We have a bit of a complicated relationship with Google In the SEO/inbound community. We are often the first, and loudest, to call them out when they get their priorities messed up or hoard data for questionable reasons.
But on the whole, we use more of Google's wares than probably any other industry.
At Distilled, we use Google Apps for email, calendars, document collaboration, reporting, Google+ for internal sharing discussions, Hangouts for live video, chat, and webinars. Most of our clients use Google Analytics (as we do for our own websites). Our PPC specialists have core expertise in AdWords. Our keyword research work invariably turns to the AdWords Keywords Tool for search volume estimates.
While working with our Creative team to plan a data visualization project recently, I learned about a relatively new service from Google (Consumer Surveys — see below), and it got me thinking about other Google projects that have proven to be useful for our work and those that promise to be in the future.
This guide is intended for those SEOs/inbound marketers who are familiar with the fundamental Google resources (Google Analytics, Apps, the AdWords Keywords Tool) but may not be aware of what else is out there and what is coming soon.
Analytics & Tagging
1. Universal Analytics
This is not particular to inbound at all, but it affects all disciplines of web marketing. Most online marketers have some familiarity with Google Analytics. It’s the most widely-adopted analytics platform on the web, and it's about to evolve.
Universal Analytics (in beta) is apt to change the way we use and think about marketing analytics. This successor of the Google Analytics we know will bring improved performance and, most importantly, new functionality and flexibility to your reporting.
Uses & benefits of Universal Analytics:
- Cross device tracking of individual users: We live in a multi-device world. To date, Google Analytics has not had core functionality that allowed for tracking users across all of their devices (one user is tracked as multiple "unique visits," one for each device). Universal Analytics creates a User ID for the individual and allows you to track their interactions with your site/app across their devices allowing for cross-device optimization.
- The ability to push "offline" data into the system: Using the same User ID functionality, you can tie this data to a single user — across devices and interactions — over the lifetime of their relationship with your business. While passing any "Personally Identifiable Information" into GA is strictly a violation of the Terms of Service, this doesn't mean you can't securely keep that information together on your end and (respectfully) use it to manage your customer relationships and otherwise learn who your best customers are.
- Performance enhancements: The current iteration of GA passes a lot of data to GA servers from multiple cookies. Universal Analytics (UA) uses a single, simple cookie and stores most data on GA servers. Faster pages = happier users.
- 20 custom dimensions, 20 custom metrics: You can do a lot with GA's customer variables, but this is really going to open things up. If you want to push offline and other data into your reports, these are going to come in handy.
- Set your own session and campaign expirations: Sessions can be set up to 4 hours, campaigns up to 2 years.
Justin Cutroni, one of the most well-informed analytics gurus you'll find publishing online, wrote a nice post about the potential of UA, using his local gardening supply store as a case study of sorts. It is highly recommended reading.
There is so much here that even if you don't start implementing for live campaigns yet, getting your head around the possibilities of UA (if not the measurement protocol itself) is only going to benefit you as this next iteration bridges the chasm to wide adoption.
Note: before you dive in and start using Universal Analytics on your website, keep in mind there are some things still missing: AdSense, DoubleClick, Content Experiments, and Remarketing are not yet integrated. You'll probably want to run UA tracking concurrently with your existing GA tracking. The next resource in the list will help with that.
2. Tag Manager
Again, not particular to inbound, but big enough to matter to everyone. Google Tag Manager was released in late 2012 and has seen strong growth, but many marketers are still unaware of its benefits. Google is certainly not the first entrant into the tag management space, but they may well (and quickly) become the most popular.
Mike Pantoliano wrote a solid technical overview of Tag Manager (and tag management in general) here on the Moz blog that is well worth a read.
Essentially, Tag Manager gives you central control of tracking tags firing in the <head> of any given page, without having to touch the page code itself once you've added the main container. The rules to trigger tag firing are flexible enough that the possibilities here are broad and powerful.
Uses & benefits of Tag Manager:
- Central, organized management of your tags/scripts: Targeting a given page with a rule is a lot faster than adding it via a CMS or to the source code directly.
- Cuts dev cycle bottlenecks out of the equation: No more waiting a week for your colleagues in dev to update your tracking snippets: Tag Manager takes the work off the dev team's plate, so everybody wins.
- Improved performance: Flexible firing rules allow you to load resources only on the pages that require them, cleaning up code on other pages and optimizing page loads.
While Tag Manager's benefits will be greatest for organizations with significant web operations and drawn-out dev cycles, it'll save most web marketers some time and headache, and signup/setup is relatively painless. There's a lot of flexibility here, and I expect more clever uses will emerge as the community gets comfortable with this tool.
3. Tag Assistant
If you are using (or intend to use) Tag Manager, Tag Assistant is a Google Chrome extension that will make double-checking your tag/rule configurations a lot easier.
Here's how it looks:
As above, you can quickly see the details of any tag by clicking the blue arrow to the right of its status.
Uses & benefits of Tag Assistant:
- In short, it makes checking your Tag Manager configuration a lot easier.
Market Research
4. Think Insights
Think Insights has been around for a couple of years and recently updated their site. While there is a lot of self-serving promotional material here, there is also a great deal of value.
Organized by industry, marketing objectives, and ad types, this resource includes a wealth of research studies, most of which were co-conducted with Google and partners (often research firms) to come to some data-driven conclusions on the way specific markets and demographics use the web. It also serves as an inspiration center for digital marketing campaigns, linking out to some compelling and innovative pieces.
Uses & benefits of Think Insights:
- Free, searchable access to market research studies, organized by industry, marketing objectives, and ad type
- Visualization of the most common multi-touch paths by industry with “The Customer Journey to Online Purchase"
- Inspiration for your next data visualization project with Chrome Experiments. The "500" home page alone is worth the time to click.
- There's also the Creative Sandbox gallery, showcasing creative online campaigns that "blend creative genius and digital innovation." This is skewed toward paid channels, but there are a lot of creative approaches here from which we can learn.
5. Consumer Surveys
Consumer Surveys is the only paid service in this post, but research with surveys, if you want to step outside of your customer email list, will always require an investment. Google's offering is relatively affordable at $.10 a response ($.50 if you need to target a specific demographic).
We are using Google Consumer Surveys for a client project currently at Distilled, and so far the straightforward pricing model and predictable timelines for turnaround are promising.
Matt Cutts ran a playful survey with this service to determine how many people have heard of "search engine optimization." The answer: about one out of five.
Uses & benefits of Google Consumer Surveys:
- Relatively fast turnaround
- Accurate data
- Affordable cost
Search History & Data
6. Trends
Trends is a relatively well-known but often overlooked source of historical search volume data.
Search behavior is fluid. If you work in SEO you probably rely heavily on the AdWords Keywords Tool for volume estimates. But if your campaigns are planned for the long term, Trends provides data that tells you something about how users will search in the future.
For example, here's an interesting comparison:
Note: "News headlines" (at top right) can be useful for identifying the cause behind spikes/drops in search traffic. I'd take the "Forecast" option with a sizable grain of salt.
Trends is also useful for measuring client brand recognition over time (vs. competitors), and for discovering the seasonal pattern for a given keyword throughout the year.
The new Top Charts section provides an engaging visual navigation through current trending searches. Perfect for brainstorming content angles.
Also check out the new live visualization of Hot Searches. Useful? Maybe. Entertaining? Yep.
Uses & benefits of Trends:
- View historical data for a single keyword, or compare two or more
- Discover seasonality in search volume
- Browse current trending searches
- Export to CSV for your Excel/other reports
7. Zeitgeist
Zeitgeist isn’t exactly a tool or a data set but more of an interactive recap of the year in search. You select the year (and/or country), and Google walks you through the biggest search trends and the related events around the world.
The most recent Zeitgeist for the year 2012 included a well-produced video recapping what the world searched for (and therefore experienced) in 2012:
At 15 million views, not a bad example of content done well in itself
If you’re looking for a large data source for a rich visualization, this is not the place. But Zeitgeist can be useful for brainstorming historical context and content angles.
Uses & benefits of Zeitgeist:
- Rich visual "story" experience of historical data
- Helpful for brainstorming historical content angles
- General nostalgia/inspiration (What? That counts.)
8. Public Data Explorer
Public Data Explorer is Google's portal into government and institutional data sets. While you won't find anything uniquely available here data-wise, the ability to search and browse data sets from one tool can make your research and brainstorming around data visualization concepts far more efficient.
This tool will also allow you to upload your own data sets and visualize them, which might not give you much of a share-worthy result for publishing purposes, but it is a handy way to play with the different ways to present a given data set before the dev team goes to work building the beautiful version.
Uses & benefits of Public Data Explorer:
- Search/browse many public data sets from one interface
- Upload your own data set
- Quickly switch between different chart/visualization approaches for a given data set
This is not an exhaustive list; there are no doubt some other Google applications and features you use for marketing (Related Searches, Ngram Viewer, etc). I am sure I have also missed some uses and benefits of the resources included here. Please share your favorites in the comments!
Good Stuff Mike, You provide nice info !
Most Google tags are checked including Google Analytics, Adwords Conversion Tracking, Google Tag Manager and more.
Great list .. thanks..
Not sure if this is an under-appreciated tool - I often use Global Markets to find markets for a product overseas. It automatically translates your keywords and returns the opportunity score based on broad matches.
Just enter your keywords, select the global market you want the data for (e.g. - G20, Africa, Emerging Markets etc. ) and that's it..
Read more here - https://support.google.com/globalmarketfinder/
Try it out here - https://translate.google.com/globalmarketfinder/index.html?locale=en
Great tool - thanks for sharing!
Hi Mike,
Thanks for this, I didn't know about most of these tools and appreciate you taking the time and effort to explain the possible uses. Cross device tracking in GA seems like a game-changer, it'll be interesting to see how that affects the data.
Thanks,
Sarah
Thanks Mike! That Tag Assistant extension is super useful. A nice quick way to see what tracking codes are in place. Can't wait to also use the Consumer Surveys service on my next content initiative!
High five for introducing me to Tag Assistant! I've been slowly ramping up my GTM use, but up until now had been relying on real data to verify it was working as intended (it's not the most straight-forward, or well documented tool.)
Glad you found something useful here! Tag Assistant is a time saver for sure. And yeah, the lack of documentation around GTM is frustrating. It has been a "here it is, figure it out" kind of release to this point. Hopefully some documentation is on its way.
Thanks, Knew about some of these, but others are new to me. Im really excited for the new Google Analytics platform you were talking about in #1 that seems like it could be an extremely powerful tool!
Hi Mike,
Google Trends is amazing, It shows how search query impacted time to time. I knew only 2-3 resources before this post.
Awesome post..... I only know about 3 resources out of 8. so you can imagine how useful this article for me.
I particularly happy to know about Think Insights and Public Data Explorer for Marketing Research & Data Research.
Thank You Once Again Mike for this wonderful post.
Thanks & Regards
Vipul Makwana
I cannot believe nobody mentioned Google+ Ripples Data Visualization. It is a sick tool that shows you who is sharing and re-sharing your posts most often. This is an excellent way to find the influencers in your community and how your audience is reacting to the content that you're publishing.
+1 on that, it occurred to me at some point along the way but never made it into the final list.
Google Big Query and Google Predictions. Some Nice Toys
You will be surprised but I meet many website owners who are unaware of even Google Webmaster Tools. I try to recommend such people to must have GWT for their websites, a free service from Google to effectively manage your website and keep it neat and clean (on-page and off-page, both ways). One of my favorite tools from Google.
Agreed, WMT is useful and definitely flies below the radar of most website owners. I'm not crazy about their misleading search impression/click data, though.
I knew something was not right with my search data on WMT. Phew, its not me, its WMT! I had not seen that post. Thanks!
Mike, could you put together a guide on getting the most out of WMT? Our team has used it some but I feel like we are barely scratching the surface. I think a guide like this would be a great resource that would stand the test of time... Unless there is already one out there you'd recommend?
Yeah, somehow you are right, I also meet some experts who doesn't know how they can Google webmaster tool effectively. If you want to enhance your skill then you should learn otherwise you vanish from industry.
Some more:
Google Big QueryGoogle BigQuery — Google Developers
Google Prediction Api https://developers.google.com/prediction/?hl=es
They are really nice toys ;)
Hey Mike, I didn't know about most of these tools and appreciate you taking the time and effort to explain the possible uses. But I appreciate that "goldenfs" has noted about Google+ Ripples Data Visualization. Thanks for sharing its a bit of information.
Sounds Good.. Thanks for sharing your ideas. Hope this will help me lot. Among those Google Trends is a good tool to know more about a keyword historical data.
Passed the Think Insights report on to our paid search department and we are discussing the tag manager for our site. Thanks for the heads up and the informative post Mike!
I am thrilled after getting this post. To be very honest, i was aware only about 4 resources out of 8 and i was totally shocked that - Oh My God there are more resources available and i am not aware about that. You have no idea that how much i am happy to get such an effective post.
Great info in this post, thanks a lot for that.
Hi Mike! You really bring wonderful tools in front of the maze community but also for the other visitors who want to know about the SEO tools and tricks. Google webmaster tools and google analytics are the most popular google tools regarding SEO but you share the other most effective tools which can make our work easier .I like most the universal analytics and Google Trends tools.
Bookmarking this. Definitely going to look into these that I haven't used before. Google has so many resources out there, its difficult to keep track.
Thanks for this!
Great post! It's tough to keep up with Google and the many different resources that we have available from them so your overview was really helpful in letting us know not only what is available, but what it does. I'm definitely excited to give a few of these a try!
The rock I've been living under is apparently pretty huge because I've been unaware of the majority of these resources. But Google Trends? How I love me some Google Trends... Great post!
I didn't realize that there were so many available resources from Google. Google continues to amaze me. I will definitely use these resources.
I Failed to register for "Think Insights" ,due to some error from GOOGLE guys,rest of all looks good,thanks for the nice article Mike
So for the user tracking in UA, will that be similar to what HubSpot is offering in their analytics where you can track a company and see what pages they are viewing and how often they come back to your website?
Can't say I'm terribly familiar with Hubspot's analytics offerings at this point - played around with an earlier version of their software, but I imagine they've come a ways since then (about 3 years ago).
Unless the company is opting in or otherwise providing their info, sounds like what Hubspot may be doing is identifying them by network. GA has been able to do this for a while. DemandBase has developed some impressive network ID analytics tools.
Reading through this page on "Prospects," sounds to me like they're relying on the user's network to ID the company. Been around a while, and not the same concept. Also doesn't work for the vast majority of users who'll be browsing from a major ISP. With UA, you'll need a method to set the User ID properly across their devices (some kind of login most likely).
We just used google consumer survey to run a test for conversion on CTR. The results are great and fast. I will create a post about it to share the data with the community.
Sounds interesting, would love to read that post.
Smart, useful post!
I am with Praveen that Google webmaster tools is often an underutilized tool that while not new it is always a favourite mention.
Thanks for sharing.
Scott
I personally enjoy using a simple, but effective time management tool by gmail. It is the gmail task manager tool.
Use it myself!
I'm glad Universal Analytics lets you track across devices. Search doesn't happen on one platform anymore. I might start looking for something on my phone or tablet, but actually make the final purchase on a PC. Does that mean PC converts better than mobile? Not necessarily! Having the ability to follow a user across their devices will give you a much better and clearer big picture.
It is the transition from the traditional search query to a search session. I agree with you Nick that there is really no distinction between the devices and it is hard to determine, or steer, your potential customers to any preferred device. So, your content should function on all platforms and the ability to track users from multiple devices is the key to usable data. This is the only way to get a true picture of the actions (search) that resulted in a conversion.
@MikeTek, the mentioned all information is one of the valuable assets for me. I really appreciate for sharing this post especially about “Tag Manager” and “Public Data Explore”. I grabbed the lots knowledge over here.
Looking forward to learning from you...:)
Nice article Mike and great insights. I really agree with the part you mention in the beginning about the fact that every time Google does something we're the first to comment on it (bitch about it) and using all of the different Google services and products we also should entice what Google is offering. Don't you?
Google can't make the web a better place on its own, the need us, the inbound/internet/web marketeers to test out everything they've changed. They throw up to ball but we need to hit it so they can catch it and trow it up again.
Without us doing what we do Google wouldn't know what does and what doesn't work. I wouldn't go as far as stating that Google is depending on us, internet marketeers but we also do play a large roll in the entire picture.
The services Google offers, most of them, are great. Somethings could be improved, others should be left the same for a while (like analytics, this is the 7th or 8th interface in 4 years?) but the bottom line is that the internet is improving and Google is making things better for everyone (I do feel that way). Number 7 and 8 were unknown to me but Google Insights is a great tool. I used it a lot in the past gathering information about almost every subject for a website.
The costumer surveys service from Google is a need little tool but they could still improve the tool. The funny thing is every time some company starts a product/service that becomes a bigger success Google follows it's example. I'm just wondering how long it will be before we can welcome Google Moz ?? Wouldn't that be something special..:-)
I'm going to check out the services mentioned by you that I didn't know. Again, great post nice insights.
Regards
Jarno
Awesome! i didn't know about one or two of these. We use Google Apps, and are huge supporters of Google's services all around. I don't know what we would do without them.
Your post provided some good tools that I have not used before, namely Zeitgeist and Public Data Explorer. It is interesting how Google has been adapting their products and services lately. Personally, I think they are moving to a business model focused mainly on revenue generation and the availability of their free products is on the way out. Anybody agree? Disagree?
Nice post! Actually I'm using all kind of Google tools as Marketing resources: Google Calendar to organize, Google+ to share new content, YouTube to upload corporate videos, Google Places for local SEO, Google Alerts to see who is talking about a company...
Google makes my life easier :)
"Consumer surveys" have really competitive rates! Thanks for the post.
That's a nice an informative article. Thanks.
Great article.
Hi,
Thanks for nice post. I like your article with example img..thanks.