This document provides an overview of using web metrics to improve websites. It discusses distinguishing signals from noise in data, questions to ask of metrics to guide decisions, and planning sites with metrics in mind. The document concludes with assigning metrics that correspond to target audiences, goals, and decisions needed. Metrics should track who is participating and producing content versus their training to guide efforts to increase participation and credibility.

1. Using web metrics to improve your site
A presentation for the Knight Digital Media Center
Knight Community Information Challenge Boot Camp
Dana Chinn
March 2010

2. • What’s noise vs. signals
• Questions to ask of your data
What data will give you answers
• Planning your site with metrics in mind
• A metrics assignment
www.slideshare.net/danachinn
@danachinn
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3. The Rime of the Ancient Web Analytics Analyst
Data, data everywhere
I think I could sink
Data, data everywhere
Will someone please
“Dutch boats in a squall” by J.M.W Turner help me think.
Rishad Tobaccowalla, CEO, Denuo
at OMMA Metrics & Measurement, June 2009
With apologies to Coleridge and mariners, ancient and otherwise
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4. “After the disaster in Haiti, [our site] hit
168.6 million pageviews
in the month of January. A new record.”
--The ”famous metrics” term comes from web analytics guru Avinash Kaushik 4

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6. Internal vs. external metrics
Decision-making Advertising, marketing
• Census data • Panel data
100% of all visitors, visits, page Activity from a sample of self-
views for all sections selected people. Only total site
data for a limited number of sites.
• Analysis, decisions,
actions, evaluation • Marketing, trending,
external comparisons
• Omniture
Google Analytics • comScore
WebTrends Nielsen
etc. Compete
etc.
• Web Analytics
Association • Interactive
Advertising Bureau
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7. Recognizing the signals amid the noise
Noise:
Everything,
every one,
every second of
every day
Signals:
Metrics
you select -- Mark Smiciklas, IntersectionConsulting.com
for decision-making
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8. Only look at the signals you need 1
You need to know
• How your site traffic
changes due to external
2 events
so you can determine
whether your actions
made a difference (or not)
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• Whether your actions
led to the results
that you anticipated
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9. What decisions do you need to make?
Which metrics will help you?
(How are sites are measured?)
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10. Two types of web metrics
What people do (behavioral)
Who they are, what they think (attitudinal)
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11. Unique visitors
visit websites,
generate page views.
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12. Questions to ask
your data
You
Your Data
Did people visit our site more than
once last week?
Was this more or less than previously?
If more, was it due to an outside event, OR
was it something we did?
Was the increase as much as expected?
If less, was there a holiday, OR
did we not do something?
Was the drop as much as anticipated?
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13. For every question...
Did people visit our site more than once last week?
...there’s an answer hiding in Google Analytics...
visits per unique visitor
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14. ...but you have to go
past the Dashboard...
visits per unique visitor
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15. ...change the time period,
and customize the reports for your decisions
default report shows a 5-week period
Use weekly
metrics, full-
week time
periods
so you can
identify unusual
movement
quickly
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16. On average, last week,
how many stories did
people see with each
visit?
Did most visits come from
returning visitors OR new ones?
Are we hooking in new visitors?
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17. On average, last week, how many stories did people
see with each visit? Are we hooking in new visitors?
page views per visit
percent of visits from new visitors
page views per new-visitor visit
percent of visits from returning visitors
page views per returning-visitor visit
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18. When someone came
to our site, what was
the first page they
saw?
Did they leave immediately when
they saw it?
Did new visitors leave more than
returning ones?
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19. When someone came to our site, what was the first
page they saw? Did they leave immediately?
bounce rate
of the page
where people
enter your site
most often
1. Overall
2. Visits from new unique visitors
3. Visits from returning unique visitors
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20. Bounce rate of top entry pages
One visit with
one page view
to the home page
= 1 bounce
No. of bounces
+
No. of visits that started with the
home page and had 2+ page views
= 100% of visits 20

21. Example
Home page bounce rate
= over 50%
Over half of the visits to the CNN.com home page
left CNN.com without clicking into any other pages
Best (?) cases: Came only to get the headlines
Home page has dynamic content
not captured with page views
Worst cases: Couldn’t find what they wanted
Didn’t like what they saw
Source: “Can CNN, the Go-To Site, Get You to Stay?” by Brian Stetler, New York Times, Jan. 17, 2009
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22. Need to translate
this...
...to information used for decisions
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23. Measure engagement...
No. of podcasts
-- put on iPod
-- played
-- listened to the end
...and construct your site to maximize success
Put “please donate by going to
ourspecialcampaignURL.com” at the beginning
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24. The perfect (measurable) Tweet
• A call to action to participate, engage with you
Look at this. Go here. What do you think?
• A link
To get news, information
Tweets are now a primary news source,
the new home page
To respond to the call to action
• A #hashtag and/or keywords
• Handle specific to person/topic
• A comment
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25. “Perfect” tweets are less than 120 characters
RT/via @handle + call to action/comment + link + #hashtag
100 characters 111 characters Watch handle,
hashtag sizes
Lost the link
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26. Two types of web analytics metrics
What people do (behavioral)
Who they are, what they think (attitudinal)
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27. Some questions that can’t be answered
from web traffic data
1. What was the purpose of your visit today?
2. Were you able to
complete your task today?
3. If not, why not?
4. If you did complete your task,
what did you enjoy most about our site?
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28. Are you reaching the audiences
you meant to reach
and
in the numbers you want?
Is it your content?
Is it your design?
Is it you?
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29. Web analytics is not easy...
• Have clearly defined, accountable goals, objectives
on which everyone agrees
each of which is someone’s direct responsibility
• Know the limitations of your data, metrics
Guess rather than rely on bad data, metrics
• Dedicate people, processes to analytics
Technology, software are just tools
• Let the hippos decide whether metrics
will really be used for decisions
Use only what you need
HIghest Paid Person’s Opinion
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30. Your metrics assignment
• List all of your target audiences and stakeholders
--residents (what areas), businesses (what types), government (what depts)
--teachers (what grade), students (how old), parents (what grade)
• List what you want them to do on your site
--Write stories. Submit comments. Rate areas. Play game.
• List the decisions you’ll need to make
--We need to increase the number of Westside participants
--Can we double the impact of the five reporters we hired with the grant in the
next year?
• Decide what metrics, site elements you need
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31. Who will do what, for whom
Residents, businesses, government officials will post content and
debate solutions for the benefit of all stakeholders in Alexandria
Types of decisions needed
How do we get more [residents] to participate?
What issues aren’t on our site that should be?
The liquor store owners are dominating the discussion boards. We
think they’re keeping the other businesses from participating. What
should we do?
Sample metrics, site elements
Behavioral: Require registration to track who’s participating, how
much? By group, track visits/unique visitor, comments posted
Attitudinal: For each group, we will need to know awareness of the
site, why they do or don’t post, problems they don’t see on the site,
what it would take to get them to participate more
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32. Who will do what, for whom
To serve Akron residents and businesses, selected citizen journalists
of all ages will get training and tools to create news stories, music,
documentaries and videos for the web and mobile devices
Types of decisions needed
In what areas do we need to provide more training and tools?
How can we help the unproductive citizen journalists to produce?
What should we do to increase the credibility of the content that’s
produced?
Sample metrics, site elements
Behavioral: Track the training/tools each citizen journalist gets vs.
what types of content and how much they produce.
Attitudinal: Need monthly meetings or surveys with citizen journalists.
For each stakeholder group, we will need to know awareness of the
site, how credible they consider the content, and do they want to
become a citizen journalist.
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33. Dana Chinn Blog
http://www.newsnumbers.com
Lecturer
chinn@usc.edu
213-821-6259
Analytics for news orgs bookmarks
http://www.delicious.com/
danachinn
Presentations
http://www.slideshare.net/
danachinn
Twitter: DanaChinn
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