Another small step for web 2.0 but a big leap for marketing as a whole; YouTube Analytics has been released. It is a small undertaking because it is so simple for Google to do, yet the benefits it will have on the marketing world will be big over the course of the next couple of years.
After my recent meeting with Google, it has been expressed that the next big step is the transition of offline to online media, in particular the demise of television advertising fuelling the growth of online spend and reach of internet marketing. Why? Today’s changing society. Instead of going home and putting our feet up watching telly in the evenings we are transitioning to online undertakings instead. Social Media sites in particular must be wreaking havoc with TV advertising revenues as businesses see that they can reach and influence more people online rather than through TV.
So, now we are seeing digital advertisements being utilised online instead of through TV, video ads on YouTube in particular. But where to position these adverts, who the target market is, and how to make them more successful are all vitally important to get the most from marketing spend. YouTube Analytics now gives you this data and gives you far more information from which to really drive more business.
Here are the top five great benefits of the new YouTube Analytics package has:
1. Location targeting – you can now define the location of your target viewership. Knowing where your viewers are around the world can give you a real insight into potential unexplored markets.
2. The ability to track when people abandon the video – great for optimisation of video content!
3. You can now define times and dates of video views on YouTube.
4. This will lead the way for other social media sites to be more transparent on internet traffic data, such as Facebook.
5. Google are updated the package in the next few weeks to include inbound traffic sources.
It is for sure that this is not the final product, is there ever a final product released by Google!? However, if you are looking to drive brand awareness and have the cash to spend then YouTube Analytics will help you spend it wisely.
Many PPC advertisers and SEO junkies invest heavily in these forms of online marketing, believing that the more money they throw into this the more sales and enquiries they will yield. True; but to an extent. What is crucial to understand is the buying process; 84% of the buying process is irrational and can be defined as emotional (more so for women buying shoes) therefore there are far more factors besides the traffic volumes that are affecting conversions. Use Web Analytics to maximise sales in the following 5 ways:
1. Compare organic and PPC traffic – determine which method of advertising is more effective for you by term. You will find that for some search terms, organic is more effective like generic terms (e.g. loans, packaging etc), but for more specific long tail searches, PPC can give you high positions for good conversion rates. If you have a high position in both SEO and PPC you are likely to see an exponential increase in your revenue and enquiries generated through search.
2. Analyse revenue by keyword and position – determine what keywords drive the volume and which drive the sales. You will find that the terms that drive the volume of traffic will drive a high amount of conversions/enquiries, but for a higher than desired price. Through Analytics, you can determine the best position for each keyword to get the best ROI from it.
3. Bounce rates – Understanding of what turns visitors off on your website is very important. Sometimes you will find that 50% of users will click onto your website and then straight back off again. For a search term like ‘life insurance’ this should not be the case if you sell life insurance. Through Analytics you can determine where you are losing your volume of traffic straight away and diagnose why people are leaving. Therefore advertisers can maximise the amount of traffic that enters the site thus getting more out in regards to sales or enquiries.
4. Funnel Overlay – determine how and why people go through your site, understanding what turns people on and off. If you can optimise the content on your site to work around the buying cycle, you can maximise your sales and enquiries again.
5. Goals – The beauty of online marketing is that it can be so transparent. With Analytics you have the ability to track four types of goals. Goals can be defined as objectives for the website. This makes online marketing spend, such as PPC and SEO costs, more transparent and can then calculate accurate ROI.
There are other analytical programs and third party software which allows for more in depth reporting and analysis which can take your online marketing to the next level. At Click Consult we use all of the above to ensure our client’s online marketing is maximised.
