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If you haven’t yet started using a data-driven approach for your content marketing strategy, now is the time to start. Instead of guessing which content readers enjoy and having only a vague idea – if any – of how readers are interacting with your content, you’ll be able to see the data and make your own conclusions. That’s why many content marketers are now exploring the various ways that Google Analytics can help them become more effective in reaching their end goals – whether it’s signing up more subscribers or just having people spend more time on their site.
Understand which content is resonating with your readers
First and foremost, a solution like Google Analytics can help you understand which content on your site is most popular. As a general rule of thumb, content marketing follows the 80/20 rule – 20% of your content is driving 80% of the traffic, interactions, and social shares. But which 20%?
That’s where Google Analytics comes into the picture. Google Analytics enables you to see a list of blog posts (or other content types) sorted by traffic volume. Once you see which pieces of content are performing the best, that’s when you can start to recognize long-term trends. This will also give you good ideas about what sorts of content should be appearing in your weekly email newsletters to customer, or what types of content can be repurposed for upcoming corporate events. For example, if you discover a specific blog post went viral, you might think about turning that blog post into a 1-pager that can be distributed to potential customers at an upcoming conference or trade show exhibition.
Find out which types of content are leading to conversions
At the end of the day, content marketing is all about conversions. You are trying to “convert” a website user to take a certain action. That might be signing up for an email newsletter or simply watching a new product video. Well, with Google Analytics, you can use the “Goals” option to drill down on which posts are actually converting users. This is will give you a good idea of how to boost conversions in the future. For example, you might discover that infographics are a particularly powerful way to convert users. In the future, then, you might focus more of your efforts on creating compelling infographics.
See if your content is optimized for mobile
In today’s digital marketing environment, the name of the game is mobile. Chances are, as much as 50% of the traffic coming to your website is from mobile users. With Google Analytics, you can look at the different traffic patterns coming from desktop and mobile, and make some key assessments about how to up your content marketing game. For example, if you discover that web users coming from the desktop spend 3-4 minutes on your website, but web users coming from mobile only spend 30 seconds on your website, that might be a very clear indication that your website design is simply not optimized for mobile.
Content marketers already know the power of stories to engage customers. Well, data also tells powerful stories. By using a tool like Google Analytics, you’ll be much more informed about the stories that matter to you – what content people enjoy, which content is doing all the heavy lifting when it comes to conversions, and whether or not your content is engaging for mobile users.
