Monday 13 June 2016

Battle of The Web Analytics: Google vs Clicky


Thus far on this blog, we have explored, It’s not you its me: How to increase engagement and reduce our bounce rate, How Tracking your traffic sources can enhance your marketing campaign and Choosing the right social media platform for your business. I think it's fitting at this point that we discuss, how you can go about choosing the right analytics platform for your business. According to Demers, “just because a feature sounds interesting and provides you with some additional data about your site doesn’t mean it’s actually valuable. Important questions to ask when choosing an analytical tool includes: Why do I need a different/new tool? What sort of data do I need this tool to give me? What actions will be driven by that data? How, specifically, will I use the data to inform decisions and activities.

Google Analytics

 When I hear about tracking analytics, the first tool that comes to mind is Google Analytics, best of all its free. Google Analytics is great for tracking traffic patterns on your website. When you log in, the audience overview gives you a snapshot of the traffic that’s visiting your website. Another view is the acquisition view which shows you who is visiting your website. By navigating your way down to the behaviour insights, you can be informed about your most popular pages and bounce rates for each page. Also, it integrates seamlessly with Google AdSense and Google AdWords. These are just a few of the measurements available for review through Google Analytics.


Just because most persons are using this platform, doesn’t mean it’s the only option available. There are other options, such as: Adobe Analytics, Kissmetrics and Clicky. For this blog post, we will explore the Analytics platform Clicky. Who remembers the first time they initially logged into Google Analytics how intimidating it all seemed? Well, you will be happy to know that Clicky makes for a very uncluttered user friendly experience. Clicky has done a pretty good job at comparing itself to the competition, feel free to check it out here.


 What is Clicky?

Clicky is a real time web analytics platform that allows you to track your website analytics.  Its free for up to three thousand page views per day for a single site, paid versions are available for users that exceed these criteria’s.


Why You’ll Love Clicky?

According to Clicky, here is why you will fall in love with their platform:
-Everything is real time not just a few things.
-You can view heat maps for each individual visitor session.
-Get notifications when your site goes offline, otherwise known as uptime monitoring.
-See individual visitors and actions

Source: Blogtyrant.com


How does Clicky Compare to Google Analytics?

Email Reports

I am addicted to regularly checking my email, so I like the fact that every morning I can get an overview of the previous days’ stats sent directly to my inbox. You can also customize the data that you want to receive in your email reports.

Detailed heat mapping

How awesome it would be if you were able to see what visitors are doing when they visit your website? With Clicky, this is possible through heat mapping. With heat mapping, you can track where visitors are clicking on your website. This allows you to optimize your website by adjusting the areas which persons do not care about. Through heat mapping, you are able to draw attention to the right areas on your website.

Real Time Information

There is just something about having real time information at your finger tips. With Google Analytics, statistics are delayed by at least 24 hours. With Clicky, you can view real time stats so you know what’s happening right when its happening.

Interface

The most common theme that comes across when people talk about Clicky, is how simple it is to use. All the tools you need are right in front of you when you log in. Navigating your way through the sidebars on Google Analytics takes a little bit of getting use and can be intimidating for the first time user.

Bounce Rate

With a bounce rate, someone has visited your website but hasn’t taken any other action. Clicky measures bounce rate differently from Google Analytics. Their view is that if some one is on your webpage for a duration of time, this is a form of engagement, thus bounce rate is only calculated for visits to your webpage that lasts less than 30 seconds.

Video & Twitter Analytics

With Clicky, you can track how long persons are watching your videos and where they pause. This is great as you know where persons are getting bored and can make adjustments accordingly. You can also monitor your Twitter mentions to learn what persons are saying about your brand.



Live Links

Clicky allows you to use its platform like a monitoring tools, thus you can see what links you are getting in real time, unlike Google that has limited real time information available.


Search Rankings

Clicky will tell you how you are ranked in Google when someone clicks on your website. Some data isn’t hidden from your analytics due to Google secure search option.

Clicky is a pretty comparable tool to Google Analytics. Are you on the side of the vast majority or have you stepped outside the norm with an alternative platform? I would love to hear your thoughts on the platform you are using and how it compares to Google Analytics.



Source: Blogtyrant.com

No comments:

Post a Comment