Practical Web Analytics for User Experience

Practical Web Analytics for User Experience teaches you how to use web analytics to help answer the complicated questions facing UX professionals. Within this book, you'll find a quantitative approach for measuring a website's effectiveness and the methods for posing and answering specific questions about how users navigate a website. The book is organized according to the concerns UX practitioners face. Chapters are devoted to traffic, clickpath, and content use analysis, measuring the effectiveness of design changes, including A/B testing, building user profiles based on search habits, supporting usability test findings with reporting, and more. This is the must-have resource you need to start capitalizing on web analytics and analyze websites effectively.

• Discover concrete information on how web analytics data support user research and user-centered design
• Learn how to frame questions in a way that lets you navigate through massive amounts of data to get the answer you need
• Learn how to gather information for personas, verify behavior found in usability testing, support heuristic evaluation with data, analyze keyword data, and understand how to communicate these findings with business stakeholders

UX professionals (UX designers, usability engineers, usability architects, usability researchers, UX managers)Secondary: Graduate level students in a human-computer interaction, usability, or related program.

Acknowledgments

About the Author

Chapter 1. Introduction

What is Web Analytics?

User Experience and Web Analytics Questions

Web Analytics and User Experience: A Perfect Fit

About This Book

Google Analytics

Part 1: Introduction to Web Analytics

Chapter 2. Web Analytics Approach

Introduction

Get To Know Your Website

A Model of Analysis

Showing Your Work

Context Matters

Sometimes the Data Contradict You

Key Takeaways

Chapter 3. How Web Analytics Works

Introduction

Log File Analysis

Page Tagging

Metrics and Dimensions

Interacting With Data in Google Analytics

Key Takeaways

Chapter 4. Goals

Introduction

What are Goals and Conversions?

Conversion Rate

Goal Reports in Google Analytics

When Do You Use These Reports?

Finding the Right Things to Measure as Key Performance Indicators

What Can You Measure On a Website That Can Constitute A Goal?

Going Beyond the Website

Tying It Together

Key Takeaways

Part 2: Learning about Users through Web Analytics

Chapter 5. Learning about Users

Introduction

Visitor Analysis

Key Takeaways

Chapter 6. Traffic Analysis: Learning How Users Got to Your Website

Introduction

Source and Medium (Dimensions)

Organic Search

Search Query Analysis

Referral Traffic

Direct Traffic

Paid Search Keywords

Key Takeaways

Chapter 7. Analyzing How People Use Your Content

Introduction

Website Content Reports

Key Takeaways

Chapter 8. Click-Path Analysis

Introduction

Focus on Relationships between Pages

Navigation Summary

“Visitors Flow” Report

Analyzing How Users Move from One Page Type to Another

Key Takeaways

Chapter 9. Segmentation

Introduction

Why Segment Data?

How To Segment Data

What are the Ways You Can Segment Data?

Useful Ways To Segment For UX Questions

The Tip of the Iceberg

Key Takeaways

Chapter 10. Pairing Analytics Data with UX Methods

Introduction

Personas

Usability Testing

Usability Inspection

Design and Design Objectives

Key Takeaways

Chapter 11. Measuring the Effects of Changes

Introduction

Choose What to Measure

Types of Changes

Changing Many Things at Once

Reporting

Key Takeaways

Part 3: Advanced Topics

Chapter 12. Measuring Behavior within Pages

Introduction

Google Analytics In-Page Analytics

Click Analytics Tools

Making Clicks Measureable in Page Tagging Analytics Tools

Analyzing Event Data

Virtual Pageviews

Key Takeaways

Chapter 13. A/B Testing

Introduction

Designing An Experiment

Monitoring and “Winning”

Key Takeaways

Chapter 14. Analytics Profiles

Introduction

Profiles

What are Profile Filters?

Key Takeaways

Chapter 15. Regular Reporting and Talking to Stakeholders

Introduction

Reporting Culture

Making the Case for Usability Activities

Key Takeaways

Chapter 16. Web Analytics in the Near Future

Introduction

Mobile Application Analytics

Cross-Device Measurement

Better Measurement of On-Page Behavior

Connecting to Other Data Sources

The Continuing Dominance of Google

Things Will Keep Changing

Index