Performance.
Every industry measures performance. It’s what businesses do to succeed. Your content is no different. Especially as it’s an integral part of your business. Know who’s looking at your content and how well it really is doing.
Analytics.
With good data you can understand your audience. Are they the target market you’re hoping to reach? Is there enough people looking? A business never got anywhere wildly guessing what was happening and neither will yours.
Analytics software uses the power of the internet to measure and monitor your audience. This (mostly anonymous) data can be a real insight into the usage patterns.
Traffic
Traffic is the most renowned measure and the one everyone wants to know about. Traffic measures the number of page impressions (total number of pages viewed) and the unique users (actual people looking). However, traffic alone can't tell the whole story. It's the quality of visits that count, whether you've answered a question, or served a customer satisfactorily.Keyword search
Keyword analysis informs you of the words people used to arrive at your content via search engines. It gives you an insight into their purpose for visiting. This should marry up with your own content aims. Keyword searches can also highlight any gaps in content you may have, or a weakness in your navigation and architecture.Referrals
Referrals show where your visitors arrived from, whether this is directly by typing in your web address into a browser, if they clicked a link - if so from which website - or if your content was an option presented from a search engine. It's always useful to know where's best to promote and market your content, especially if you are spending money on advertising.Bounce rate
Bounce rate measures the speed someone enters in and out of a page. A high bounce rate is a quick time, and lower a longer time. This aims to reflect 'accidental' or 'inaccurate' visits to your content. People may have visited, but was it what they were looking for, and if so, did it grab their attention? A high bounce rate suggests not.
User testing.
Your audience is your judge and jury. But unlike in court, here you can approach the bench. Why not ask the opinion of the very people you’re targeting what they think of your content? With user testing you can.
Focus groups
Gather a cross section of people representative of your target audience. You can go wider than this and include anyone if you wish, but if you're not going to be aiming your content at them, their opinion may not necessarily be valid. It's best to keep groups small - up to five people. Meetings can be held in person, or remotely to people with an internet connection.Scenarios
Rather than leave it open-ended, 'what's your overall impression', 'does it all look ok?', set some specific scenarios for people to complete. These should be based around the central aims of your content. This way you can test if you're achieving your goals and give the test some focus.Satisfaction
Your scenarios will set specific tasks. This will measure if they're achievable, yes or no. What it won't measure is someone's satisfaction levels. They may have completed a task, but it was difficult to do. Broaden any survey to include satisfaction rates. Ask for suggestions and opinions.
Task management.
Improving performance and raising satisfaction levels is the name of the game, although it’s not easy. Too often, it’s easy to get lost in the sea of content you’re producing. While you’re drowning, all perspective is lost.
When publishing content, it needs hierarchy. Squeezing everything into one place means nothing is found, not everything. But how is this hierarchy found? Ask your colleagues and staff and they’ll all think what they do is the most important. So, those who shout loudest win. Really?
Content should be user-focused, after all they are the people we’re aiming to satisfy, not staff. Judge what tasks your audience are completing. Serve this to them quickly and easily
Contact
Not every one of your customers will visit you online (unless you give them no other choice of course). You may well be dealing with customers in other ways besides via your content. If so, use this contact to understand any failings or gaps in your content.
- Telephone calls
- Mail (post)
- In person conversations
