Having a blog for your small business is a fantastic way to drive more web visitors, boost brand awareness, and bring in those much-wanted prospects. But, do you actually know what metrics to use to determine the success of your blog posts? If you’re looking to learn more about blog metrics or blog KPI’s, you’re in the right place.
Too many marketers focus entirely on vanity KPIs, like social media likes and blog page views. And, while these metrics can help with your content marketing efforts, they’re not the be-all and end-all decision-making tools.
Way more significant metrics to think about are the ones that have a direct impact on your bottom line. KPIs like lead conversion rate and email subscriber counts are far more likely to influence your business’s growth that page views.
Let’s dig a little deeper into the best metrics you can utilize to measure your blogs’ success.
1. Blog traffic
Traffic to your blog has so much more in it than simple page views. You need to look at where those page views are coming from, and exactly where they’re going next.
Are the majority of your blog views coming from organic searches? If so, what specific keywords or key phrases are bringing viewers in? Or maybe your traffic comes mainly from Facebook or other social media? But, which platforms exactly? Knowing these basic web metrics allows you to streamline your marketing strategy to focus on what’s working for each post.
More than merely page views, you need to be looking at blog success metrics like pages per session, bounce rate, and how long people spend on your site (average visit duration). Look for these numbers in your Google Analytics account. For an advanced web analytics tool with a wealth of valuable information, opt for Statly. Get this 3-part video course to see how Statly will help your business turn more random traffic into sales.
Now, back to the success metrics of your blog. How do you increase the number of pages each user will see? Increasing the number of pages per session, means that people will read more of your content. There are a lot of plugins and strategies that can help you increase the number of pages per session. Let’s look at a few of the top options:
- Make your blog mobile responsive and mobile friendly. This point is an important one. You’d be shocked how many blogs and small business websites are not optimized for mobile traffic, which in a lot of cases is the majority of traffic.
- Make navigating your blog easy. Don’t make browsing your website too challenging, or visitors will leave. Have a structured menu, use sidebar widgets and add related posts after each blog post.
- Add Calls to Action (CTAs). Adding CTAs and subscription forms to your pages and posts will entice users to take another step before leaving your blog. CTAs will also help increase the number of subscribers to your list.
2. Post engagement
Now, another important blog metric is posts engagement, either on-site or off-site. Let’s look at social networks first. The more that your blog posts are shared on social media, the more visitors will start talking about your brand. Likes, comments, and shares on social network sites all boil down to even more traffic, and raised brand awareness.
You should also be motivating site visitors to engage with your blog posts directly. Allowing readers the to interact with your posts (like through comments or email contact), can help to carry on the conversation.
3. List growth
Is list growth a way to measure blog success? It definitely is! Subscribers are qualified visitors who have express interest in your brand or products, so they’re like gold for your online business. These are the people who enjoy your posts enough to want to hear from you again, and potentially receive promotions and offers. Your blog subscribers typically come in two forms – RSS and email.
Although RSS subscribers are a good indicator of how many readers want to keep in touch, email subscribers are a step up. These type of readers have allowed you to contact them directly through email. They enjoyed your material so much that they want it to appear in their emails.
Be very conscious which blog posts are generating the highest number of email subscribers. Use these articles as guides for future blogs to give a boost to your email list.
How do you captivate these prospective subscribers? Look at this post we wrote around the topic of growing your email list. It has some cool tips that will help you get traction.
4. Number of leads and lead conversion rate
Your lead conversion rate is arguably the most important metric of blog success.
At the end of the day, we want our content to generate more targeted leads, don’t we? Blogs can be a great source of visit-to-lead, and lead-to-customer conversions– so monitoring these KPIs is fundamental.
And, don’t forget to keep the buying cycle in mind when crafting your posts. Read this article about how to create content with the buyer’s journey in mind. Fill your posts with compelling content and instill value and trust in your blog readers.
Take this process a step further and observe the complete funnel. Where are your leads originating from? Social media? Email campaigns? Direct Google searches? Look at what types of content your readers land on.
Look at this sort of qualitative data and you may find that you have blog posts that are not attracting a large number of views but account for your strongest lead conversion rates. See how you can improve the content structure and CTAs to convert more anonymous blog readers into subscribers or leads.
Look at how you’re promoting these posts and make an effort to split test elements (like the title or featured image) to really make the most of them. Don’t forget – leads are what you need.
To double down on these important blog success metrics, you’ll need two basic tools.
- Statly. Statly allows you to track every visitor that lands on your website. With Statly, you’ll be able to visualize a complete, meaningful funnel – where your blog readers came from, which pieces of content they read, what actions they took next.
- Google Optimize. Whether it’s a custom-tailored message at checkout or a different blog post title, Google Optimize shows you which user experience works best with your site visitors. Google Optimize is a must-have A/B testing tool.
How do you measure your blog’s success
So, what do you think?
How can you measure the success of your own blog? What’s important to your business and your bottom line? How would you weigh individual blog success metrics?
And, finally, are you ready to let go of the idea that high blog traffic equals success? Can you imagine your blog succeed without the need of thousands of new monthly visitors?