Google Analytics

What is Google Analytics and how it helps your ecommerce business

Dan McCarty avatar
Written by Dan McCarty
Updated over a week ago

Why every business owner should use Google Analytics Enhanced Ecommerce?

You should know how your prospects and customers behave, how their journey through the store looks like, where they are dropping off and etc. The enhanced ecommerce makes it possible to track every step of a customer’s journey, from impression to the transaction. “You can’t manage what you can’t measure.” © Peter Drucker

What the difference between Ecommerce and Enhanced Ecommerce?

Ecommerce tracking in Google Analytics was all about using information on the “Thank You” page on an order to send transaction and revenue data back to Google Analytics. Enhanced Ecommerce will give you additional reports and about users’ actions.

Shopping Behavior Analysis a.k.a “The Sales Funnel”.

This report shows concrete statistics on how many customers moved from one stage to the next of your sales funnel. To access this report, navigate to Conversions > Ecommerce > Shopping Behavior.

Here, you’ll see how many sessions occurred during a set period of time, how many of those left without shopping (looking at products), how many sessions with products views, how many left without adding anything to their cart, how many did something to their cart, how many of those abandoned it, how many initiated checkout, how many abandoned checkout, and ultimately how many sessions ended with a purchases.
How to use Shopping Behavior Analysis Report?

Having a clear idea of where you’re losing visitors in your funnel can give you insight on how to fix it. Lots of product views, but mostly leaving adding anything to their cart? Evaluate the strength of your product description, and/or consider adding product reviews, testimonials, or tutorials right on the page.

Too many people abandoning their cart without checkout? Perhaps throw in free shipping, volume discounts, or compare to check if your prices are competitive.

Checkouts initiated but then abandoned? Simplify and streamline the process. Eliminate hidden fees and surprises. Make it easy for them to buy.

In case if you have a large percentage of sessions which do not include any shopping activity, that means you have a low-quality traffic. You should check if you’re targeting the right audience.

Checkout Behavior Analysis a.k.a. “The Checkout Funnel”.

This report functions much like the Shopping Behavior, but it focuses strictly on the steps involved in your checkout. To access this report, navigate to Conversions > Ecommerce > Checkout Behavior.

With the Checkout Behavior report, you can see concrete numbers for each step: how many made it step one, what was the drop-off for step two, and so on.
How to use Checkout Behavior Analysis Report?

If you see, for example, that the bulk of your abandoned carts occur at payment options, perhaps you need to provide more choice for your customers. If too many are walking at the shipping page, you might need to offer cheaper options. Use the data to give your customers what they seem to be craving.

Other possible causes for checkout abandonment:

Website timeout

Checkout crashed (asking users to start checkout all over again)

Shipping charges are too high

Delivery time is too long

Limited payment options

Payment is not processing or declining

Errors while filling out the form

Product Performance Analysis.

Through enhanced ecommerce “Product Performance” report you can track sales performance and shopping behavior of your products. For instance, you can track the best performing products or you can click on “Product Category (Enhanced Ecommerce)” a take a look which product category performing better. To access this report, navigate to Conversions > Ecommerce > Product Performance.

Conclusion

Data Analysis is an integral part of Ecommerce and it is a vital tool that will help increase your business by getting the facts and by pointing out your weak spots. Enhanced Ecommerce gives you the reports and helps in analysis of the factors that matter the most. So what are you waiting for? Sign up now by clicking this link and let's get started on Google Analytics. Once you are signed up we will help you create an account or assist you on your existing account. If your website is older we can provide one of our complimentary theme to take advantage of this feature or you can buy one of our premium themes as well. 

If feel that you want to dive more into the Analytics world to get a better understanding, we suggest checking out this free online Ecommerce Analytics course from Google.

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