I noticed some months ago that SEOmoz was having more and more web analytics/conversion rate related post, so I decided to give it a shot and talk about segmenting your traffic data in order to have a better understanding of your traffic. For this post I only use the Advanced Segments Tool from Google Analytics.
Segmenting by location:
I used to work for a website who was selling services to UK people exclusively. When I started there they were driving exclusively organic traffic, and the overall landing page conversion rate was as good as expected. So I started to segment the data by location and checked UK conversion rate against overall conversion rate.
In fact the conversion rate of our target country was more than decent, and the reason our overall conversion rate seemed low was due to the mass traffic coming from other location (in this case coming from US). Unfortunately, we had nothing to offer them L. The solution was to drive more UK traffic and sort some SEO problem in fact. (For the story, Google did not understand we were a UK site: .com TLD, server in California, and Google Webmaster tools not yet implemented). Without looking at the UK segment exclusively, we would have taken the wrong business decision.
Segmenting by keywords:
This one is quite obvious for most of the SEOmoz community I guess. Adwords is probably the most transparent ad network, and you can easily see which keyword converts, which one does not. The ROI is quite straight forward to measure.
Internal Search is quite interesting to segment as well: It is very important to understand which visitors use internal Search, and if those people convert more than average! Very easy to set up on Google Analytics.
Quite insightful, isn’t it? The conversion rate is 5-6 times higher for visits with Site Search than visits without Site Search!
Content Segmentation (very useful for Linbait analysis)
Let’s say you made very good linkbait content which went viral and gave you a lot of inbound links. As everyone knows, the SEO benefit is amazing, but did the post on its own lead to conversions? Did visitors signed up to your blog or Newsletter after finding out about your site? How could we measure this! Well, nothing easier. You can easily segment your data to show only visits and visitors which had your linkbait page as an entry page.
That way you can quickly appreciate the value of your linkbait (excluding the SEO benefit). I have a small online marketing blog where I wrote a post on how to track spiders with Google Analytics some times ago, and I can see very easily with that kind of segment what the visitors did after reading that, and where they were coming from.
Segmenting by Visitor behaviour:
I love this one as it gives you very good insights and reveal a lot on how your site perform. For example I have an e-commerce website which has a conversion funnel of 5 pages. In that case, we can consider that a visit with 5 page views is an “engaged visit”. It is very important to see how those visits behave on your site, against the overall traffic.
The number of Page Views depends on what you want to measure, and which industry you’re on.That sort of segments are very good indicators to measure the engagement of your site. In the example above, we can clearly see that there is a lot of room for improvement.
I only described 4 ways here to segment your data (which I hope you enjoyed). There are so many other ways to get insights with segmentation. You can for example have more than 1 dimension in your segment: Example: I want to see only visits coming from UK, with more than 15 pages views, which stayed on site less than 6 minutes (tricky isn't it?)
Segmentation is a wonderful topic which leads to another huge subject in web analytics: Key Performance Indicators. That will be my next post if that one is published (I’m thinking of a KPI Cheat Sheet). In the mean time, I would love to have your feedback and here about your experiences with segmentation.
Nice post, I've been using Analytics for less than a year and still haven't got to grips with it fully. Thank you for the insight!
Thanks Traxor. Analytics is a very wide topic indeed.
You're welcome. From what I've learnt so far it's a very advanced tool that will take me years to master and, even then, I won't be as good as most of these people online.
Thanks for the informative post.
@traxor one thing I was told or heard (forgot which) was that you don't necessarily need to be a Google Analytics master to get a great deal of value out of it. For each site there is a different goal and that goal requires the SEO professional/site owner to look at a unique set of metrics.
What you need to do (IMO) is figure out what your overall goal or goals is, and then figure out which metrics will allow you to track and measure that. You may find that there are tools or reports in GA that you just don't use, while others you use all the time.
Ah okay, thank you for the advice. I'm sure one day I will have explored all parts of analytics but until then I'll just stick to what I know I guess :-).
I really liked this post. It's great when members of the community share information all of us can benefit from. I too am sometimes overwhelmed by the information provided within analytics tools. I think Google Analytics is a great resource especially in the current economy where many client's are looking to minimize expenses. Thank you for a great post.
my only grudge with google analytics is the limited number of goals you can set up
Since the new release a few days ago, you can actually set up 20 conversion goals per profile, instead of only 4.
20 is quite big now, so it should not be a problem any more :-)
I agree with you on that
Great Analytics post! IMO it seems that marketing campaign accountability is lacking from most marketers vocabulary. The more in depth the industry becomes, the more SEO wannabes will disappear!
@Edobb, interesting remark... But I don't think that the presence of, or competition between, a lot of SEO consultants is a problem. On the contrary even: the more the SEO industry faces internal competition, the more professional the industry will become, and that's a very good thing IMO.
Measuring SEO results through CTR / segmentation / KPI analysis is one aspect. The usage of better tooling for SEO purposes in general is another.
A shake-out on less professional SEO parties is more likely through the use of such result metrics and tools.
Cheers! ;-)
Nice examples. Segmentation is incredibly powerful stuff and often under-utilized.
Personally, I do a lot of segmentation based on New vs. Returning visitors. You can learn a lot about customer loyalty and overall usability by sorting out the differences between those two group.
@Dr. Pete - Not to go off on too much of a tangent, but with New vs Returning visitors do you feel that having too much of one or the other is bad? Meaning if the majority of your visitors are new, does that mean your site is not keeping people interested? Or if they are all returning does that mean you're not able to attract new visitors?
I'm assuming this largely depends on your market and site, but am interested to hear your thought.
This is something I look at a lot through the KPI "Repeat Visitor Share":
 (Returning Visitors / Total Visitors) * 100
As You said, it completely depends on your industry. Usually, you want that rate as high as possible, because most of the time you want people to come back on your website. You must be very careful with the time period you select though, depending on your industry.
For example the "help" section of your website should have a repeat visitor share as low as possible otherwise, if it's too high it  means your clients struggle with the services or products you offer, as they come back often to find answers to their questions.
I find a lot of variation and, like any metric, you have to be aware of the underlying causality. For instance, I had a client who shifted strongly towards new visitors, but it was because we had launched a large-scale SEO campaign, so the shift was a good thing (they were gaining traffic, not losing loyalty). Of course over time, we worked to shift that percentage back - creating more return visitors.
@Dr. Pete and @philou2803 - thanks for the feedback. This is what I was assuming and the premise I go on, but it's always good to hear what other people have to say.
I agree with Dr. Pete -- probably the most frequent segmentation I do is new visits vs. returning.
Think of it this way --Â "new" visits over time shows whether you're making progress or losing ground with your awareness-building efforts (link-building, paid search, PR, social, etc.).
As for "returning" visits...for e-commerce sites, this is a critical measure, since returning customers can make or break you. For b-to-b sites, it typically takes several visits before a visitor will buy something, or even to request a sales call. For publishers, this is a key indicator of customer satisfaction.
So segmenting visits into new and returning is much, much more useful than looking at total visits.Â
Great post. Segments in Google Analytics is something that I've just started using with my current company and it's amazing what can be done.
I think posts like this are really valubale in that they give real world examples of what can be done and how to view that data. I hope you continue with posts like these, and perhaps do a little series, I'm sure you'll get a lot of feedback.
Thank you for your feedback. I'm thinking of writing some more indeed, especially since Google released new tools and functions last week. We can finally have much more complex goal settings now, and it's becoming very handy to measure engagement.
I'm still amazed by the number of websites still obsessed with just improving visits without any segmentation. I see it all the time, and it's extraordinarily short-sighted.
Wow, this really put some more value to our analytics effort.
Im gonna use this on our biggest customers right away
So if your conversion rate is higher with people who use your internal search, do you think that is because they are more motivated buyers, your information is not properly organize thus making it hard to find or if you increased the amount of traffic that searches your site you would also increase conversions.
If the later holds true then you should optimize your site search. For example placing it in the right hand corner on all pages and using the term "Search" in stead of "Go".
I would also use A + B testing to determine if other changes to site search size, color or having the word "search" in the field as well as the button makes a difference in the amount of searches taken place or if it increases your conversions.
In fact the segmentation between visits with Site Search and the one without site search need to be deeply looked at. I don't think think this is actionable enough at this stage, but definitely insightful enough to dedicate some A/B testing indeed.
Great Article..
 I have been using this for a while and it has really helped me...
A good report to see which pages need optimization is the landing pages report, sorted by bounce rate. If you are getting decent traffic to particular pages with a higher than average bounce rate on those pages, they require your attention asap.
I also like to segment new vs returning visitors as well, it gives you a look into how your loyal visitors use the site vs the new. Should you be spending more time optimizing your site for your loyal visitors or do you want to know why those new visitors are bouncing?
I have only used Analytics in a general way over the years, but we now have someone on our team totally dedicated to analytics and conversions. It is amazing how deep this tool really is. I just saw a report today, that had totally new data on it. I will be sure our "analytics guy" sees this post. Well done as always on SEOmoz.
Awesome post, it makes me all excited about Web Analytics again.
 One thing troubling me at the moment is the raging Omniture vs Google Analytics debate going on at my work - I've asked the main Omniture defenders to try and duplicate the analysis you did iusing GA's advanced segmentation tools. Let's see what they come back with and if Omniture can match GA head to head.
As a Google Analytics fan, it's not going to be easy to be unbiased...
Hi, is that possible to send me the article by private message ? I can't see the pictures, thanks
Google web analytics is a very vast topic, you need to have deep knoweldge and very clear basic knowledge. Advance segmentation lets us refine and gather more visitor and website traffic related information. I have also tried one for my in-house project. Really works and offers great value for the website.
So glad to hear your idea of the SEO KPI Cheat Sheet. I've been in the trenches with our team here for awhile and we've realized that we need to lift our heads, take a step back and look around. We were just talking about what are the KPI's that we should be tracking on a regular basis, what they can tell us, appropriate time frames to measure, etc. Would love to hear people's ideas re: what they've used.
This is helpful just to see how others are segmenting with their analytics. I still don't have a handle on all of the things I can do with Google Analytics. Thanks.
Great post.. i am working with analytics for some time and this post encourages me to really get into advanced segmentation..
Very interesting information...I find the section with > 5 page views very useful.
Number of Page Views and Time On Site are the best for behaviour segmentation.
If you start to play with it, you'll never stop: it is very addictive ;-) and very insightful.
Really useful post and gave me some ideas I will use with GAnalytics.
I use a lot segmentation tool too for a hosting and internet service firm in Spain, in order to check out exactly which ones of the many products results in better conversion.
I cross those infos with conversion rate for keyword in Adwords, so I can relate the better keyword (also for SEO purpose) with the better page/products...Â
This kind of information is the one the Marketing VPs love ;)
Segmenation is one aspect you can never have enough of. More ideas, please! It is just mindboggling how effective and powerful this feature is!
I could have add more things but the possibilities to segment your data is just endless! I could do another post though with more advanced segmentations.
That would be a great second post, I'd definitely read it.
Yes please do!
Yes, more with segmentation. Because of the very specific locations of our properties, I am learning about some different search patterns versus a blanket national campaign.
Thanks allot! I have so much to learn with analitics. Keep em comming.
im still learning all the things you can do with analytics so this is great information thanks for the post. i wouldn't be surprised if it gets promoted
so if a post gets promoted then it doesn't get a whole new list of comments... just something i noticed
That makes sense I think.
yes, i also learning alot about site data analytics, target traffic is too impotant !
Wow, I've totally been under-utilizing Google Analytics, but your analysis has got me curious.
Think it might be time to jump back in. Unfortunately, IMHO, Google isn't very forthcoming on how to evaluate the metrics it provides. It was your analysis of the data that created value that could be developed into a marketing plan.
So question: has anyone seen a book that provides this kind of creative analysis using Google's Webmaster Central tool box? I Googled it but just found the usual cr@pfest of e-book downloads.
Man, if this isn't a writing opp, I don't know what is.
Thanks for the eye-opening post. Even more, thanks for a good book topic. Hmmmm...
Paul
"Google isn't very forthcoming on how to evaluate the metrics it provides. It was your analysis of the data that created value".
This is not very new. A web analytics software never give you an action plan or deep analysis, it just gives the data. Avinash Kaushik (web analytics guru) made 90/10 rule some time ago which is when you spend 10 in web analytic tools, you should spend 90 in human brain to analyse the data and make it actionable.Â
I highly recommend Avinash Kaushik. He's a GA Black Belt. His site is:
https://www.kaushik.net/avinash
and he wrote an excellent book: Web Analytics An Hour A Day.
He has a terrific sense of humour and some really meaty blog posts.
He also wrote a new book, just been released:
Web Analytics 2.0: https://www.amazon.co.uk/Web-Analytics-2-0-Accountability-Centricity/dp/0470529393/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1257183539&sr=8-2
Just received it!
Thanks philou2803. I didn't know that. I'm off to Amazon.com.
Issues, like the UK conversion rates, illustrate the need to properly build your funnels/segments to look at the world that matters to you and the items that impact those funnels.
$ Index is another way to evaluate pages in the conversion process. If you want more information about how $ Index works, check out this link: https://www.google.com/support/googleanalytics/bin/answer.py?hl=en&answer=86205
 I'm a huge fan of Google Analytics and thought that this blog post was great!
 (edited for clarification)
That's a very interesting metric Nick! I've never used it the $ Index before, but your link tells a lot. Tell me if I'm wrong, but it basically tells how much credit we should give to a certain page in the conversion path?
$ Index allows you to determine which pages are most frequently viewed prior to a conversion, and which pages are generally not part of the conversion process. I think that my first description may have been a bit misleading in that $ Index doesn't really assign credit in the way that you mentioned (please correct me if I'm wrong here).
Here's a really useful link that explains it better than I ever could: https://services.google.com/analytics/breeze/en/interpreting_reports_revenue/index.html
To go directly to $ Index, click on slide 6.
Great stuff, Philou
Very insightful way to segment the data, and differentiate the performance and customer behaviors.
Thanks a lot.
ah awesome i love any post that helps explain some of the more advanced features and possible benefits for seo.
Still not enough websites are using web analytics and should be!
I use webmaster tools but have never seen the segmenting option as pertainent to my site. I'm wrong I see, I can learn much from the keyword segmenting.
Thanks!
Great article! Good to see Seomoz is putting more focus on tracking and web analytics. It's becoming more and more useful to SEO and the overall internet marketing strategy!
Cheers
" It's becoming more and more useful to SEO and the overall internet marketing strategy! "
Lol.. what good is SEO without some sort of traffic analytics?
Tracking has and always will be the most important aspect of proper marketing with any sort of budget. After all, how would anyone be able to tell if what tactics/tools they are using actually work?
I totally agree with you. In fact in any new things you want to try from an acquisition point of view, the first question should be:
"How am I going to track this?"
Tracking is key factor for success.
exactly, at this level its similar to DM but with even more accurate tracking