After more than a decade of collecting and analyzing data for the folks I work with, I can tell you one thing that is consistently true: small business owners have a hard time making decisions based on their data. This is partly because turning quantitative data analytics into actionable qualitative information is challenging – and partly because of data forces people to leave their ego at the door.
I’ll leave you to guess which one is more common.
In 2024, data analytics are more important than ever. Make yourself a promise: it’s time to stop making choices purely based on the ‘gut feeling’. You’ve got to start reporting on your traffic, sales, social media, and email data analytics to make choices for your business.
Nine Times to Use Data Analytics for Choices in Your Brand
1 – Data will tell you why sales are low
If your sales are low, use data analytics to figure out why. There are basically two reasons your sales are low:
- Your conversion rate sucks
- You need more traffic
To suss this out, start with your sales data and look at your conversion rate – if it’s below 2%, you’ve got a conversion rate issue. Don’t throw more traffic at the problem yet! Focus your attention on figuring out what part of your website needs to do a better job of converting people.
2 – Use data analytics to identify traffic spikes
Understanding your traffic spikes could give you a clue about what people like to see from your brand.
To see a spike in traffic, you need to look at your traffic over time. We use Google Analytics for this. Then, figure out exactly where your site visitors came from. Where did they land? What platform did they come from?
Suss out who that traffic could be, and whether they’re part of your target audience.
If you can see why your traffic increased and whether you can connect it with a significant boost in sales, you can start to push your communications towards prioritizing that language.
Protip: check your traffic every month and jot down your traffic spikes for the month. Take a look when you’re reporting and see if you can identify a trend in the spikes.
3 – When your sales spike
BOOM nice work!
If you see a spike in your sales, take two minutes to celebrate… then dive into your data analytics.
Figure out what caused the spike – did you improve your website? Is it a specific page? Are you driving more traffic somehow? Did you have a great affiliate marketing promotion?
If you know what spikes your sales, you can replicate it. You can also create a plan to capitalize on the new customers that just came your way.
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4 – Data analytics will help you increase your followers
It’s good to know when your followers on your social media channels spike because, even though it’s a vanity metric, it means you’ve done something that increased brand awareness.
Watch this consistently, and when you see a bump in your followers, couple it with your posts within the week. Look at any hashtags you used, anyone you tagged, the imagery, and the content. Were you tagged in any else’s posts, were you shared?
When you know what got you this traction, you can figure out how to capitalize on it.
5 – What to do when you see a drop in your email open rate
If your email open rate falls for more than a couple of emails, you need to figure out why. For us this is mega important because a drop in email open rate can point to a deliverability issue.
Pro tip: We suggest working with Klaviyo because you can find detailed data about every single campaign.
Start by identifying potential causes of the drop in open rate (OR). Look at the domain information of the campaigns and see if one of the domain ORs is lower than average. In our experience, this is usually Google. If your gmail OR is low, then it’s likely that your email pinged their algorithm and you’re in the promotional folder. Sending value content is the number one way to get out of the promo folder.
If all of your domain open rates are lower than usual, then start running tests and look into your deliverability.
If you’re not seeing a deliverability issue, it’s likely a content issue (boring or salesy subject lines), a timing issue (test sending at different times) or an audience problem.
6 – Seeing a decrease in referral traffic? Data has the answer.
It’s not abnormal to see regular shifts in referral traffic because of the 24 hour new cycle and sheer volume of content that gets pumped out every day on every channel.
But, if your referral traffic trends are starting to tank, check your data analytics. Where was the traffic coming from before? Was that traffic was worth it for your brand? What changed when the referral traffic decreased?
If your referrals are worth it and they’re decreasing because you’re not prioritizing this aspect of your brand, your next step is to start focusing on improving referrals from the right content sources.
7 – Data analytics to help increase email revenue
If you’re running email marketing campaigns and you see sales coming in from one or more of your branded emails, dive into what caused it.
Did you put a link in a different place? Was the open rate better than normal – or the click rate? Did you share information differently than you have previously? Did you change your CTA or a button color? Have you increased frequency in your emails?
8 – If you’re seeing changes in your clicks on IG
Clicks from IG can be huge for any business. More and more people are using IG for online shopping and for checking out a brand’s ethos before making a purchase.
If you notice that your clicks have increased, identify the posts that are driving traffic to your website. Look at the hashtags on the post and the content. Post that types of content more often and keep watching!
9 – Optimize and improve your landing pages
If you’re driving people to a landing page (LP) and you want that landing page to work, you have to look at the effectiveness of the landing page itself.
If that LP isn’t hitting your goals, it’s important to figure out why. Is it your landing page or is it your content? Or is it the audience that you’re sending there?
Look into how people are getting to your landing page, what they’re clicking on/looking at on the page, and how far down they scroll. Use that information to make incremental changes that will increase your conversion rate on the page.
Are you using your data to make choices for your brand right now?
It’s time to level up your content marketing strategy and make your content work for you.
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