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One of the most important marketing tasks you can complete as a small business owner is tracking how well your efforts are doing.

If you’ve heard how important website data and reports can be to your online marketing efforts, but you aren’t exactly sure why, here are some top reasons to begin using Google Analytics — and understanding what all of these numbers mean.

You Can Better Track ROI

ROI (short for return on investment) is an essential part of any great marketing plan, especially for small businesses. With limited budgets, it’s all the more important to understand what you’re getting out of the money you’re spending on search engine advertising, social media ads, email promotions and more!

For example, if you spend $500 per month on a Facebook ad for a few months, but only generate $100 in sales each month, your ROI is pretty low. This can mean your ads aren’t reaching the right people and need to be adjusted, or that the item you’re advertising for isn’t a good fit for a Facebook ad.

In short, tracking ROI can exponentially help you save money in the long run, as well as prove whether or not it’s worth it to keep advertising in the same way over time.

Best and Worst Performing Pages and Posts

By far one of the top benefits of utilizing Google Analytics on a regular basis is knowing how well your website is doing on its own.

Do you have some pages with high traffic and engagement, but others with really poor numbers? Do you have a couple of high-quality blog posts generating a big chunk of your traffic while others struggle to bring in one new viewer each month?

By understanding which pages and blog posts are doing poorly, you can better investigate why they may not be performing as well as other pages and posts and how to fix them over time.

Understanding Your Audience

Want to know which cities or states are most engaged with your website? Interested in data that shows you which services or products you offer are of most interest to them?

Google Analytics can help you uncover more information about your online audience that you may not already know. Even if some of the data confirms your guesses, other numbers may surprise you!

Take a look at the information in the Audience > Geo > Location section to learn about where they are visiting from. You might also explore the Behavior tab to see which pages they are engaged with the most on a regular basis.

Learn More About Google Analytics

Is it all a bit overwhelming? Thankfully, Google offers a free course on Google Analytics to show you all the ins and outs of utilizing the data and tailor the reports to your specific needs!

Optimize Your Website’s Design Today

If the data you see in Google Analytics isn’t what you’d hoped it would be, then it may be time to change up your design and content.

With a liveBooks website, you’ll be able to use our stunning, customizable website templates that look great on any mobile device!

We’ve also got a top-notch support team who’s here to help you every step of the way. Start for free today!

Andrea Brizzi was born in 1950 in Firenze, Italy, where he studied Architecture. In 1977, Andrea moved to New York where he since been active as a photographer, specializing in Architectural and Interiors subjects. For the past decade Andrea has been based in both New York and Honolulu, while frequently traveling in the US, as well as Asia, the Near East and Europe. Long passed the million miles marker with one airline alone!

Q&A with Andrea Brizzi

Q1: How would you describe the aesthetic of your website?

AB: Minimalist.

Q2: How often do you typically update your website?

AB: 3-4 times a year – or whenever I send out a newsletter.

Q3: How do you choose the photos that you display on your homepage?

AB: I like to show the variety of projects I shoot, even within a niche photography specialty. I try to present projects my clients can relate to.

Q4: What is your favorite feature of liveBooks?

AB: Ease of use.

Q5: What’s one piece of advice you’d offer to someone designing their website?

AB:. I believe a website aimed at business serves different needs from one directed at art directors or consumers. In the former case, mine, I am comfortable with a template which is not unique to my site and I see no need for bells and whistles. Art directors going through many competing sites might find the predictable format repetitive. Consumers (say, for portrait photography) expect more pizzaz.

See more of Andrea’s work here: www.andreabrizzi.com

You might have noticed the images on your website display different colors depending on the browser you’re viewing them from, or whether you’re using a mobile device. The differences are subtle and they are more in the lines of saturation, but they’re there. And while you don’t know what device your clients are using or whether their screens are calibrated, you need to do your best when saving your images for the web to reach a satisfying compromise. The source of these slip-ups can be tracked down to how your images are converted and whether or not they contain an ICC profile.

sRGB and ICC Profile

In the pre-mobile times, all monitors and browsers were presented with pretty much the same color scheme – Standard Red Green Blue. If you saved your images in sRGB, it was likely your images looked the same on all browser desktop versions and on all monitors.

Now, with the introduction of tablets and smartphones, another layer of identifying and displaying color has become available, but only on desktop – the ICC Profile. You must enable the Color Profile in your image editor software when you save the image for web. This will enable all browsers to read your image settings as they truly are, and thus, display them correctly.

Alas, the mobile devices still use mainly sRGB, with the exception of Safari for iOS, which also reads ICC Profiles. So before you save the image, make sure to convert it to sRBG.

The Firefox singularity

While Firefox is designed to interpret ICC profiles, its default display values are as of this time inaccurate. Perhaps a future update will fix this value, but for now, here’s what you ca do to force the browser to read the proper ICC profiles.

Write about:config in the address bar and gfx in the search bar that appears below. Look for gfx.color_management.mode and click on it to change the value from 2 to 1.

This will activate a complete color management in Firefox and if your images contain ICC profiles they should be displayed correctly on your monitor.

Unfortunately, until there will be a unification of display settings for all monitors and all browsers and platforms, small differences are bound to appear. And since you cannot control what device your clients are using when viewing your images, you have to do your best to set them up in the most common format: saving them in sRGB and adding an ICC Profile to each of them.

Whether you have a team of hard-working employees supporting you or you’re just venturing into the business world on your own so far, your website’s About page matters.

Studies show that in nearly every industry, the About page is one of the most visited pages on any company’s website. Why? Because every type of customer almost always wants to connect with a business before purchasing something from them.

And since it’s so important to get it right, it’s also probably why so many of us often struggle to find the right balance of being both informational and engaging!

If you’re in the process of creating content for your website’s About page, here are a few tips to help you figure out what you’d like it to say — and how to do so in a way that will help generate more leads for your business.

Quality Over Quantity

This rule applies to every web page, but is especially important for your About page.

Many websites out there overdo it by providing far too much content in order to describe a company’s history, values, goals, leadership background information, and more.

Although we initially may think that providing the most information is the best step for having the greatest impact, too much content can actually have the opposite effect and turn away people from your business.

Instead of writing out all the details that may relate to the business, focus on the most important information your ideal customer’s would want to know. If this is hard for you to achieve with an unbiased perspective, consider drafting up information as best you can and then asking for a few “outsiders” (such as close friends or family) to give you their advice and opinions for revision.

Get Personal

One mistake companies tend to make in regards to their website content is that they avoid being too personal. In contrast, some of the most successful online businesses out there today are the ones that do a great job of making personal connections with their audiences.

This is especially vital to your website if you are a local business trying to reach members in your own community. Remember: people want to do business with those they know, like and trust. How can they learn to like (or love) your business if they can’t connect with you on at least a small personal level?

Don’t be afraid to talk about why your work matters to you personally, what type of impact your organization is hoping to have on the local community, or the values you want your company to uphold.

Introduce Yourselves

As human beings, we’re all very visual creatures, so it’s a smart idea to utilize photos to connect with your ideal customers on your About page.

Include photographs of the owner, leadership or managers, team members, and even behind-the-scenes photos if appropriate! This allows any potential customers visiting your website on the web to learn a little more about who makes up your organization, and allows them to put a face to a name should they ever call, email or communicate with people within your team.

Focus on Your Audience

A great About page also makes sure to bring attention to the questions and concerns of a company’s audience. Talk about why your customers may be searching for answers or address their current challenges.

When you start an About page with this in mind, you’ll be able to do more than talk about yourself: you’ll connect with your audience right from the start by acknowledging their needs, and not just yours.

Tell Your Story with an Impactful Website

liveBooks offers stunning, customizable website templates for wedding industry professionals and creatives.

Impress your potential clients with a visually stunning website that is ready for search engines and looks great on any mobile device!

We’ve also got a top-notch support team who’s here to help you every step of the way. Start for free today!