The end of the year is coming. Now is a great time to take stock of your blogging over the past 12 months to discover how healthy it is and what areas could do with improving. Today we are sharing 5 important metrics for you to check over before you begin working on your business blog content calendars and marketing strategies for 2017. You will need to have Google analytics or a similar package that provides you with the information you need for these statistics.

The Most Popular Blog Posts

Which blog posts receive the highest amount of traffic? Discover what type of content your audience responds to and use that information to create more content in the months to come. Could you repurpose the blogs into different forms of content such as a podcast, video or infographic? Are there spin-off topics that you can build on?

The Number of Sessions

The single user can have multiple sessions during one visit to your website, or even over a longer period of time such as days or weeks.  A session is actually defined as a group of interactions that occur on your website over a set time frame. When one session ends another one can begin.  In Google Analytics, a session expires after half an hour of inactivity by default, but you can change this time frame if you wish. A user will visit the website and Google begins counting from the time the user arrives. If the user visits one page, remains on the website but is inactive for half an hour the session will end. If the user arrives and visits multiple pages, interacts socially or makes a purchase Google will extend the session expiry time by half an hour from the start of each new interaction.  Check the number of sessions recorded and see what trends you can see.

Average Session Duration

How long are visitors staying on your website? Use this information to help you improve the calls to action on your pages that will help to encourage users to spend more time on your site and help them to find more information.  You can also discover which referral websites provide the most valuable users. If you’re investing time and money on a website that only brings users with high bounce rates is it really worth your investment?

How Many People Visited Your Website?

Check to see how many people can to your website but don’t stop there. Use the information to discover where your traffic comes from. Discover the websites that referred you the most and which social media channels are sending traffic your way. Use this information to help you decide where you can invest your time and your marketing efforts in 2017.

Time Trends

Are there days of the week that have the most traffic? Are your users more likely to visit on a Friday evening or a Monday morning? Use this information to help you plan your blogging schedule and help your content receive the highest amounts of traffic possible.

Need help with your business blog? Contact us and ask about our content marketing services.