How an Ecommerce Powerhouse Uses Your Data

Amazon Prime is one of the greatest and most dangerous innovations of our lifetime. We can essentially order any good we could ever want and have it to on our doorstep in just two days. Amazon took things to an even greater level with one hour delivery in some markets.

Amazon is one of, if not the, biggest online retailers with 304 million active users as of 2016. Amazon came on to the ecommerce scene and really helped it grow, but it isn’t the only dog in that fight. Ecommerce grossed $1.2 trillion in 2013 alone over 1 billion people making online purchases. That number was projected to rise to $1.672 trillion, making up 7.3% of retail sales.

Amazon is a top 10 ranked page according to Alexa. It is ranked fourth in the United States and sixth internationally. Amazon tracks all of it’s traffic data and other web metrics. The company even offers ecommerce applications to help other online retailers track and store visitor data on a cloud server.

When tracking visitors, Amazon likely looks at many of the things that would interest all online retailers: how much traffic there is, where it is coming from, who it is, and what they do while they are there. Amazon sees roughly 6.2 million visitors a day (Statistica, 2015). That is a great deal of data to track. Therefore, they must use very robust tools.  The more expansive the tool, the more data Amazon can examine about it’s customer base.

Amazon is pretty much the go-to site for buying an array of products online, especially for Prime members, but that doesn’t mean they can neglect digital marketing. Amazon uses many web marketing techniques to attract new users and to bring existing users back. SEO and Google AdWords are among some of these techniques. “Amazon’s initial business growth based on detailed approach to SEO and AdWords targeting millions of key words." Even though they are a powerhouse, Amazon still uses keywords to keep themselves high in Google, Bing, and other search engine results. Some of the top searches that drive to Amazon’s homepage are “Amazon”, “Amazon Prime”, and “Amazon Smile."

One advantage that Amazon has over other online retailers is its seller network. Over two million people sell products on Amazon. 40% of the companies sales come from third party sellers. These sellers have one billion products listed on the site (Martin, 2015). Not only do these sellers add traffic to the site personally as well as through people looking to buy their products, but they also may add paid advertising. Not only are there tools that help sellers increase their sales results, but sellers may be using social media ads and other digital advertising to drive sales to their personal Amazon pages.

It may not seem like that would help Amazon too much as they aren’t making as much as they might from their own product sales, but with all the add placement on Amazon, people ore often than not explore further than just one product. The averagetime spent per user on Amazon is just over 11 minutes 30 seconds. These users also visit about 12 pages each per visit. I know I am guilty of adding a few extra things to my cart. I’m a sucker for a deal.

Those ads Amazon serves up on its own site is another great digital marketing tactic. These personalized ads use data collected from users searches, viewed products, and other interests. “Using personalisation to make relevant recommendations and a clear check out process that many now imitate." Like ads through Google AdWords, Amazon looks into your cookies to see what other products you may be interested in. They also pair up products that compliment each other or may work together.

Though they maybe using social media, Google AdWords and other tools to boost online sales, Amazon sellers can also utilize ad portals within the website. These likely attribute to the high page views per visitor scale.

Another SEO and online benefit Amazon reaps is being linked to from other sites. Almost 1.1 million websites link to Amazon (Alexa). Amazon may receive more free advertising and marketing benefits than any other ecommerce site out there.

According to SEC filings, Amazon has five main marketing goals. To increase customer traffic to Amazon, to create awareness of Amazon products and services, to promote repeat purchases, to develop incremental product and service revenue opportunities and to strengethen/broaden the Amazon.com brand name. This post has already addressed how Amazon increases web traffics and increases awareness of products and services. Their third goal is one that uses a little more data than the previous two: increase repeat purchases.

As we buy more and more things online, it makes sense that many of these purchases would need to be repeated. Amazon created the Dash buttons to help with just that. With the press of a single button, you can reorder certain goods like laundry detergent, diapers, razors, etc. (Thank goodness there isn’t a blue jolly ranch button to keep refilling the bowl on my desk.) There are other, online, techniques that Amazon can and does use to meet this marketing goal.

One of the first and most common is email marketing. Amazon sends out emails promoting similar products and deals on products that may be a reccuring purchase. People often do not buy products until they run out. This usually means an instant purchase may need to be made. However, if reminders are sent to people via email they may be more likely to make that purchase in advance.

This is an area where I think Amazon has room for improvement. People like to opt into things that are easy for them, things that take minimal effort. We autopay bills, have certain services deliver products like contacts and medicines delivered to them monthly, why not allow people to auto-enroll to have specific products delivered to their door. This is a service many busy professional would opt in for. It could be for all kinds of products from dog clean up bags to protien powder.

At the end of the day Amazon knows how to put themselves out there and how to capitalize on the work of others. I give the brand major props for using their network the way that they do. They also create revenue within their own site through advertising. However, this advertising also creates a site that is dynamic and encourages visitors to explore which may be why their bounce rate is only 22%. Amazon is a powerhouse, but still has areas where it can improve and better reach it’s marketing goals. As ecommerce booms in the next five years, I expect Amazon to do the same.

The state as ecommerce is only projected to grow. This gives online retailers chances to use data on customers they aren’t able to capture in person and to make shopping experiences more efficient and personalized, leading to high success and even more billions in sales.

Understanding Social Media ROI with LiftMetrix

The first step every business should take in starting their digital presences is creating a website. While creating your webpage may seem an easy step, you have to make sure your site is well designed, easy to navigate, and truly representative of your brand. Your website is often a customers first point of contact with your brand. 81% of consumers do research online prior to making a purchase. It’s very likely that your site isn’t the first one they visited. Because of that, you need to present your site as the easiest to use and the most persuasive.

More than needing your site to be persuasive, you need it to be visually appealing. Poorly designed websites actually cost you sales. 70% of consumers don’t trust a site with sub par design according to a BaseKit poll. There is no point to having a site if it isn’t increasing sales. That’s where Google Analytics come in. They help you understand where people begin on your site, where they drop off, and where they are spending their time. By understanding your sales funnels you can tweak the lesser performing places on your site.

The same way Google Analytics helps you determine ROI and success of your website, application LiftMetrix does the same for your social presence. By telling LiftMetrix your key business objectives, the software can help recommend types of content and ads to drive your social media ROI. LiftMetrix uses Google Analytics data to provide end-to-end ROI measurement solutions. The software uses the data from Google Analytics traffic sources to look at social referrals and uses UTM pararmeters to track social content, both paid and organic.

If a website is the first step in creating a digital presence, social media is the second step. You want to choose platforms that have a high concentration of your target demographics and where you can excel.Having a strong social media presence is what will lead consumers to your website. That is, after all what LiftMetrix is primarily measuring, what traffic your social sites are bringing to your website.

Social media is an emerging ecommerce frontier that cannot be ignored. By the end of 2015, social media was expected to make up roughly $14 billion in online sales and that number will only grow with time. Measuring your online traffic allows you to see what platforms are working and which aren’t. This can help you craft strategies to boost your success on all platforms.

The marketing implications for social media and ecommerce are plain to see. Social media is where selling happens. Whether that is through social media advertisings, coupons, or general awareness. Over 2 billion people (that’s 2/3 of internet users) are active on social media. That should be a big motivator for brands to step up their social media promotion.

There are many ways one can increase online sales. One of my biggest tips to clients is to get personal. Think about whom you are trying to target and create content geared towards them. This involves a mix of promotional and non-promotional content. When I create a social media strategy for a client, I think of the content mix they should be posting based on their audience. Aside from promotional content, it is important to share industry articles, stay on top of relevant trends, and share human-interest pieces at the local or national level-depending on client reach.

Customer service is really important to for social selling. Customers turn to social media for service issue because they see it as a place tor receive a more immediate response. 72% of consumers who reach out to a brand on Twitter expect a response within one hour. Though it can be challenging as a social media manager or small business owner to get to all the requests, it is important to address issue of service on social media. This is often the first place people go to say a website is down or they are having order issues. 

I've tried to pay my @PepcoConnect bill twice in two days and their website has been down both days. Does this mean I don't have to pay?

— Courtney Palazzo (@cpalazzo92) June 21, 2016

It is important to keep in mind that social media marketing is the new word of mouth.  92% of consumers trust a review from a friend or family member. As people expand their network of friends more and more to social media, that gives them tons of potential people to learn about a new product or service. It can be as simple as seeing a friend has liked your Facebook post, retweeted your tweet, or tagged your restaurant on Facebook. These can all be seen as an endorsement of your brand with minimal effort on your part aside from having an active, tagable profile.

Where does LiftMetrix come in? LiftMetrix gives you an extension of limited Google Analytics data. Google Analytics tells you that 40% of your website traffic is coming from Twitter. LiftMetrix software tells you that six post contributed most of that traffic. You can then look at those posts and see what type of content is giving you the best bang for your buck. This is especially helpful with any social media advertisements or paid influencer posts you maybe be using. You want to not only ensure that your company is wisely spending its social dollars (and your time) but that event your organic content is attracting consumers.

Proving the ROI of social media is one of the biggest tasks marketers face. This is especially true in B2B (Business to Business) companies. By being able to show yourself and executives what social media is really bringing to the table in terms of sales and path to purchase not only validates your efforts, but your job role. It’s important to show that the companies money is being spent wisely and by linking your social efforts to your website metrics you can see not only what is paying off, but improve what isn’t.

Though I have never personally worked with LiftMetrix, I appreciate any tool that can help me better shape strategy and tweak content to receive optimal results. If you’ve used this software, please feel free to give your opinion in the comment section of this post.

Web Analytics: How KISSmetrics Stacks Up to Google Analytics

         Since it’s invention in 1991, the World Wide Web has proven itself to be invaluable in connecting people, dispersing information, and marketing businesses. In the last 35 years, the web has grown to over one billion websites and 3 billion people who access the internet. In the United States, 84% ofcitizens use the internet, that is about 270 million people looking at websites and surfing the web. This huge marketing pool has made web analytics essential for businesses.

As far as web analytic tools go, Google is king. As of 2013, over half of websites used Google Analytics to measure their web traffic and success. With Google Analytics being the go-to (and free) tool for measuring web metrics, other companies had to create offerings that go above and beyond Google’s free measurements to lure businesses to switch metric providers. One such company is KISSmetrics.

Founded in 2008, KISSmetrics focuses on helping marketers better than website and other digital media performance. Unlike some data tools, KISSmetrics takes the approach that it is marketing that “influence our actions and ultimately drive revenue.” The company hopes to simplify the immense amounts of data so marketers can plainly see what is working and what isn’t and then provide actionable insight.

KISSmetrics has many great features including real-time data that let’s you capitalize and view trends as they happen. They also utilize a data funnel feature that helps identify your companies weakest and most costly conversion points. This is an extremely helpful feature in the path-to-purchase journey that other tools may not give great insight into. KISSmetrics API is easily integrated into your website to help you begin viewing traffic and visitor stats.

While Google Analytics has the demographics and audience insight features, KISSmetrics allows companies to look deeper at their audience and see the path users take from interest to conversion. KISSmetrics engage feature allows companies to set up triggers in hopes to better engage your audience. They also provide templates and segmented testing to see what triggers work best for different audiences. This is a feature that Google Analytics does not offer.  KISSmetric goes above and beyond to help decode data.

            G2Crowd developed and advanced matrix to compare different web analytic software. As you can see from the graph left, Google Analytics ranks high in market presence as well as being an industry leader. KISSmetrics is almost equally as high in market presence, but straddles the line between a high-performer and an industry leader.

            The biggest difference between Google Analytics in KISSmetrics is the way they track. KISSmetrics focuses more on tracking people so it lack some of the traffic features that Google Analytics provides. Though Google ramped up it’s people features, KISSmetrics allows you to track individual people. Here’s how the tools handle tracking:

1. Identifying users: When someone visits site Google Analytics and KISSmetric assigns him or her an anonymous ID. For Google, only the last session is logged. If a user visits again a week later, Google only logs that visit and the data from the first visit is lost. KISSmetrics assigns previous sessions an alias so the data isn’t lost.
2. Tracking through cookies: Once a user as identified through the log in process, KISSmetrics ties all future visits to that person, even if they log out and close their browser. They do this through cookies. For Google, every session needs a user ID. Google Analytics would catalogue that logged out visit as a new user.
3. Tracking multiple devices: With KISSmetrics, if a user visits from their desktop logged in, they are assigned an alias. If they later visit your site unlogged in through a mobile device, they are assigned an anonymous ID. Whenever they log into your site through a mobile device, KISSmetrics merges the data from the alias and anonymous ID to one profile. With Google Analytics, the two IDs keep logging independent data on that user. The chart below illustrates the different processes.  
4. Identifying multiple users on one device:  If one person is logged in and the other isn’t, like in the case of public devices, KISSmetrics attributes all the data collected during the sessions with the logged in user. Google Analytics on the other hand, only logs the most recent session for each person they are tracking so the logged in data will be correctly attributed and the non-logged in person will appear as a random anonymous ID. 
5. Multiple users logged in on the same device: The way KISSmetrics attributes sessions on a public or multiple used device changes if all parties are logged in. In that case, KISSmetrics correctly attributes all data to the correctly logged in person. If a second person does browsing before logging in, that bit of data is attributed to the last logged in person. With Google Analytics, the correct data is attributed to the correct person.

Based on the way they track, KISSmetrics does a much better job overall giving a full picture of a persons journey and experience on a company’s site. Google Analytics, however, appears to better handle data and session attribution on public or shared devices. This is definitely and area I suspect data companies will look to improve on in the future.

Funnelfeatures are another area where Google Analytics and KISSmetrics differ. While you can set up funnels with Google Analytics, they lack some of the functionality KISSmetric provides. The biggest perk of KISSmetrics being that their system is able to go back and restore funnel data from before your funnel was set up. Google Analytics only records the data going forward.

There are plenty of other areas where the tools differ, but as with all innovation, they are catching up to one another. For example, KISSmetrics has advanced cohort analysis while Google Analytics launched a beta of this feature. Fortunately, the world of web metrics is not a one or the other decision. You can use both Google Analytics and KISSmetrics together. Using multiple tools allows you to easily create reports and see trends. Using the tools together can strengthen the weak spots of the other tools so that you have a more comprehensive look in your company’s website visitors, conversions, and other data.

Social Media: Be Where Your Audience Lives

Choosing which social media platforms your company should be on is no small feat. Some companies assume they should be on every platform and spread themselves very thin. Other companies just pick one platform and spend all their time, energy, and budget in one place. Neither of these ways of thinking is really the best way to manage your social media presence.

The best way to determine which social platforms to be on is to determine your audience. Who are you trying to reach? If you want to reach the above 50 crowd on social media, Facebook is probably your best bet. If the under 24s are your golden goose, head over to Instagram or even Snapchat. There’s no point to being on a platform where your audience isn’t; it’s a waste of time and resources. Your content will not be received as well nor will you reach the right people. Think of social media in the same light as TV commercials. You wouldn’t show a commercial for new golf clubs on the Disney Channel or promote a monster truck show in between episodes of All My Children. In order to reach your goals you have to be where your target market is, even if it isn’t exactly where you want to be.

Another factor to consider is your type of business and the tone you wish to portray. If you’re an insurance agent, you’re probably a little too serious to be on Snapchat. If your company culture is very visual like a bakery, you definitely want to get your images out on an image-based platform, Instagram. That’s not to say your company can’t mix it up and have fun despite being in a serious industry. It just means that when choosing platforms you need to keep in mind that perception is key and you don’t want people to see your business in a non-flattering light.

You should also evaluate your current audience on the channels you plan to focus your attention. Who are they? Tools like People Pattern help you look at your current audience and determine whether or not they are you target demographic. This allows you to see if your social media marketing strategy is attracting the right people and analyze who already likes your brand. Seeing who is interested in your brand could point your company to a new target market you had never considered and influence changes in your social media targeting strategy.

            Working in social media, there is a big debate over quality vs. quantity on content and platform presence. I am on the side of quality. Why try to exist on a platform you do not have the bandwidth or content to be successful on? The Huffington Post dubbed 2015, the year of quality on social media, “High-quality, rich content will win over quantity, and informed, data-driven decisions will determine success." Posting too often is not only a waste of time, but it annoys your community. Companies that post 60+ times per month receive 60% less engagement than those who post less. With engagement and conversation being one of the biggest success metrics of social media, doing anything to decrease this is obviously a big no-no.

            A similar debate rages for conversation vs. content. I think these battles are one in the same. Conversation is quality while content is quantity. You can put out the best content in the world, but if it isn’t seeing success then it is wasted effort. “Content without conversation is just broadcasting, or just advertising." With the way social media algorithms are written, your less engaging content isn’t likely getting in front of any new eyes or being widely distributed.  Catherine Novak suggests creating content that invokes responses from fans and followers. Producing boring content on your chosen will get your company nowhere close to meeting your goals. It is also important to remember when choosing and posting on networks that each network has it’s own set of unwritten rules and guidelines.

When deciding which social networks to post on, you need to think about the content you have or will be able to produce. This can help shape your decision on which networks to be active. If you will be unable to produce regular or quality video content, YouTube and Vine are not the right platforms for you. If what you have to share is much more informational and high-level, you may want to focus your energy on Twitter. All content does not work on all networks.

People use social media platforms for different purposes. 72% of social media users believe that certain platforms are better for certain interests of theirs than others. Some platforms are better for professional use. Others are good for connecting with friends or discovering new interests. Below is a graphic showing how people use different social networks.

The same study also showed that people are more likely to engage with brands on Twitter, Facebook, and Pinterest than Instagram or LinkedIn. This is something to keep in mind when choosing your company’s main social media platforms.

At minimum, I believe every small business should at the very least have a Facebook business page where customers and consumers can reach out to share feedback, ask questions, and discover information about the brand. Social media has become the new customer service platform. 2/3 of consumers preferreaching out on Facebook to calling on the phone. As more and more people head to social media platforms to receive customer support, social media managers have to be on their toes almost 24/7. With 42% of customers expect a response within 60 minutes, 57% still expect that quick response time even after business hours.  

The most important thing to remember when choosing and using social media platforms is that they are always changing. As new networks emerge and older ones update their features, you should evaluate to see if your current networks are still where your audience live or if they have moved on. You always want to be on the most relevant platform for your audience. In the every changing world of social media, you have to stay ahead of the curve; otherwise you may lose your relevancy and post potency.

Impressions vs. Reach: What's the deal?

There are a lot of web and social media metrics out there that can tell you about the scope your post or page commanded. Impressions and reach are two of the biggest metrics used to measure how far your post went and how many people saw or were impacted by it. Many marketers use impressions and reach as interchangeable terms, however, that is not the case. Though they measure very similar metrics, the two terms give you slightly different information.

Impressions, simply put, are the number of times your post, ad, etc., is displayed. Reach is defined as the number of people who saw that post.  It may seem like a small detail, but the difference between these two metrics is monumental. If your page or post has 2,000 impressions but a reach of 500, it means that 500 people were shown the same content four times. Here’s why this matters to you.

Many people put more weight in the reach of a post than the impressions but they don’t mean that reach is a better metric. In fact, impressions can be more telling especially if your campaign uses remarketing.  “[Remarketing] allows you to position targeted ads in front of a defined audience that had preciously visited your website-as they browse elsewhere around the internet." In this case you hope for a high number of impressions as people are “followed around” by your brand.

A high number of impressions can also tell you which of your pages or blog posts are the most popular or useful. If people keep coming back to your same page, it must mean that they find something on there interesting or helpful for their work or lives. This is a great way to tell what type of content works and which doesn’t. It could also be a sign that this post is somehow the starting off point for clients like your homepage or a landing page they may have bookmarked.

Another element to examine is how impressions line up with engagement. Impressions are best used in relation to other metrics. For instance, if you create a post that has a high number of impressions, but little engagement, it may not be quality material. Impressions are used to help calculate the engagement rate (impressions/engagement). Post and pages with a low engagement rate are offering little value to those they reached. This is a good sign that the content is getting out into the world, but there is nothing, such as a call to action or question, encouraging viewers to engage with the post or page.

The goal of most campaigns is to keep impressions up. Looking at your website and social metrics for an extended period of time can tell you which months were your best. If you had a large dip in impressions this month, it would behoove you to look and see why. Are you posting less? Was your content shared less? Was your site down for maintenance? Consider impressions as the barometer of metrics. It is the first sign that changes you made have had an impact, either positively or negatively.

Diving into Visitor Characterization

When it comes to website metrics, most people think about page or post views. And while that is definitely an important metric, it tells a very small piece of the picture. It's good to know that people are visiting your site, but what matters more is how they got there, and what they are do while there.

While working at Peak 10, I worked on a large-scale path-to-purchase project. I followed new customer's journey from their initial website visit to signing a contract with our company. Knowing where customers began their interest in your company and the journey they took to work with you can help you see what collateral is valuable and what is not. This can help you focus your efforts into better targeting potential customers that matter as well as prove ROI of marketing efforts, something sales teams and upper management sometimes believe have no value. 

While working on this project, I looked at a few specific web metrics such as sessions, users, and page views. Breaking that down further we have visit duration, referrer, and new vs. returning visitors. With the right software, these metrics are easy to find. Google Analytics can be installed on most websites to tell you these metrics and even more. Here's a break down of what those metrics mean, and why they are important. 

• Sessions- Sessions are essentially the number of visits (new and returning by users. This tells you how many times people come to your website. Knowing this information can help you tell if your website is having the reach that you want.
• Users- Sessions do not equal users. If you’re doing it right, your number of users will be less than sessions because many users will visit more than once.
• Page Views- Page views tells you how many pages are viewed in total by users. This includes pages viewed multiple times even by the same user. This metric can let you know if people are exploring further than their entry page.
• Duration- The amount of a time a person spends on your site has value. If they are only on a page for 30 seconds and you know that page houses at 2 minute video or at least 1 minute or written content, you know you aren’t making a strong impact or relaying relevant or meaningful information.
• Referrer- The referrer tells where or how a user came to your website. Whether it came from an email, Google search, or social media platform. Knowing where people came from can help you see what platforms and tactics are successful and which could use tweaking.
• New vs. Returning Visitors- Knowing your percentage of new vs. returning visitors is crucial. You want to know if your site is “sticky enough” to have people coming back. If not, you may not be providing the value add you thought you were.

While these aren’t all the important visitor characteristic metrics to look at, they are a great start for anyone just beginning their web metrics journey. There are many great tools out there to help you understand your metrics and better use Google Analytics. Happy measuring!