There’s absolutely no doubt that Google Analytics is the primary insight tool that we use for website analytics. But in a day and age where the customer experience is everything alongside personalisation and other marketing trends, is Google Analytics enough?
Why do we use Google Analytics? Well, it’s free, it’s well established and trusted and it provides pretty comprehensive top level statistics about the performance of a website. Plus, most of us know how to use and read it. But does it tell us everything we need to know? No.
Google Analytics does provides insight into how websites perform, however it rarely offers a why. The reasons why these insights are the way they are could be the answer to those vital website design changes – which will affect website conversion rates, for example. but rarely offer the why behind the statistics to justify crucial design changes to websites, which can either positively or negatively affect website conversion rates.
So, how do we go about gathering deeper insights? There are now a great number of tools that the internet offers, which can be useful, even necessary, to add to a live website.
For Behavioural Insights, I’ve used both Hotjar and Lucky Orange. But have a look around, it’s important your analytics for the function of your business.
Google Analytics will remain as the tool that all marketers should be using to identify how their website is performing. But it’s worth noting that more and more Marketers need to be utilising real data to make informed decisions about the way their digital platforms perform and looking at new ways to drive conversions and increase ROI.
