Your business’s place in cyberspace

What small businesses should know about measuring their digital performance

If your business has a website, maintains a social media presence and uses online marketing campaigns, it’s important that you take full advantage of all data regarding traffic, click-through rates and purchases. This information will help you retain your current clients and attract new ones. Here are a few types of data to help you make sense of your digital performance.

UNIQUE VISITORS

Calculating the number of unique visitors your website gets, on which pages they spend time and the geographical location where they reside provides you with critical information with which to evaluate your current marketing strategies.

You can also determine whether visitors found your website through a search engine or a social media website. This is valuable information you can use to craft more targeted campaigns.

CLICK-THROUGH AND BOUNCE RATES

Tracking the number of clicks per visitor and how long they spend on each of your website’s pages can tell you a lot about its quality. If visitors tend to leave quickly, it may be time to think about a redesign. Similarly, if they never seem to visit important pages, or any page past the homepage, a revision of the site or of your marketing strategy may be in order.

SURVEY RESULTS

Tracking customer satisfaction through survey results is a good way to identify your platform’s strengths and weaknesses. If you have an e-commerce component, you can also identify popular products. This will help you define effective marketing strategies to attract new customers and retain current ones. To get the most out of your online presence, determine which indicators are the most relevant to your business. There’s a lot of data out there and using it could help you more than you realize.

For tips and practical resources to enhance your online performance, visit bdc.ca.