All posts in website analytics

‘Build websites for users, not search engines’ is the advice continually propounded by insiders at Google. As SEOs, we’re used to looking at websites and analysing how they would be viewed by a search engine. In actual fact, though, there’s a fairly big overlap between what’s helpful for a user and what’s helpful for a search engine, and the user and search engine experiences can often mirror each other. That means that it’s often worth carrying out user testing research in the initial stages of your SEO project to gain valuable insights into how real visitors view and use your site.

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It’s this time of year again! In the previous years my web trends lists were very successful, both as predictions and by traffic or number of shares.

People working in the web industries want to know what’s ahead.

So for 2012 I want to tell you again what’s coming up. Basically I’m not predicting anything here; instead I just list trends you can already see and measure, but which will be obvious next year.

(not provided)

While the search industry has been all abuzz with the bad news of Google SSL search, most average people might not even understand what happened. They may wonder “why is (not provided) my most popular keyword in Google Analytics?” (Other analytics solutions might not even show up this data at all). Also:  how can you fix it?

First off, I want to explain in simple terms what happened. I tried to explain it to my wife recently and she didn’t understand at once. So this is the version she could fathom easily:  Google hides the keywords people use to find your site from now on, or at least a significant part of them. All these hidden keywords are tagged as ‘(not provided)’ in Google Analytics.

On SEOptimise currently (the first week of November) 14,7% of Google search visitors had no keyword sent with its referrer.

The referrer is the page address where they came from. On my own blog, SEO 2.0, the number was even higher, with 16,27% of Google visitors. Also, (not provided) is the most popular “keyword” on both blogs.

Whose referral data gets hidden? All users logged in to Google services get redirected to SSL search now by default.

So all these people hide the keywords they use from the sites they visit. Google and thus the CIA, MI5 or any other secret service can still access these data for at least 18 months.

As an SEO it is essential to report on the metrics that will show the progression of the project that you are working on.

These reports need to provide the client and yourself with actionable information, whilst also being able to outline your KPIs clearly. All reports should ideally include metrics from both on-site and off-site activity, providing the client with a clear understanding of what improvement has been made.

SEO reporting metrics
Image by seoinc

Multiple Choice Exam*

If you want to become qualified in Google Analytics, Google offer an online exam called the Google Analytics Individual Qualification.  It’s a useful qualification to have when working with Google Analytics on your clients’ sites (and you should be using some analytics software!).

I passed the test last week and thought I’d put together a few tips for anyone else who may be thinking of taking the exam.

In recent weeks I have set up Google Webmaster Tools for a number of different clients, some of whom wanted some documentation on how this could be done.

Based on that document I have decided to publish this very basic beginner’s guide for those who are unfamiliar with the set up process of Google Webmaster Tools.

What is Google Webmaster Tools?
Google Webmaster Tools (GWT) is a free and easy way for webmasters to view their own website the way that Google sees it. GWT is a free tool that can be used for websites of all sizes, and features information such as:

  • Which of your pages are included in Google’s Index
  • Any errors encountered while crawling your site
  • Search queries that list your site as a result
  • Which sites link to yours
  • And more

This guide covers how to set up GWT in seven easy steps, from creating an account to adding and deleting users and associating your Google Analytics.

Everybody is talking about content farms as if they were the only type of sites hit by the latest large Google update. That’s a very limited viewpoint.

One of the most striking effects of the UK version of Google’s quality update dubbed Panda has been the huge losses by shopping search engines and review sites that focus on price comparison. Not all such services have lost though.

Piwi goals

It’s not only the black hat and the paranoid who are increasingly wary of Google’s privacy issues. Google Analytics has come under attack repeatedly in Europe. Recently, German government officials even threatened to ​declare Google Analytics illegal.

While I consider Google Analytics a minor threat to privacy compared to other Google products and services (like Doubleclick, Google toolbar or Google Chrome), I think there is still room for improvement.

These and other reasons made me revisit Piwik, the open source, self-hosted Google Analytics alternative.

It’s a German project on top of that, so the solution is already there. I was testing Piwik two years ago in an early beta stage. Now it’s available in version 1.1.1 and already it’s quite a powerful web analytics solution.

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Do you measure keyword temperature to improve your SEO? You don’t? Well what about keyword density? Also there are other exotic metrics​ to fool you into believing you do something for your site’s SEO. Sounds weird? Then read on. The story starts like this:

In recent days I’ve been haunted by the ghastly specters of the past.

In several cases I’ve had to do with metrics long gone or which weren’t ever meaningful in the first place. There seems to be a need for simplistic metrics that can make complex issues appear straightforward and clear.

Image by Westside Shooter.

Google Instant is the talk of the town not only in the SEO industry. While some people still hope SEO will go away most experts agree that SEO is either just changing a bit or now more important than ever due to the recent changes. So I won’t list most of the usual “SEO is not dead” posts here as I expect you to know that. I’ll focus on what the instant search results will mean for SEO, SEM and analytics in reality.

Check out the following 40 Google Instant SEO, SEM & analytics resources list. Btw. The last item is probably the best one.

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