In the current climate, many of us have been forced to carefully examine customer journeys and customer behavior metrics. This is a time when businesses should double down on their audience’s digital experience.
Although it may seem difficult and tedious, improving the digital experience is more simple than you think when you understand how to execute. The best part of it is that it will aid in growing your online business.
Steps That Will Help Identify Areas Of Improvement
I. Consider Business Goals
Each initiative and task you take on should have a purpose. Some of us have a clear view of what that looks like while others may have a general idea. If you’re not clear, discuss this with your management team. It’s important to understand what those goals are.
When you think about your online business, what is it that you want it to do? What is your objective?
Setting SMART goals makes you are aware of what needs to be done to achieve success and helps you realize that it’s attainable.
For example, if your objective is to gain traffic to your online platform, how will you work towards that goal?
Use the SMART goal technique:
- Specific: What will you do?
- Measurable: How will you know whether you’re successful?
- Achievable: How will you implement the chosen goal?
- Relevant: Does it connect with your business objectives?
- Timely: When will it be achievable?
When you define your goals, you can create task lists with meaningful work.
All of this together with good business habits will be the guide for constant improvement and achievable goal maintenance.
II. User Journey
When creating an online platform for a product or a service you must always have your user in mind. You’ll probably have your own opinions about what will work, but you have to keep in mind that you’re not the end-user.
When you considered the user first, you’re giving yourself a better chance to connect with your audience, whether it be for content or a product.
User Experience
First, the content needs to be compelling and also relatable to your audience which in turn will increase engagement. It needs to be refreshing, new, and thought-provoking.
Not only does the content itself matter, but the way that it’s presented and the design have your content can influence your audience one way or another. Investing in design that is pleasing to the eye can make a good impression even if the content isn’t completely there.
This happens due to visual searching which basically is clicking or engaging in visually pleasing content.
Map out the touchpoints and compile user actions into a timeline. The typical stages for most users are awareness, research, purchase, and use.
III. Tracking and Measuring
For great results, you must track metrics in order to understand what’s happening. There are all kinds of metrics that you can track and measure, but tracking all of them isn’t particularly useful.
That’s why it’s important to figure out what your key performance indicators (KPIs). These are metrics that demonstrate how effectively a company is achieving key business objectives necessary for growth.
Some examples of KPIs are number of leads, membership registrations, downloads of gated content, email sign-ups, or revenue.
Additionally, it’s a good idea to track user behavior around your KPIs. Here are some areas to look at when tracking user behavior:
- Conversion Goals: email sign up, form submission, downloads of gated content, time spent on-page, or purchases.
- Behavior Flow: determine how a user travels from one page to the next as well as engagement.
- Events tracking: interaction within the website, such as downloads and shared content.
Eventually, you will have figured the right recipe for success, or at least what does work for you.
You will need a few tools to help you make sense of it all. The most known tools for analytics are Google Analytics and/or Monster Insights.
IV. Website Analysis
Because user behavior is imperative for understanding what is working and also what needs improvement, you must be able to decipher all the data provided by the previously mentioned tools.
When trying to optimize your online platform, you will need a basic but thorough website analysis for a better understanding of things that can be improved to grow your online business.
Once you’ve acquired the data for your measurement period, you will be able to see insights about your users, including:
- Demographics
- Amount of Visits
- Acquisition Details (Direct, Organic, Referral, Social)
- Landing & Exit Pages
There is a lot of interesting data but the key to identifying areas of improvement is to focus analysis on user behavior data.
Here is a list of 5 things you need to look for when performing this analysis:
- Understand the data
- Figure out what interests the user.
- Identify where your users get stuck.
- Explore the performance of pages and sections.
- Analyze the outcomes of the user journeys.
By using the list mentioned above, you can use the information obtained to improve the content, marketing tactics, and design efforts.
Thoughts on Identifying Areas of Improvement To Grow Your Online Business
First, set goals, then focus on creating an experience with a design that is simple and easy to navigate always with the user in mind. Perform analysis by collecting and analyzing data that will be used for improvement and content optimization.
While all of this will take time and multiple tries when you put in action the steps above you will have a much better chance to achieve success and growth for your online business.
Like the overused phrase “slow and steady wins the race”. Don’t always focus on the big score. Be consistent, provide valuable content, and you will eventually reach your goals.
The journey on its own may be hard and long but it is part of the process. It’s a testing process and it helps decipher the right way to go.
Trying different alternatives is the best way to know what actually works. What this does is maintain your content current while also testing what works and what doesn’t.
