5 data-led tips to analyse your content strategy.Two aims of a well-executed content strategy are to:
Although both metrics are measurable, their success is reliant upon the quality of the on-page user experience, which is more challenging to assess. Whilst it’s more difficult to assess, “looking after the performance of your content is critical to detect issues and gain time and efficiency resulting in higher conversions rates”, explains Samuel Graham, Digital Content Specialist at Greater Bank. According to him “the observation of the user’s behaviour will help you map out their interest for each element on your website”. 1. Identify your best content Firstly, it is necessary to identify the user journey on your website by tracking page views and by grouping the content you can find on each page. In Google Analytics, the tab “site content” that you can find under “behaviour”, provides you with a list of the landing and exit pages while “behaviour flow” supports you with a precise visualisation of the user journey. Although, remember that for big websites, these reports will only take into consideration a small portion of the total traffic of your website. The goal here is to identify the pages that generate traffic whilst considering the content that appeals (or not) to users. For a more detailed analysis, Tag Manager, a free tool provided by Google, can support you with generating tags to add into your webpage’s code. You’ll need to be familiar with HTML and JavaScript to achieve these tasks. These tags will help Google Analytics to receive information on the number of visits, grouped by their need under specific themes, page or even author. The ultimate goal of this analysis is to identify what content generates most of the views. 2. Analyse your bounce rate The bounce rate measures the number of visitors who navigate away from your website after viewing only one page. A rising bounce rate is a good indication that your landing page isn’t providing users with the relevant information they were looking for. Although, for some websites, a bounce rate from 60 to 70% can indicate that the information provided was easy to read and quick to get, suggesting user satisfaction. “We were wondering why our credit card landing page had such a low bounce rate while generating a good amount of traffic but by putting yourself into your customer’s shoes, it’s easier to understand their initial intent” explains Samuel Graham, Digital Content Specialist, from Greater Bank. This case study demonstrates very well the urge to distinguish bounce rate from traffic. Coming back to tag management, the best way to set it up for content analysis purposes is to create a script that will be tracked by Google Analytics and send a signal when the user stays for a specific amount of time on the page tracked. The “specific amount of time” depends on your own criteria. If tag management isn’t something you’re familiar with, I would recommend consulting with SEO or data specialists. 3. Understand how users interact with your website by using heat maps Heat maps provide real time analytics in the format of a graphical representation of data that uses a system of colour-coding to represent different values of interaction within a website. On top of being a very good analytical tool that will support you with understanding the way users interact with your content, it will also help you improve your existing content. For example, you’ll notice that an article particularly generates a high rate of scroll down behaviour because users are interested in a specific part of your content that sits under the fold, your next step to improve the content will be to integrate a CTA relevant to the part of the content generating interest. Heat maps are the best way to get instant visual feedback and uncover insights to make the right changes. 4. Create a user scenario A user scenario describes the intent and context as to why users come to your website. When writing scenarios, there are three key aspects to look after:
In summary, the idea is to connect all the dots to figure out what the most common interactions are that users can have with your landing page. From clicks, taps and scrolling behaviour to filling out a form. Usability testing scenarios should not include any information about how to accomplish a task. The usability test will show how the participant accomplishes a task and shows you whether the interface facilitates completing the scenario. For instance, analysing your form completion would help you discover which fields can take too long to fill, as optional features are often left blank and if there is a specific area within the form that causes confusion. 5. Check the efficiency of your Call to Action buttons Again, this one requires some Google Analytics and Google Tag Manager knowledge but online tutorials are fairly straight forward and available under different formats, from videos to step-by-step guides, implementing tags is accessible to any marketer. Implementing appropriate tracking within your CTA will allow you to collect data and improve the precision of your Analytics reports. If you don’t know where to start, here are a few examples of buttons you might want to track:
6. Create your data driven content Now, let’s move on to the content creation phase. The way you are going to approach your topic, the angle, the tone of voice, the title and the format will have an impact in the success of your content. Before creating your content, it is important to use tools to measure existing and on-site viral content for the theme you’re choosing. For example, Buzzsumo, is a popular tool for content marketers. It’s a free tool but the premium version offers more capabilities. This software allows you to find what content is viral for a specific theme. The results, will show you the content’s performance across several platforms (Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn etc.). Data isn’t only serving audience targeting purposes, but can nourish the content itself to boost the creativity of your marketing. By that, we aren’t talking about automating the creative process but using data in your content. To give you a better idea, here are few examples of what data led content campaigns look like. The first one might sound unexpected but it forms a very good example of a clever use of data available to anyone. It’s an infographic called History Lesson In Aussie Spirit. This infographic gathers historical statistics and information in a unique way to legitimately demonstrate what makes Australia a country of understanding, strength and optimism. Another example is the Australian Attitudes towards Money and Relationships survey, by Greater Bank. This bank commissioned a survey of over 1,500 Australian adults to uncover their attitudes towards money in the context of romantic relationships. This is a clever use of data for content in an entertaining way. Down the funnel, this content was repurposed into different format to adapt it to different amplification supports.
Author bio:
Subina is a digital marketing specialist with years of experience in Australia and the UK. She has worked with a plethora of companies from big global brands to creative start-ups. She has supported them in finding their direction, organising their approach and implementing the right digital marketing solutions.
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