What is Data Analytics
In order to understand a website’s performance and make decisions about its future, website owners rely on data analytics. Data analytics enable websites to take the raw data that they are routinely generating and storing and analyse it so they can draw reliable conclusions. For any website owner or online business, getting to grips with Google Analytics is essential.
What Is Google Analytics?
Google Analytics refers to a freely available suite of web analytics tools offered by Google. These tools enable users to analyse the performance of their website and the traffic that it is attracting. For any modern website or business, this kind of data and the means to analyse it are invaluable.
Businesses today are heavily dependent on their websites as a central hub for all their digital activities. Google’s Analytics tools allow businesses to monitor their ongoing marketing campaigns and measure the results in real-time.
These same tools are also important for evaluating marketing campaigns once they have concluded. For example, if you are spending money on social media advertising and search engine marketing, at the end of it, you will want to know whether you have got your money’s worth.
Users who want to take advantage of Google Analytics just need to add some tracking code to their website. This code will ensure that the activities of all visitors to the website are recorded, and the resulting data is aggregated in several of ways.
What Is Data Analytics?
As the name suggests, data analytics is the science of analysing data in order to draw conclusions from it. Without proper analysis, data only has limited value. However, when it is properly processed and analysed, data enables businesses to achieve some pretty amazing things. Similarly, website owners can benefit from data analytics and the improved understanding it gives them of their audience.
Of course, before data can be analysed it first has to be collected. Collecting data appropriately is just as challenging as analysing it correctly. If there are flaws in the collection process, there will be corresponding deficiencies in any analytics performed on it.
Data analytics is not just used by websites and online businesses. Regular brick-and-mortar stores also utilise data analytics to assess their performance and identify any bottlenecks in their production and workflows.
There are different forms of data analytics, each of which is useful for a different scenario and type of data. For example, diagnostic analytics is concerned with working out why something has happened. On the other hand, predictive analytics uses data to try and make more accurate predictions about what will happen in the future.
What Is Analytics In SEO?
Search engine optimisation is all about data. Without the right data to work from, SEO specialists don’t know which keywords to target or which tactics are proving to be the most effective.
Analytics is the best way for SEO specialists to assess their current situations and strategise properly for the future. Using analytics ensures that the discussions your team has regarding SEO are grounded in cold, hard data and removes more subjective considerations from the debate.
Marketers can benefit enormously from setting up their analytics in such a way that any data relevant to analysing SEO campaigns is being gathered and processed automatically. With such a system in place, measuring and testing SEO campaigns while they are in progress is much easier. This, in turn, enables marketers to respond dynamically and adjust the approach of their campaigns in real-time.
How To Learn Marketing Analytics
If you want to learn how to do your own marketing analysis, then there is a range of options open to you. However, before you start pursuing any formal training in marketing analytics, there are a number of core skills that you should equip yourself with first. For example, as you could probably guess, analysing data requires a solid understanding of numbers and statistics.
In addition to confidence in dealing with numbers, previous experience with marketing is invaluable. First-hand marketing experience makes it easier to put the conclusions you draw from data into context. Numbers alone can only tell you so much. If you don’t have the necessary background knowledge to interpret those numbers, then you run the risk of drawing the wrong conclusions.
Any prior training or experience with analytics tools and other related software will also be beneficial and will give you a leg up if or when you start applying to study a formal qualification.
Degrees in either data or marketing can be beneficial for anyone looking to work in marketing analytics. There are a number of courses that combine both of these elements.
For example, the CIM Diploma in Professional Digital Marketing has a specialisation in marketing which also will cover data analytics. Learning how to properly analyse data, interpret the results, and communicate your conclusions to other people are all essential to marketing analytics.
There’s a lot of degrees out there that will give you a good grounding in multiple relevant skills, so it is worth taking some time to see what’s out there.
The CIM Diploma in Professional Digital Marketing teaches you about the main features and capabilities of Google’s Analytics tools. This covers everything from setting up your account to doing the actual analytics.
Once you have learned how to generate and interpret basic reports, you can then move on to the more advanced capabilities of Google Analytics. This is where you will get to grips with the majority of the analytics features, what they do, and how you can use them to analyse your own websites. This course also covers the use of other marketing tools that Google offers.
Consider doing some reading around Google’s analytics tools and again there are lots of books out there, Dynamic Digital Marketing (it is a #1 best-seller and is featured in Book Authority’s Best Books in the World) covers everything you need know and how to apply what you learn in to real-world situations. The book features tools, checklists as well as trends and insights.
How Is Data Analytics Used?
Data analytics has a range of uses beyond the world of marketing. Businesses and websites can benefit from data analytics in a range of different ways. It enables them to make much better decisions and to gain considerably deeper insight into their current performance and future goals.
Adopting a data-driven approach to decision-making doesn’t just lead to better decisions; it also leads to more reliable decision-making.
Part of the reason that data analytics is so effective in the realm of marketing is because of the depth of audience research that it allows for. The better you understand your audience, the easier it is to market to them. This is just as true for websites as it is for businesses. By seeking deeper insight into who their readership is comprised of, websites can develop more refined content and marketing strategies that are tailored for their audiences.
A better understanding of customers and audiences also makes for better customer service. The more data you are able to gather about your users and the experience they are having, the better the service you will be able to provide them.
How To Get LinkedIn Analytics
The LinkedIn platform features a number of inbuilt analytics tools that are useful for gauging audience trends and gaining insight into exactly who your audience is. To access your LinkedIn analytics, click the Me icon at the top of the page. From there, you should look for ‘Posts & Activity’ under the Manage heading. In this section, you will be able to find the analytics for individual posts and articles that you’ve posted.
Check out this article on Forbes which has some great ideas to develop your LinkedIn strategy. An Expert’s Advice on Making the Most of LinkedIn.
Data analytics is an incredibly powerful tool for gaining insights into your audience and making more informed decisions about your future strategies.
What’s more, anyone who wants to understand data analytics and how to implement them within their own organisations needs to develop their skills because whether you are managing a business or a website, data analytics is an essential tool to have at your disposal.