source: https://www.woopra.com/appconnect/

Market Share

Google Analytics has a much larger market share than Woopra. According to Datanyze Universe’s report dated June 12, 2016, GA is at the top of the list and Woopra is 35^th in the analytics category based on the number of websites using each analytics tool. Woopra runs on approximately 20,300 websites compared to GA’s 13.5 million websites (Datanyze, 2016).

Pricing

Woopra is available for free for websites with up to 30,000 actions per month, but can get expensive for busy websites. Pricing begins at approximately $80 per month for websites with 400,000 actions per month and goes up to approximately $1,200 per month for websites with up to 10 million actions per month (www.woopra.com/pricing/).  

Training

Similar to GA, Woopra has a Documentation page (www.woopra.com/docs/) on the website where users can find instruction manuals as well as instructional videos. The introductory video says a new user can learn to use Woopra in about 15 minutes. After watching several of the instructional videos, Woopra seems easy to set up and use.

IM Impact’s Shane Melaugh has examined and reviewed many GA alternatives and in his opinion, Woopra’s strengths are its easy-to-use interface and its AppConnect feature. Melaugh’s biggest concern is that Woopra can be expensive for busy websites. There is no “one best tool” for every business. In his review of real-time analytics tools, Melaugh recommends that businesses follow Avinash Kaushik’s 10/90 rule  – “for every $10 you spend on an analytics tool, you should be spending $90 on a very smart person to make use of the tool (Melaugh, 2014a).” Kaushik recommends businesses start with GA, and move to a subscription-based analytics tool when the level of knowledge in the business outgrows the information available from Google Analytics (Kaushik, 2006). I think if your website qualifies for the free Woopra account, the additional customer insights and real-time results would be worth the change from GA.

Sources:

Blankenspoor, J. (2014, Feb. 24). 5 great Google Analytics alternatives. SitePoint. Retrieved from https://www.sitepoint.com/5-great-google-analytics-alternatives/

Datanyze. (2016, June 12). Woopra vs. Google Analytics. Datanyze Universe. Retrieved from https://www.datanyze.com/market-share/analytics/woopra-vs-google-analytics/

Kaushik, A. (2006, May 19). The 10/90 rule for magnificent web analytics success. Occam’s Razor. Retrieved from http://www.kaushik.net/avinash/the-10-90-rule-for-magnificient-web-analytics-success/

Khoury, E. (2013, March 2013). Woopra turns 5 and unveils brand new logo! Woopra Blog. Retrieved from https://www.woopra.com/blog/2013/03/06/woopra-turns-5-and-unveils-brand-new-logo/

Melaugh, S. (2014a, Nov. 12). Advanced customer analytics: Roundup review. IM Impact Blog. Retrieved from http://imimpact.com/advanced-customer-analytics/

Melaugh, S. (2014b, Nov. 12). Web stats: Alternatives to Google Analytics. IM Impact Blog. Retrieved from http://imimpact.com/web-stats-alternatives-to-google-analytics/

Is Facebook the only social media network a business needs?

            The answer to that question is “maybe” but probably not. There is no one-channel-fits-all solution to the question “What social media does my business need?” The answer depends on the type of product or service your business offers and how your customers use social media.

            To determine the right social media channel(s) for your business, you need to answer the following questions about your customers:

• ·       What social networks are my customers using?
• ·       How are those customers using each network? Are they “liking” content? Are they tagging friends and sharing content?
• ·       Are customers engaging with brands? Are they visiting brand websites or initiating purchases through the social media channel?

You should also answer the following questions about your business:

• ·       How much time and money will the business devote to social media? Joining most social channels is free, but money will matter, even if it’s just in staff time devoted to social media.
• ·       Will you advertise on the social channels?
• ·       How many employees will devote time to social media and how much time can they spend on social media?
• ·       Do you want to engage with your customers or just provide brand awareness? My personal opinion is that businesses should always engage with their customers, but there are differing opinions on this question, sometimes even within one organization.
• ·       Do you have a growth plan in place for when the activities on your social networks require more staff or more time from the current staff?

Where do you start?

            If you’re not using social media already, the first inclination may be to start a business page on every social channel you can find. It may look good on your website to have multiple social media links, but you need to be active on all the social sites you promote. It’s best to start with one or two social networks and add more if and when it makes sense to your marketing strategy.

Which Social Network Is the Best One for Your Business?

          Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Pinterest and the list goes on…which channel or channels are best for your business? The best channels for your business are where your customers are. Let’s take a closer look at the most popular social channels mentioned at the beginning of this paragraph.
            With more than 1.55 billion active users, Facebook is the most popular network. Facebook is constantly improving and adapting to become more relevant to businesses in many categories (Helmrich, 2016). It’s easy to use and businesses can post a variety of content, photos, videos, updates on your business, links to your website, etc. Since purchasing the image-based Instagram social network, Facebook has placed more emphasis on images and video. Facebook’s auto-play video feature rivals the power of YouTube videos. A Nielsen study found:

“…from the moment a video ad was viewed, (brand) ‘lift’ happened across ad recall, brand awareness and purchase consideration. As expected, lift increased the longer people watched the ad. (Harrison, 2016)”

Image source: (Harrison, 2016) SHIFT Marketing Communications 

Research suggests that the auto-play feature has lifted the engagement rate on Facebook videos 40% higher than YouTube videos (Harrison, 2016). You don’t need special equipment to create Facebook videos. Many businesses create effective videos with smartphones. SHIFT Marketing Communications offers these tips to create effective Facebook videos:

• ·       Keep the video under 60 seconds long.
• ·       Use strong images to grab the viewers’ attention in the first 5 seconds of the video.
• ·       The video has to be engaging without audio. Viewers have to click on the video to turn on the audio. If the silent images don’t grab attention, viewers will not turn on the sound and watch the entire video.
• ·       Make the video feel authentic. Don’t use a highly produced commercial – save the commercials for YouTube.
• ·       Include a call to action (CTA) and your website URL (Harrison, 2016).

Facebook has recently introduced live video feeds that give business an exciting new avenue to connect with customers.

            Twitter is another network that is easy to use and lets businesses post a variety of content – with a 140 characters limit.  Despite the limited amount of text, tweets can include links, videos, or images. Twitter will challenge you to be concise in your messaging, but it’s a fast way to share your message. Your customers who use Twitter can easily engage with your brand, retweeting, asking questions, responding to polls, or sharing their recommendations of your business. To keep your Twitter feed interesting for your customers, you shouldn’t stick strictly to promotions for your business. Add in relevant tweets from your industry or thought leaders that will interest your customers and followers. Twitter can also be an additional customer service channel, as long as you’re “listening” and are prepared to respond quickly to comments and questions (Helmrich, 2016).

            Facebook-owned Instagram is an image and video-based social network and it’s primarily a mobile channel. There is a web version of Instagram but it has limited capabilities and is used primarily for viewing Instagram feeds. Image is everything here, so it helps to have a good photographer posting on your Instagram feed (Helmrich, 2016).

            Pinterest is a digital bulletin board and it may not be a good fit for all businesses. However, if images are important to sell your product, for example, clothing, food or jewelry, you will definitely want to investigate Pinterest. Every Pinterest post must be an image or a video and you can organize your posts into categories. Customers can follow your boards, like them and share them. Research shows that customers use Pinterest to share their intent to purchase and to learn more about products (Jackson, 2016).

Image Source: (Jackson, 2016) SproutSocial. 

Which Social Networks Are Effective for Your Business?

            Once you get started with social media, you should review each channel for effectiveness. Are you gaining followers? Are customers engaging with your brand? Are customers finding your website through your social media? You can use the social media analytics available on each social channel and Google Analytics to measure the most effective channels for your business. The Google Analytics (GA) “Channels” report can tell you how much of your web traffic results from social media (McLaughlin, 2016). The report will look like the sample below:

Image source: (McLaughlin, 2016) 

Select “Social” to see a breakout of traffic from individual social media channels, as in the example below (McLaughlin, 2016).

Image source: (McLaughlin, 2016)  

For more information on how to use GA to analyze social media channels, please review How to Use Google Analytics for Social Media Measurement .

Alex and Ani Uses Social Media to Expand the Brand

Jewelry company Alex and Ani is a good example of how a company can use social media channels to increase sales. Alex and Ani, best known for their charm bangle bracelets, has found that social media is a vital segment of their marketing strategy. The company started slowly, first assigning an employee to respond to tweets (www.twitter.com/alexandani) mentioning the brand, then posting images of their jewelry collections on Facebook and responding to comments on the Facebook page. Noticing the image-based posts received the most amount of engagement (comments, likes and shares), Alex and Ani moved their image marketing to Pinterest, adding photos of all product lines. The Alex and Ani social community began sharing favorite products and their plans to purchase those products. Wanting to strengthen and track the relationship of image-based social media to sales, Alex and Ani partnered with marketing analytics vendor Curalate (Bonifacino, 2013). Alex and Ani used data from Curalate and GA to translate social media engagement to sales. Curalate data tracks “pins” and posts of a photo of an individual Alex and Ani product and can link those posts back to sales.  Alex and Ani attributed $1.31 million 2013 sales to social media engagement (Enright, 2014). In iMedia’s video interviews (below) Ryan Bonifacino, Alex and Ani’s vice president of strategy, and Apu Gupta, CEO of Curalate, discuss the importance of images to Alex and Ani’s marketing. Bonifacino and Gupta tell how they learned that customers use Pinterest to show what they aspire to buy and they use Instagram to show what they actually purchased (iMedia, 2013). Links to videos:

Part 1: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9RbEdYYU9f8

Part 2: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IDk6N75Cic8

Part 3: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QyUyQb67LFw

Content or Conversation: Which one is king?

            Some brands may downplay conversations with customers on social media, but I think there is little conversation without good content. As I mentioned earlier, businesses can set up their Facebook pages so customers can’t post comments. I think that’s primarily to avoid negative comments from customers. We have this debate in my current organization. The social media manager for one office doesn’t allow fans of that office’s Facebook page to post on that page. That doesn’t stop negative comments. People who want their complaints heard just post them on pages for other offices. In my opinion it’s allowing the conversation, positive and negative, is the way to build a stronger relationship with your customers.

Sources:

Bonifacino, R. (2013, Nov. 7). How Alex and Ani struck gold with visual marketing. iMedia. Retrieved from http://www.imediaconnection.com/articles/ported-articles/red-dot-articles/2013/nov/how-alex-and-ani-struck-gold-with-visual-marketing/

Enright, A. (2014, March 25). Web sales skyrocket for Alex and Ani in 2013. Internet Retailer. Retrieved from https://www.internetretailer.com/2014/03/25/web-sales-skyrocket-alex-and-ani-2013

Harrison, M. (2016, Feb. 2). How Facebook videos are outperforming YouTube. SHIFT Marketing Communications. Retrieved from http://www.shiftisgood.com/2016/02/facebook-videos/

Helmrich, B. (2016, Jan. 29). Social media for business: 2016 marketer’s guide. Business News Daily. Retrieved from http://www.businessnewsdaily.com/7832-social-media-for-business.html

iMedia Connection. (2013, Nov. 5). How Alex and Ani struck gold with visual marketing, part 1. [Video file]. Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9RbEdYYU9f8

iMedia Connection. (2013, Nov. 5). How Alex and Ani struck gold with visual marketing, part 2. [Video file]. Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IDk6N75Cic8

iMedia Connection. (2013, Nov. 5). How Alex and Ani struck gold with visual marketing, part 3. [Video file]. Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QyUyQb67LFw

Jackson, D. (2016, April 12). How to find the best social media channels for your business. SproutSocial. Retrieved from http://sproutsocial.com/insights/social-media-channels/

McLaughlin, D. (2016, Jan. 19). How to use Google Analytics for social media measurement. The Simple Measured Blog. Retrieved from http://simplymeasured.com/blog/how-to-use-google-analytics-for-social-media-measurement/#sm.00000f1jaigxgvezrx6czzeet8c3r