Web Analytics for Banks, Three Reasons to Start Today
This one I don’t get! There aren’t many, but I still run across a few banking websites not running web analytics. Credit unions are the worst offenders, by the way.Why is this?Why not throw Google Analytics on there for free? If nothing else, have it there knowing you’ll always have a benchmark should you ever need it one day. Which leads me right into...
The three reasons to implement web analytics today!
Who’s Been Sleeping In My Bed?
1. Benchmarking
I’ve said before in posts, if you don’t have web analytics installed on your website then don’t talk to me. When I am asked to come in for an assessment I need data. Sure I could pore over log files, but that takes a significant amount of time (the banks' money) and rarely does it allow me to push up the data in a manner needed by my customers to make the higher level business decisions.One day you or a consultant is going to be called in to answer some very tough questions about a past event or what to expect during an upcoming seasonal event important to your financial institution.
No web analytics = No insight = GUESSWORK
Whose Phone Numbers Is This?
2. Attribution
- Do you know the makeup of search traffic vs. referrals vs. direct visits?
- Are your targeted SEO keywords actually the ones driving the most traffic?
- After your homepage, which is the most common first page? Does that page represent your banks in the best light?
This list goes on. You get the point. Even the simplest of analytics implementations allows you to go back and answer questions you didn’t know you needed to answer.One of my favorite questions I pose to my clients. "Which site drives the most traffic to you? No wait, which site drives the most converting traffic to you? Oh, it’s the ACME School District in the neighboring county?" Well it’s time to see what’s going on with their website and thank the author of that inbound link, but not for the SEO value of the link. I’ll take a converting link over a hundred non-converting links all day.
But how would you know?
Let’s Be More Than Friends!
3. Action Time
You’re ready to move to that next step with your website, right? But what does that mean? Can banks really actively impact online banking customers?It should mean that you’re ready to confidently move those website KPIs you defined for your site and your marketing plan for the bank. Now is when the analytics for banking really kicks in. You will start tagging your campaigns, building those advanced segmentation reports and tweaking those budget allocations. From there you will grow into the next level of testing, redesigning and experimenting with new concepts.The nice part of the “action time” is the immediate feedback you’ll receive. You can quickly can the losers and mutate the winners into more powerful tactics.
This iterative process will put your bank years ahead of your competition in a matter of months.
This Is Some Serious Crack!
Web analytics gets addictive.
Well maybe to those of us who live in that lonely chasm between marketing and technology/IT. I love it here. The impact a smart business analyst can have on your bank’s bottom line is an order of magnitude more than you could ever spend on the software needed to empower that analyst.But don’t wait for that analyst to be hired or contracted.
Install the analytics now so when he does come on board he can quickly knock it out of the park.