Small Business Research and Enterprise

Author: Clarice Lin

Since 2010, I’ve been tapping into the power of Google Analytics to help businesses make more money through their websites, create new revenue streams and cut down on low-margins activities. I’m a huge advocate of the Google Analytics Marketing Platform – a software that is connected to your website via a piece of tracking code inserted on your site.

Two questions I always ask my new clients: “Do you have Google Analytics installed on your website?” and “Do you use the reports to guide your business decisions?”.

Your website is an integral part of your business.

Without a website, your business doesn’t exist. It’s your virtual shop front.

1. It’s open 24 hours a day
2. It plants seeds of trust and gives potential clients a glimpse into your products and services
3. It’s acts as a communication channel enabling prospective clients and customers to get in touch with you

And that’s why having first-hand knowledge about your prospects and existing customers is so important. If you know what they need, you can offer them more products and services potentially leading to more revenue. If you know what doesn’t appeal to them, you can remove or change things within your business offerings and focus your efforts on profitable activities. If you know your prospects’ concerns, you can address them and convince them to buy from you! (i.e. more revenue!)

Knowing what’s going on in the heads of your customers gives you a leverage in winning them over!

That’s why Google Analytics shouldn’t be an afterthought for your business. It’s a priority. Insights from Google Analytics reports is the ammunition you need to fill up your pipelines and boost your revenue!

How Google Analytics can boost your revenue numbers

Visualize this.If you had a physical shopfront today and you want to maximize your potential earnings, you’ll want to arm yourself with the following basic knowledge:

• How many people walk past your shop every day and who they are
• Number of people who see your shop window and pause to take a peek
• Number of people who step into your shop and browse around and how long they linger
  • If they browse around, which section of the shop they head to and if they picked up any item to take a closer look
• Number of people who made an enquiry and asked for assistance

These questions help you to decide if your shop is located in a good spot and pulling in the right crowd. You’ll also know if your shop window is merchandised well enough to get the attention of your prospective customers. Then we see what were the items that people were most interested in buying and if you have enough staff to assist customers’ queries. I could go on and on, but I believe you get the idea.

This knowledge is pivotal for you to plan your resources wisely and maximize the usage of your assets.

Hence similarly, on your virtual store front, setting up Google Analytics means you’ll have easy access to information that that empower your business decisions.

What can get out from Google Analytics reports?

In a nutshell, Google Analytics will give you the ability to extract numbers to learn who your customers are, what they want and exactly how to convince them to buy (more!) from you! The marketing platform has a standardized reporting interface for anyone to view key performance metrics for websites. There is also the option to customize specific reports that are unique to your own business. For those who want to have a quick daily and weekly overview, you can create dashboards that allow you to have bird eye view of your customers’ browsing and buying behaviour. You can set up a notification email to be sent to yourself and your team when there is sudden traffic spike or drop on your website. And if you are running any social media or paid advertising campaigns, you’ll know instantly if those campaigns are sending any visitors to your website or if they are visitors who are more likely to buy from you. Not only that, if you’ve been pouring time and money into creating blog posts or videos, you’ll have a clear picture whether they are getting any Google traffic or filling up your pipeline.

With Google Analytics, you’ll get immediate feedback when your campaigns are not showing significant positive results. And you could make rapid changes to your plans to minimize risks and losses!

It makes no monetary sense to wait till the end of the campaign to discover your marketing activities were a total waste of time and money. I always tell my clients: If you are serious about growing your revenue, Google Analytics is a must for your business!

Stop the guesswork

And start empowering your business decisions in 2019.

If you want to

• maximize your investment in your marketing activities
• discover how you are getting visitors to your website
• find out what your customers are doing on your website
• know whether they have expressed an interest to buy or if they are one step away from tapping on that buy button,

It’s time to dig deep into your Google Analytics reports to increase your sales and improve your marketing.

Sign up for my “Google Analytics for Small Business” workshop on Thursday, 31 January. It’s a beginners’ course targeted for those who want to use a data-supported approach to improve their business or blog. If you need a refresher in Google Analytics basics, this is also the best place to start.

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Clarice Lin is marketer and Google Analytics expert. Using data, she helps small business owners and startups identify opportunities and eliminate inefficiencies in their businesses.

She is the founder of BaselineLabs, marketing, and rebranding agency who tailor their marketing approaches to make a real difference in your business.

If you want to grow your revenues and improve your margins, book a complementary consult to find out more.