Using Web Analytics Using Web Analytics for

Newsroom Decisions

d / d bRadio Free Europe/Radio Liberty May 2011

Dana ChinnTwitter: @danachinn

My mission To help news and nonprofit organizationsb ild d t i dibuild and retain audiencesby using data for decision-making

• Setting site goals

• Mapping metrics to goals, or,Mapping metrics to goals, or,determining what needs to be measured

• Using Key Performance Indicators f itfor news sites

• Tracking traffic by topic

• Using site data about streaming, radio programming and web-only content

Using data effectively starts with clarifying organizational goalsy g g g

vs. individual site goals

Start here

not here

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Radio, TV

InternetRFERL orgRFERL.orgIndividual sites

ComputerMobile

Social mediaRFEIndividual sites

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Each individual site needs specific audience goals

Is each individual site reaching and engaging its highest priority t t d di ?targeted audiences?

Does it have the content it needs to oes t a e t e co te t t eeds toreach its targeted audiences?

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Using data for decision-makingUsing data for decision making

Y h d t t t You had to cut one reporter. How should the others re-arrange their time?

You got new funding! What should be covered – something new or something more?

Should you partner with another organization?

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organization?

What does a site need to do t hi it tifi bl l ?to achieve its quantifiable goals?

Has content, but not the audience, or not enough of the audienceor not enough of the audience

-- navigation, design-- marketing

Has the audience but

Doesn’t have the content or the

audience, but not the content

Doesn t have the content or the audience

--Add content – how much? what type? Have the expertise already? Reassign or hire?

What needs to be measured: All ways a person can engage with you*y p g g y

* not “all the places you put content and hope everyone will come”

Computerp

1SEARCH

SITESHome

Work

Public

1

SOCIAL MEDIAMobile devicesWAP/mobile web

5 - 7Apps

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3 5 - 7

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Tablet4

“So what?” metrics waste time, lead to analysis paralysis lead to analysis paralysis

Our site has 5,000 monthly unique visitors.

Last Tuesday that story got 20,000 page views.

The average time spent on our site last week The average time spent on our site last week was 24 minutes.

Our iPhone app was downloaded 10,000 times.

We have 2 000 fans on our Facebook page

We have 5,000 Twitter followers.

We have 2,000 fans on our Facebook page.

Measure onlywhat’s meaningful and usefulto make decisions

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to make decisions

What verbs indicate engagement? actions

Vi it l l Visit

R d/ i l

, regularly

Read/view content, a lot

Interact oftenInteract, often-- rate, print, vote, take a poll, click on an ad-- share, e-mail, comment, contribute

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Audiences, actions, metrics differ by channelAudiences, actions, metrics differ by channel

SITES SOCIAL MEDIA

Totals*

1. Who? How many?In target audience?

2 N f i i ?

? ? ? ? ? ? ?

3. What did they see?

2. No. of visits? How often? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?

? ? ? ? ? ? ?Did they get want they wanted?

4. Did they interact?

? ? ? ? ? ? ?

? ? ? ? ? ? ?

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yWhat did they do?How much?

? ? ? ? ? ? ?

* Different metrics, methodologies for each channel!

Two types of web analytics data Two types of web analytics data

Behavioral research

What people did when they came to your site,as captured by an action taken on a keyboard or mousean action taken on a keyboard or mouse

Attitudinal research

What people say they didwhat they think

Attitudinal research

andwhy

as captured by surveys, focus groups, social media, usability studies

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Key Performance Indicatorsf it

Behavioral research

for news sites

Overall site indicators1. Visits

2. Visits from new vs. returning visitorsvisitors

3. Visits per weekly unique visitorWhen you enter Google Analytics, set up “Advanced Segments” to see new and returning visitors for all metrics

4. Page views per visit

5. Bounce rate (percent of one-page visits) of the top landing pagevisits) of the top landing page

Drill-down indicators that will give more detail on what happened

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6. Visits by topic 7. Visits to radio vs. web content, by topic

Need to track by week – not month –t k th d t ti blto make the data actionable

One-time big news geventornew section launchortechnical problem?

• Seasonality• General effects of external and internal events• Technical issues that affect data integrity and comparisons

• internal traffic• coding problems

site launches and consolidations• site launches and consolidations• Google Analytics uses samples if the number of visits for a specified

time period is greater than 500,000

Key Performance Indicator #1: VisitsKey Performance Indicator #1: Visits

A visit is counted A visit is counted

every time t itsomeone comes to a site

Visits: the strongest metric availableAn increase in visits? Always good.A decrease in visits? Always badA decrease in visits? Always bad.

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Strong vs. weak metricsStrong vs. weak metrics

Strong metrics are useful tools that give clear indications that give clear indications

of what’s successful or not

Weak metrics…-- are conceptually flawed

“so what?” counts of things

c. Kyle Taylor

so what? counts of things

-- are technically flawedmetrics calculated by

b l ti t c. Kyle Taylor

web analytics systems in ways that give unclear indications

…could be so misleading

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gthey could lead to bad decisions

A unique visitor is really a unique computer.

Really weak metric #1: Unique visitors

A unique visitor is really a unique computer. Unique visitors are either over-counted…

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…or under-counted.You don’t know when or by how much.*y

??library, school, Internet cafe

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* It doesn’t matter anyway….better to measure outcomes (did people do what you wanted?) than the number of people who came to your site.

An increase in page views can be good -Really weak metric #2: Page views

or bad.*

Bad design navigation site architecture?Bad design, navigation, site architecture?Lots of page views, annoyed users

A redesign improved usability?

? Fewer page views, happier users

Content that should be there but isn’t? Lots of page views, annoyed users

?Lots of page views, annoyed users

Dynamic content? Fewer page views, happier users (probably)

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* It doesn’t matter anyway….better to measure outcomes (did people do what you wanted?) than the number of pages people went to when they came to your site.

An increase in average time spent on Really weak metric #3: Time spent on site

g psite can be good - or bad.*

Bad design, navigation, site architecture?Bad design, navigation, site architecture?Lots of time spent, annoyed users

A redesign improved usability? Less time spent happier users? Less time spent, happier users?

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* It doesn’t matter anyway….better to measure outcomes (did people do what you wanted?) than how much time people spent on your site.

Systems only measure the time spenti b t it in between pages on a site, so…

The time spent of a user who goes only to

?p g y

one page is NOT included in the time spent calculation. ?

The time spent on the last page

1 minute The time spent on the last page

of a site isn’t counted at all. minute

10 minutes

Time spent = 1 minute

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Site X

Time spent = 1 minute

i diAre you attracting new audiences?

Key Performance Indicator #2

Visits from new visitorsy

Visits from returning

vs.

gvisitors

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Generally, is your site engaging visitors? How often are they visiting?

What how much are they seeing?What, how much are they seeing?

Visits per unique visitorKey Performance Indicator #3Visits per unique visitor

Is an average of 3 visits a week for a 24/7 site enough?

Page views per visitKey Performance Indicator #4

Is an average of 3 pages per

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p g pvisit for a site that produces a lot of content?

Wh di d t i When audiences - new and returning -come, are they staying?

Bounce rate percentof the landing page

Key Performance Indicator #5

of the landing pagewhere most visits start

“I came. I saw. I puked.”-- Avinash Kaushik on bounce rate

24A bounce: a visit with only one page view

Bounce rate example

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Bounce rate example

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Is your site set up…Is your site set up…

….with navigation that uses terms that appeal to your audience and help them find what

so you can track traffic by topic throughout

that appeal to your audience and help them find what they’re looking for?

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….so you can track traffic by topic throughout your site?

OnCentral believes that News & Politics stories are crucial to serving audiences who live and work in the Central Avenue area.

How many News & Politics stores are produced each week?

How much traffic do News & Politics stories get per week?

What is “news” and what is “politics?”How many political stories are there? What types of politics?

How much traffic did political stories get the week of March 13?

Is each page coded in a way to get this information?

Web traffic data gives few insights…

…unless each story is coded or classified.

Does OnCentral have enough local politics stories to build a Central Avenue audience?

How many stories on local politics did it have the week of March 13? What percent of pOnCentral’s content is about local politics?

How much traffic did local How much traffic did local politics stories get the week of March 13?

Does it have enough multimedia content on local politics?

Note: In Google Analytics use unique page views as a proxy for visits

Does it have stories from all areas of OnCentral?

visits

Should a site be a supplement to radio/TV

ora 24/7 news source on its own?

Metrics that show what type of content audiences use indicate how engaged audiences are with the news org

Level of engagement

- Listen to live stream - Listen to radio programming

- Use web content

g g

Use web content

- Listen to live stream/radio programming and use web content

- Interact with news org. based on live stream or radio

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- Interact with news org. based on web content

Home page bounce rates for radio news organizations may need to be interpreted differentlyif the goal is to build the site to stand on its owng

A visit that enters the site through the home page…

…and goes only to the live stream the live stream and radio content…

…is not counted as a “bounce” in Google Analytics.

BUT it h ld b i t t d i it th t’ t

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BUT it should be interpreted as a visit that’s not interested or engaged with web content.

Also, this is another reason why time-on-site for a radio news org isn’t a meaningful metric.

HIghest Paid Person’s Opinion

Two types of decision-making

HIghest Paid Person s Opinion-- Avinash Kaushik, Google

S t ifi tifi bl it l

Decision-making with data• Set specific, quantifiable site goals

• Use meaningful metrics; monitor weekly; y;distinguish between traffic

from external events vs. newsroom actions

• Analyze traffic by audience type and topic

• Understand site goals and traffic beforetackling attitudinal survey research,

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tackling attitudinal survey research,social media metrics,mobile metrics