Martins Groza, Author at Blog

When it comes to selling stuff online, the more you know about the specifics of your business, the better your chances of maximizing your profit. To help you learn as much as you can without investing in costly analytics tools, this post will teach you how to use data segments - one of the more advanced features offered by Google Analytics, which will help you get your hands on in-depth data about your store's performance, marketing activity results, and user behavior on your website. This is our second post about using Analytics. In case you've missed it or feel like you could do with a recap, feel free to read our beginner's guide to Google Analytics for ecommerce. Otherwise let's cut to the chase! How does it work? Simply put, data segmentation lets you take your analytics data to the next level. Instead of looking at data about all your visitors at once, segmentation lets you filter analytics data based on various parameters and metrics ranging from user demographics or geo location to channels through which they arrived or values of their purchases. In other words, segmentation lets you create highly specific groups or traffic segments based on nearly all of the parameters or metrics found in Analytics, and you can then analyze and compare these segments using nearly all of the reports available in Analytics. If you're an ecommerce owner with a highly specific target audience, segmentation can help you filter out visitors that belong to your target audience, and this is just the tip of the iceberg. Here are some of the tasks that can be made easier using segmentation: getting a better idea of where your target audience is located; seeing which products specific visitor groups view/buy the most; checking which marketing campaigns/traffic channels generate better results; comparing performance of different types of visitors. All users segment. Before going into using segments, let's go over what happens when you don't segment. By default, there is always one segment selected. This segment is called All Users, and you can see it above the data graph in most sections of Google Analytics: The All Users segment consists of all website visitors within your specified time period. If you don't apply a more specific segment, all the reports found in Analytics will display data about all website visitors. You can slice and dice your segments using any of the reports tabs found along the left-hand side of the platform: Important to remember: Some report tabs, like the Adwords, Search Console, and All Traffic -> Referrals tabs within Acquisition are designed to only show data about specific groups of visitors, meaning that these report tabs will automatically apply an additional filter to whatever segment(s) you've applied. You can see if the data sample you're looking at covers your entire segment by checking the percentage of sessions displayed below the segment title. If your data sample is not using the entire segment, you'll see a percentage that is less than 100%. Using data segments Now that we've covered the basics, let's get into data segmentation 101. To change/add segments, click on All Users, +Add Segment or anywhere in the area: This will open a list of segments for you to choose from: All the predefined segments have titles that pretty much describe what you'll get, but you can also hover over them to see a more detailed list of the filters used in each segment: Some of the segments that might be more useful for ecommerce include: Made a Purchase - users with at least one transaction; Converters - users with at least one conversion or transaction; New Users - only new visitors; Returning Users - only returning visitors; Sessions with Transactions - only sessions with a transaction; Sessions with Conversions - only sessions with a conversion or transaction. You can add additional segments by clicking on them. The selected segments will show up on top and become highlighted in the segments list: Click Apply in the bottom-left corner to reload Analytics and display data for the segments you've selected. Each segment will have a different color to help you differentiate between them in any visual representation of your data: Creating custom segments Now that you know how basic segments work, let's dive into creating your own data segments. Custom-made segments are the ultimate tool if you're interested in analyzing behavior of highly specific user groups, traffic channels, or marketing campaigns, because there is only so much you can do with the predefined segments. If you want to get your hands on segments tailored to your specific needs, creating custom segments is the way to go! To create a custom segment, click the red +NEW SEGMENT in the top-left corner of the segments popup: This will open up the segment creation popup: The gray area along the right side gives you a summary of the key elements of your custom segment - number and percentage of users and sessions belonging to your segment, and a list of filters you've selected for this segment. Important to remember: The volume of users or sessions in your segment also depends on the data period you've selected. In the gray area along the left side you'll find a list of category tabs, each of which contains various filters you can use to create your own segments. Depending on your needs, you can create segments using one filter from a single tab or several filters from multiple tabs at once (eg. age group in demographics + mobile as device category in technology). Most of the filters available in these tabs also offer predefined values for you to choose from, but you might have to start typing and then delete what you wrote before you see the list, as the suggestion library can sometimes be a bit glitchy. By default, the tool is set to create segments using all the values that “contain” the phrase you've written or selected from the list of suggestions. If you want filter out only the traffic that exactly matches your value, or do the complete opposite and exclude specific values from your segment, click on the gray drop down button and select the option that best suits your needs. For example, if you want to create a traffic segment consisting of only people using iPhone 5, you have to change it to exactly matches, as the contains option would also include iPhone 5s. Now let's go through what you can do with each tab. 1. Demographics tab. Use if: you wish to create custom traffic segments based on parameters that define your visitors themselves, like their age, gender, location or interests. Example: If your target audience is within the 18-24 age group, you can use the filters in this tab to create two segments - “Women + age 18-24” and “Men + age 18-24.” To do this, simply tick the age and gender check box you want to select, name your segment in the top left corner and click “save.” You can use the Behavior -> Site Content -> All Pages report to analyze and compare audience group behavior across different pages on your site. 2. Technology tab. Use if: you wish to create segments based on the technology your visitors are using to visit your website, like the device they are using as well as operating system, browser, and screen resolution they have on their devices. You can even segment traffic coming from mobile devices based on the brand and model of their mobile phone. Example: If you're in the custom phone case business, you can use this tab to split your mobile traffic into multiple segments based on the operating system they are using. To create a segment for mobile traffic from a specific operating system, select mobile as the Device Category and Android or iOS or Blackberry, etc. as the Operating System. 3. Behavior tab. Use if: you wish to create segments based on user behavior on your site, like session duration, number of sessions a user has had, days since the last session, or the number of transactions performed by a user within the specified period or within one session. You'll notice that the options for the drop down button are different in this tab. This is because the platform uses mathematical functions to deal with numeric values, so make sure you change the = (equal) sign to another one when dealing with parameters that can have more than one value. Pro tip: Repeat purchases could be considered as a sign of loyalty, so one possible application for this tab is to create a separate segment for these users. Setting the Transactions filter to ≥ 2 will create a segment of all the users who have made at least two purchases. You can then use this segment in the Audience -> Geo -> Location report to see where these customers are located. 4. Date of first session tab. Use if: you wish to create segments based on the date of your customers' first arrival on your site. Important to remember: Analytics uses cookies to get this information, meaning that users can reset their first session date by clearing their history. 5. Traffic sources tab Use if: wish to create segments for specific marketing campaigns or traffic sources. Understanding return on investment from your marketing activities is essential in making sure you're spending your time and money wisely. You can use the filters in this tab to create a segment for each of your main traffic sources and then compare their performance using different Analytics reports. Example: Let's assume you've recently paid someone to write a promo blog post about your store on www.example.com, and you want to see if you're getting anything out of it. To create a segment for traffic coming from this site, select referral as the Medium and www.example.com as the Source. Pro tip: You can use this segment in Conversions -> Ecommerce -> Overview to see if anyone who came from this website made a purchase. 6. Enhanced ecommerce tab. Use if: you wish to create segments based on interaction with your products or the revenue your customers generated. You must have enhanced ecommerce tracking enabled to...

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