I read with great interest an article in A List Apart Magazine this week. A List Apart is an online magazine dedicated to the Web design and development industry. The article is Beyond Goals: Site Search Analytics from the Bottom Up. What drew me into the article was its premise of "bottom-up" analysis.
My FORUM article and most writings on the subject of analytics focuses on the top-down approach - setting goals, implementing them and then measuring outcomes.
A shortcoming to this approach, the article suggests, is that this type of analysis only measures known goals and ignores existing user behavior. Analyzing how users interact with the site right now - before tinkering with goals - can provide surprisingly useful insight into what they actually find useful.
The article focuses on internal search engine queries as a window into user behavior, but any pattern-based analysis will do.
Take some time and review your analytics reports for answers to the following question:
What are the top entry pages?
What are the top inbound search phrases?
What are the most common click paths?
Then ask yourself "why"? Chances are, some site visitors are interacting with your site in unanticipated ways. All you need do is review the metrics with an open mind, follow the data and uncover this hidden utility. Then, you can restructure the site to take advantage of it and nudge users towards your needs.
The full article is located on A List Apart.
My FORUM article and most writings on the subject of analytics focuses on the top-down approach - setting goals, implementing them and then measuring outcomes.
A shortcoming to this approach, the article suggests, is that this type of analysis only measures known goals and ignores existing user behavior. Analyzing how users interact with the site right now - before tinkering with goals - can provide surprisingly useful insight into what they actually find useful.
The article focuses on internal search engine queries as a window into user behavior, but any pattern-based analysis will do.
Take some time and review your analytics reports for answers to the following question:
What are the top entry pages?
What are the top inbound search phrases?
What are the most common click paths?
Then ask yourself "why"? Chances are, some site visitors are interacting with your site in unanticipated ways. All you need do is review the metrics with an open mind, follow the data and uncover this hidden utility. Then, you can restructure the site to take advantage of it and nudge users towards your needs.
The full article is located on A List Apart.
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