by flemo on September 1, 2010
There may be an occasion where you have text or a logo or hotbutton on your website or a client website and you’re curious as to how many folks are clicking on it before leaving your website. Normally it’s not going to show up on your analytics and you possibly don’t want to go and add more complexity to your setup by installing a script or additional software but by modifying your links you can add some additional data for a campaign or simply assuage your curiosity.
OnClick Google Analytics Link Adjustment
Let’s have a look at our website Dinkum Interactive which offers an image link back to our Twitter account. We are limited in tracking the number of folks who sign up to our twitter account but where they come from remains a mystery. At the very least, we would like to see who is heading to twitter from our website via a button on our home page. Not very interesting but for the sake of an example, right now the code looks something like:
<a href=”http://www.twitter.com/mydinkum”><img src=”images/twittericon.png” alt=”twitter icon” width=”83″ height=”76″ /></a>
So the first part of that link is the destination, the second part is the source of the image file. We are mostly concerned with the first part which we will adjust to accommodate for the onclick and will look something like this:
<a onclick=”javascript:pagetracker._trackPageview (‘/outgoing/www.twitter.com’);” href=”http://www.twitter.com/mydinkum” target=”_blank”></a>
Then we would combine that with the image source code <img src=”images/twittericon.png” alt=”twitter icon” width=”83″ height=”76″ /> to give you your final link.
I use ‘outgoing’ but I know others use different names for that, plus I believe you can pretty much use anything to tag the outgoing URL landing page, you just need to be able to remember it when you’re checking your data which is why I like to keep consistent with it.
Checking Your Data
Now you’re going to have to head over to your Google Analytics account and make your way to the Content Section:
You will then go to Top Content which will display a list of your most popular pages.
Below this list will be a Filter option. Type in the relevant word here. I’ll use “outgoing” but I could also do www.twitter.com if i wanted.
This will reveal the details of visitors who have clicked on our link or logo or a hotbutton…or for you, whatever you have decided to track.
There may be occasions where something like this will come in handy, particularly if you are working with other websites who don’t have any form of analytics installed. You may need to let them know how generous you are and there’s nothing like hard and fast data to back you up.
by flemo on August 23, 2010
Think about how much information is floating around the www. News websites, blogs, magazines, videos, photos and audio fills up our online activities and are, more often than not, destinations that drive our online activities. So while you’re busy focussing on how that button on your website looks or what your current keyword ranking is maybe you should be paying a little more attention to how you can contribute to this bevy of information that is being indexed by our Googlebot friend or shared with people’s networks via twitter or facebook. If you also assume that folks aren’t out there looking for your product or service then maybe your business model is flawed (or your confidence is low) because on the Web, there are millions of people out there looking for something. I’ve personally been amazed by some of our clients who have products so unique that i was blown away purely by the search data so I don’t question these things any more. So where do you start? For some, a blog is good foundation and one that offers the greatest control. But it’s not really about control, it’s about getting out there. It’s about sharing.
Articles – chances are you may already have some of these floating around but if not, get going. A strong article talking about your services, distributed through the many article websites can be an effective weapon in your arsenal. Depending on what you’re offering, sometimes a single interested web surfer who seeks to take action on that article can demonstrate a significant return.
Video – people love videos, just look at the popularity of YouTube.com. While there are certain elements people look for in an online video, simply touting your wares or even yourself can be a powerful differentiator and yet another way for folks to find you.
Press Releases – the web is filled with these bad boys (a little saturated sometimes) but again, if you have something to say, don’t rule out the power of a good press release to share your news. For some it can be an announcement of a newly designed website. For others, it can be a truly newsworthy announcement that should be shared with the world. Whatever the reason, getting it out there is a good start which may continue through Google Alerts, a blogger picking it up and posting it on their website, someone tweeting it or Buzzing or adding it to Digg or the thousands of other community sharing opportunities.
Guest Blogging – leveraging the power of an existing blogger with a built-in community is a great way to get your message out. Chances are the bloggers will also appreciate the extra input.
If you’re afraid to share your ‘trade secrets’, you’ll most likely be scooped by someone else sharing their (your) ‘trade secrets’. If you’re not a good writer, get one. If you’re afraid of diluting or damaging your brand, spend a bit of time and money doing it right.
As always, time is a factor but there are ways to overcome this obstacle either by getting help or shifting a few things around to make the time. Getting proactive with your content is a surefire way to start or continue building your online foundation, often with some nice side effects (like SEO for example). I’ve been swayed into making purchase decisions by a well written article so don’t think that others wouldn’t.
by flemo on July 22, 2010
I’ve been hearing a lot of business owners griping about review websites like Yelp (you should know my opinion of those jokers) and the slew of others. Foursquare offers the ability to post comments about a place you visit (or don’t visit). Target also offers the ability to rate and comment in fact, I would suggest that most large retailers offer the opportunity to have your say. So business owners see these and if there’s a negative one, will freak out and try everything they can to get rid of it or satisfy that complainer with a coupon or something. I have a feeling though, that’s it’s probably not a good idea to do either (handing out coupons for negative reviews may well generate more negative reviews).
Most savvy Internet users are quite aware of the percentages when it comes to reviews. First of all, they know that there is no way to qualify these individuals (unless they follow them) so taking the opinion of Debbie Downer will probably have you going nowhere. Secondly, many competitors have taken to slamming their competition on these places, again without qualification other than they are competitors. Third, a lot of people are idiots, especially online. Back in the day it was comments on Digg and now it’s YouTube but essentially you get the sense that under the veil of anonymity, people are pretty content blurting out without much thought.
What you should be looking at though are the percentages. If you’re seeing a couple of poor service reviews out of several hundred, chances are these folks were either Debbie’s or just got unlucky. It’s probably not going be a worthwhile exercise criticizing your staff based on those percentages as it will most likely not sway a persons opinion about trying your place. Generally if you get enough reviews, even your competitors won’t be able to keep up posting negative ones on your listings and while I have suggested that ‘a lot’ people are idiots, it actually only feels that way and more often than not, these folks are the minority and most are reasonable, good people. People who read reviews generally get a sense for what’s going on.
Now if you are seeing bad percentages, it is time to take stock. What are people’s issues, where are the problem areas. This can actually be a great opportunity to address it based on a focus group that you don’t even have to pay.
by flemo on July 16, 2010
I recently started using and checking out restaurant.com after hearing about them from a friend. I was amazed that I had not heard about them before as it seems like they’ve been around for several years so I went and checked out their website which may help to explain why I hadn’t heard about them. Quite frankly from basic SEO perspective it’s a mess. Their popularity however astounded me but it looked as though they relied heavily on affiliate marketing which makes sense and encourages other people to do the work for you. But boy are they doing a lot of things wrong with their website.
Let’s just have a gander a their search visibility. They have a great domain name so I assume that they would do well for “restaurants” and variations on the phrase. A quick search reveals #1 Google ranking for “restaurants” as anticipated.
That’s a strong keyword phrase with some 68 million broad global searches per month which should in itself yield some good traffic. Let’s have a look at what they do. Coupons would be the obvious selection here so “restaurant coupons” would be a no brainer.
I see a paid search result there and the top spot again which is great and a 450,000 search volume which should also yield some good traffic.
So let’s move to local searches which one would anticipate to be higher conversion phrases. Someone in my local area looking to dine out would go for “Philadelphia restaurants” for example. One would anticipate that with a valuable keyword phrase as their domain and obvious popularity that they would do well but I don’t see them for some reason.
So I’m seeing menupages.com and yelp.com and zagat.com but interestingly not restaurant.com. So I wonder why that is.
If I go to restaurant.com and drill down to the Philadelphia section i see this URL http://www.restaurant.com/rdc_site2.net/listings.aspx?PageSize=0&Page=1&sorting=Relevance&Zip=19146&SearchRadius=5&&attribute_value_string%7cCity=Philadelphia
Ok so that explains a lot. Why not http://www.restaurant.com/philadelphia/ for their URL? Sorry couldn’t tell you. Let’s have a look at their title tag then. “Restaurant.com – Dine out for less! $25 Restaurant Certificates for only $10″. Right, pretty useless there.
It’s pretty obvious that we’re now looking at a poorly coded web structure that’s going to impact their search results and little thought to SEO so they are without a doubt missing out on some low hanging fruit. Then again, it looks like a popular website with a strong affiliate marketing campaign and a search marketing campaign which I’m sure is costing them a pretty penny. One wonders at how much value an SEO consultant could be to them particularly for what appears to be a predominately online business. Maybe if they go their act together they would piss off their affiliates. Still, for someone who bases online businesses in SEO, it’s a good opportunity to demonstrate what not to do.
