Website Rescue Workshop on Orcas Island, January 30



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You’re missing critical data in Google Analytics

by Joe on January 30, 2013

Unless you’ve had your super-geek hat on recently, you’re missing critical website data in your Google Analytics.

How do I know?

Because it’s a total pain in the ass to set it up right.

But it’s worth it. I know because I just got it set up right for a new website. And here’s what I know about my visitors:

  • How much traffic is coming from links I sent out in broadcast emails (and which one)
  • How many times people scroll down the landing page
  • How many people reach the bottom of the landing page, and how long it takes them
  • How many people start the video
  • How many times the video gets paused, or buffers, or is watched all the way to the end
  • Which email signup box gets used
  • How many people sign up for the newsletter

And I can slice and dice the data. For example, I can exclude everyone but the people who clicked on a certain link in an email.

Here’s what I did (the short version):

  1. Marked up my links in the email with the URL Builder so I have campaign data
  2. Installed JavaScript to fire events when YouTube videos are played
  3. Added code to the signup buttons so that Analytics gets an event when it’s clicked
  4. Created a goal for the thank you page for signing up
  5. Installed JavaScript to track scrolling
  6. Set up a filter to make sure I get full referring URLS from referral traffic (and learned how to find the data).

The biggest bonus of the scrolling tracking is that it changes how visits are characterized as bounces. As soon as someone scrolls they’re no longer counted as a “bounce.” This works for me, because anyone who even starts to read at least thought they were in the right place, even if they didn’t end up liking the page.


SEO help from the ScribeSEO plugin. Check it out for yourself.

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What’s the best time to post on Facebook and Twitter?

by Joe on January 8, 2012

Like a lot of people, I post on Twitter and Facebook when it’s convenient to me.

But I should be posting when my readers are reading.

Because there’s nothing worse, in social media terms, than having a great post buried because it’s way down the timeline by the time your readers tune in.

They’ll never see it.

That’s why I was interested in this infographic that crossed my desk the other day.

It shows clearly that marketers (and by extension small business owners) are busy posting stuff during the day, but consumers are more focused on social media in the evenings and on the weekends. (and it varies by platform)

Stands to reason, right? We all have jobs, and they sometimes keep us away from our computers…

Based on this infographic, I’m going to experiment with posting outside of business hours (using Hootsuite’s scheduling feature).

Have you tried this yourself? How did it work out?

» Social Timing Insights Infographic | Argyle Social is on a mission to help marketers drive meaningful business outcomes through social media marketing. Hundreds of small- and mid-sized businesses rely on our platform to power marketing campaigns on Twitter, Facebook, and LinkedIn.


SEO help from the ScribeSEO plugin. Check it out for yourself.

Why haven’t you installed web analytics yet?

by Joe on January 6, 2012

It’s a real question.

The other day I was looking at a site for a client and when I looked under the hood I was surprised to see (okay, not that surprised) that they had never hooked the site up with analytics.

This means they know basically NOTHING about what’s been happening on their website for the past three years.

Sure, they could dig out the server logs and run them through a simple program, but this isn’t going to tell them much.

I was disappointed, selfishly, because I always enjoy sharing before-and-after stats with clients.

Getting analytics going isn’t hard. You can sign up for the free Google Analytics product and have the code running and collecting data within 20 minutes or so. Maybe an hour if you get confused halfway through.

Once it’s running, you don’t have to touch it. You don’t even have to look at your stats if you don’t want to. But they’ll be steadily collecting as the days, weeks, months and years pass.

There’s gold in those stats.

If you’re one of those people who haven’t signed up for an analytics program and installed the tiny bit of code on your website, it’s time to make a change.

Here’s a great free resource to help you get this done. Eugen Oprea has a free Google Analytics course that walks you through setup and understanding the data.

It’s at http://www.eugenoprea.com/google-analytics/. Go sign up now.

It’s free, and I don’t get anything for sending you there.

Another analytics resource is GetClicky. This is a great little service that gives you real-time, as-it-happens data on your website. You can actually see the clicks individual users make as they go through your website.

I like this service, which is paid, because it makes me look at my visitors differently. I learn a lot by putting myself in their shoes and wondering, for example, “why did they click that link, not the one above it?”

Sometimes I learn a lot just by seeing someone go to a page I know needs work, and then they disappear from the site instead of staying engaged. Kinda brings focus…

You can get GetClicky here, and yes, that’s an affiliate link because I think it’s a great service and it’s helped me fix one of my sites, so I can recommend it confidently.

What holds you back from installing analytics? Or from making good use of it? Share in the comments.


SEO help from the ScribeSEO plugin. Check it out for yourself.

Review of Laura Roeder’s Facebook Fame

by Joe on September 12, 2011

I was lucky recently to get an advance copy of Laura Roeder’s new Kindle e-book, Facebook Fame.

I didn’t figure I’d learn much, but I was wrong. Laura’s got a whole bunch of tips and tricks in addition to the basics, and I like her whole approach to FB.

Check out her launch party for the book.

Here’s my review:

This is a great book about making a name for your business on Facebook. It covers the basics, so it’s good for someone who is just starting out, but Laura Roeder also sneaks in some advanced tips and techniques. I’ve been helping a non-profit’s Facebook page for over a year, but a couple of things here were new to me, and I know I’ll use them.

Here’s a small example. Laura walks you through how to choose whether to post on your page “as your page” or as yourself. This is something that’s pretty confusing when you’re starting out, and it was even confusing to me as someone who had been a page admin for a year. (I don’t think you used to be able to do it, but without Laura’s book I never would have figured out you could.)

The book also shows you how to get more info out of your Facebook insights. Honestly I’d only ever looked at the overview, but there’s a lot more information available.

Overall, though, the basic mindset that Laura Roeder operates from is more important than any particular tip. She understands how to use Facebook without getting used by it. And she understands what Facebook is good for an what it’s not. You’ll save a lot of time and effort by following her advice because you’ll focus on what works and builds your business rather than on distractions that don’t.

Hop over to the launch party site to check out the launch and get a free sample chapter.


SEO help from the ScribeSEO plugin. Check it out for yourself.

Buy a book, save lives

September 8, 2011

My friend Sonia over at Copyblogger wrote a great post about what’s probably the best thing you can do with twenty dollars today, this week, or maybe even this year. I did it. How to Rule the Whole Freaking World To be perfectly precise, I actually did it this morning, when I read this post [...]

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Brand New Product: Easy Mobile Web Site

June 15, 2011

If you’re a small business owner with a website that doesn’t look great on mobile devices, help is here. And it’s free. “I’ve been wracking my brain for days trying to figure out how to make a photo I used as a background on a friend’s website work on a mobile device. Then I found [...]

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The easy way to get “expert” results for your small business

April 17, 2011

Last night we sat down at a friend’s dinner table with 6 kids to decorate Easter eggs. Fancy Ukranian Easter eggs (also called Pysanky eggs). To make them you take raw eggs and decorate them with wax and then dip them into colored Easter egg dye. By dipping into a sequence of colors, you can [...]

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Understanding Facebook’s Page Changes (March 2011)

March 4, 2011

This is a quick guide for small businesses & small non-profits who need to understand the impact of the new Pages features on Facebook. The key piece is that you can now like other pages as your page. When you make comments on other pages as your organization, instead of as yourself, you can raise [...]

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How to Stop Talking to an Empty Room

March 1, 2011

Do you know those people who stand on busy street corners handing out leaflets? They drive you nuts, right? But you never see them in quiet residential neighborhoods, do you? There’s a reason. If you’re trying to communicate with people, you need to go where the people are ( that’s a link to my own [...]

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How to increase Facebook fan engagement: an interview with Andrea Vahl

September 13, 2010

Update: I’ve added a transcript of the interview. Look below… [Watch the intro video on YouTube if you're on a mobile device] The other day I had the chance to interview Andrea Vahl, otherwise known as Grandma Mary, the crotchety Facebook expert. Andrea shared several tips and techniques for making your Facebook page more appealing [...]

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