“We’re not getting the traction on our Facebook page that we expected,” explained my client, a local agency teaching senior citizens how to use their computers. Despite regular posting and engagement, their Facebook page activities weren’t affecting sales and we wanted to know why.
Analytics provide a window into your customer’s life.
Who you want to see your content and who is viewing your content may be two vastly different people. One of the easiest ways to identify if the content you’re creating resonates with your ideal audience is to review the latter.
Note: As you settle into your research, make sure you have Have a notebook handy or use a spreadsheet to collate the information, you find. Recording your findings will help you today as well as providing a base point for future review and alignment.
The first step in identifying where their sales funnel was leaking was to determine who was entering the funnel. However, reviewing the analytics today will help you better target your content and marketing efforts, as well as providing a baseline.
Don’t wait for your sales funnel to leak — get to know your audience today.
Google Analytics
Log into your Google Analytics and choose Audience to review who is visiting your site. While Overview will show you how many people have been to your site, click on the following to dive deeper:
- Demographics for age and gender
- Interests for market affinities
- Geo for language and location
- Technology for the apps and search engines they use
- Mobile for how they’re visiting your site: desktop, mobile or tablet
In addition, review your sources. If your social platforms are referrers, you’ll be able to weigh those audience demographics accordingly.
Social Media Analytics
Your social platform audiences may be different than your website’s audience. Not all of them may be using your blog to stay current; they may only be interacting with you via the social medium. As you review each platform, look for the similarities in differences between each and your website.
From your Facebook page, choose Insights, then People from the left-hand column. Here you can identify the most prominent subset of age and gender.
Note that fans and followers are different in that only followers will see you in their newsfeed – question to ask yourself > is there a difference in demographics? Why?
While you’re on the page, identify 3-4 top engagers. Review their social profiles for what you can glean on age, gender, relationships and interests.
To access your Instagram analytics, go to the APP, click the gear icon, then choose Insights, Audience. You will be able to identify their location, age and gender.
For their affinities and interests, review your most popular content. Don’t forget, as well, to identify your top engagers and review their profiles.
To find your numbers in Twitter, look for ‘More’ in your profile menu, choose Analytics, then Audiences. You can review their top interests as well as location and gender
As a note, your followers may be different than your organic audience, which are those users who have viewed or engaged with your organic Tweets.
You can also review the Events tab to find out what events and news are affecting your audience as well as recurring trends which lists oft-used hashtags and activities.
Again, review your top engagers and head to their profiles to learn more.
For a review on Twitter analytics, this article by Hubspot is quite comprehensive.
If you have a business page you’ll be able to review the Analytics of both visitors and followers. LinkedIn provides information on:
- Job function
- Location
- Seniority
- Industry
- Company size
Again, check out those top engagers!
Buyer Review
Another important audience subset is those folks who have converted, either by signing up for your email list or purchasing a product or service.
Newsletter Software
Take a look at your lists in your newsletter software. While many don’t go in-depth on demographics, you may be able to determine their geographic location.
You can also review your campaign reports to learn what sort of device they’re using or which email client they read your emails from. You’ll also be able to find out when your audience is engaging – the day and time they’re opening your emails.
Pick a few recipients who read your emails regularly and search their name or email online. You may be able to learn more about their interests, demographics, and location.
Some offer more in-depth details on paid subscriptions, eg., MailChimp offers Social Profiles which “gathers publicly available social data to help you learn about your contacts”.
Purchase Behaviour
This is easier for service-based providers who meet with customers. Review those who have purchased from you and their demographics. Is there a trend?
Alternately, you can set up conversions in Google Analytics that may help you track purchase behaviour on your site and demographics of those buyers. MonsterInsights also offers a paid plugin for your WordPress site to do the same.
Identify trends to draw a picture of what your audience looks like.
As you review the numbers, you’ll begin to see trends. The audience may differ between platforms but you’re unlikely to see any wild swings. As you outline who is consuming your content, ask yourself questions like:
- Are the demographics different from platform to platform?
- How different from each is your ideal client?
- Are my top engagers similar across platforms?
- Look at opens for day and hour they read emails – are they different than when you send?
- Are those that consume your content different from those that purchase your content and services?
- How can you align your content consumers with purchasers; your actual audience to your ideal audience?
While the examples pictured above are my own, I can tell you what was going on with the client I mentioned. The audience engaging on Facebook was different than the audience purchasing the services. The Facebook audience was mainly 25-34 years of age when we began working together. While they were able to tell Grandma about the digital literacy service, it was Grandma who was buying herself the classes. This created a chicken and egg scenario we were better able to address as we became aware of it.
We didn’t want those younger people to stop engaging, but if the goal was to increase sales, we did need to align to the purchasers. It took months to see a change as well as a realignment in goals. We reduced our focus on Facebook as a sales tool and we changed the tone of the content towards empowering seniors to seek help.
Know who you’re talking to.
Once you’ve got your data recorded from the exercise above, add a reminder to your calendar to review in six months. And tell us in the comments below – is your audience who you want them to be?
Now that you’ve determined who’s looking at your work, read more about your buyer’s journey.