The Web Smart Blog
Google Analytics Adds Benchmarking
March 21, 2008 at 10:59 am by Eric| When it comes to interpreting website analytics the most important frame of reference is the past performance of your own site. Seeing overall improvement and growth over time is the main thing to look for. Figuring out where there may be problems or opportunities is the main goal. But often I wonder how my stats compare to other sites like mine. Unfortunately, my competitors aren't likely to welcome me into their analytics reports to compare. But recently Google has offered an option in their Analytics package to anonymously share your traffic data in order to provide aggregate comparison benchmark reports. Once you opt in you'll get a new "Benchmark (Beta)" option under the "Visitors" tab. This page allows you to pick an industry that most closely matches your own and creates benchmark comparison reports for some key metrics. Here's our comparison to other website design and development sites.  The reports include overall visits, bounce rates, pageviews, average time on site, pages/visit, and new visits. I'm pleased with our comparison especially in overall visits. Because we produce a lot of content, not all directly related to our web development services, I'm not surprised by the higher bounce rates. And these high bounce rates also effects the Pages/Visit report. This new feature should prove very helpful in measuring website performance. Thanks again Google! |
Tags: google analytics
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Comments 
 steve jennings |
August 2, 2008 11:17 AM Very good idea, will check it out after this comment. |
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alice cooper |
August 2, 2008 11:18 AM The more analytics tools the better. |