How to Measure Content Performance

When it comes to creating high quality content, it is imperative that you understand how to measure content performance. This helps you gauge how successful it was. In other words, learning how to measure content performance will help you understand how effective or ineffective your content is. It can also help you make educated decisions on how to improve in the future. This article is going to give you the tools you need to measure your contents performance and how to interpret content data metrics.

Table of Contents

Content Marketing Metrics

To understand how to measure content, you must first understand the content marketing metrics you need to measure. There are various metrics to consider but a few of the most important to consider are traffic and user behavior, engagement, revenue, and SEO outcomes.

Traffic Sources

When it comes to measuring content performance, tracking user behavior in relation to your website it essential to understanding how your content is fairing with your audience. First of all, knowing where your users are finding your content from is extremely important. This is called traffic sources. Traffic sources will allow you to narrow down the marketing channels to see which of your content is showing the most prosperity.

Social Media

Let’s say that you have invested your in time and energy into building a following on social media pages such as Instagram, Facebook, and Pinterest for your website. However, you are trying to figure out which ones of these social media platforms is pulling in the most people to your website. Measuring traffic sources is great in finding out which social media platforms are doing that the best. Now let’s say your marketing platforms range from social media and online ads, to paper flyers and billboards. Measuring traffic sources can help you compare your online marketing efforts to your offline ones. Either way, you will have a better understanding of how the content you’re creating is driving in more viewers and which of your marketing platforms is the most successful at doing so.

User Behavior

User Behavior is another essential content metric to consider measuring. Measuring user behavior gives you a greater understanding of what your website viewers are most interested in, how they are spending time on your website, and if they are sharing your website with others. User behavior metrics include:

number of page views
average time spent on these pages
how many users are visiting your site per day
the number of pages your users visit on your site per session
the number of new vs the number of returning website users

Measuring user behavior can help you determine what content is holding most of your users attention. If your content is reaching new users, it can help show how long your content keep your users engaged. The goal with measuring user behavior is using it to make changes to your site that will maximize the amount of users on your site. This also can maximize how long they stay on your website. Learn more about your users so you can create content that better aligns with their interests!

Engagement Metrics

Increasing engagement is a huge part of creating effective search engine optimization habits. Engagement means everything. It is a content marketing metric that explicitly shows how many of your website users are truly engaged with the content you create. In the realm of social media, knowing your engagement rate is essential. Examples of engagement metrics include likes and comments, mentions, and the number of shares or reposts. Good content performance will show high engagement from your followers.

Likes and Engagement Indication

The likes your content gets are important to know as they usually indicate how many of your users find your content to be visually or aesthetically pleasing. Usually though, having a large number of likes is not always the greatest indicator of an engaged audience. Comments, mentions and reposts and shares are the most important engagement indicators because they require more effort on the followers or website users part since they take up more time. The number of comments your users leave is a metric that shows that your content is not just visually pleasing, but insights a reaction or a response out of your users. In other words, your content sparked a conversation and got people talking.

Reposts and Shares

Measuring content such as reposts, mentions, and shares show the ultimate sign of engagement. They prove that your content is worth sharing with others and they indicate that your users found your content so valuable that they wish to share it with their followers and friends. When it comes to engagement metrics, you should strive to have high reposts, shares, and or mentions because high quality content is always shareable content.

Revenue

If your site is selling a product or service that uses Google AdSense or sponsorship commission from the content placed on your site, measuring your revenue metrics will help you indicate how effective your content is at making money. Revenue metrics include aspects such as return on investment, conversion rate, and the number of new leads generated from your content.

ROI

Return on investment simply means how much money your site made in comparison to the amount it spent. If you spent more money on these areas than you made, it could be an indicator that your content is missing something. Content performance and ROI are closely linked. Perhaps you should cut down on those costs or change something about your content strategy to gain more revenue.

Conversion Rates

Conversion rate metrics indicate how many users were enticed enough to perform the action that was indicated. This could be signing up for a free trial, creating an account, or providing their email for a discount. Low conversion rates may indicate that the offer or content was not appealing to users and to perhaps make a necessary change.

Search Engine Optimization Outcomes

Search Engine Optimization metrics, otherwise known as SEO metrics, are important to see how your website is fairing with search engines. SEO metrics to consider measuring are organic website traffic, keyword rankings, and dwell time. Website traffic will help you determine the percentage of users are finding your website through search engines. Your website’s PageRank, a term that describes your standing in the search results, is an important metric that will help you understand why your website traffic may be lower or higher in comparison to other sites. Keyword rankings are important to know because they help you determine your rankings in a specific search term that your users are searching up. Dwell time will help you figure how long your users are spending on your site before moving to somewhere else.

Content Performance Measuring Services

Now that you understand what metrics are the most important to consider when measuring content performance, you can now make a selection on what content measuring services will be most beneficial to your content goals. There are many different options out there. The two services indicated below are two that you should definitely take advantage of.

SEO Design Chicago

See Design Chicago can help your website prosper in a number of ways from website development, link building, content writing services, and of course content performance measurement services. We can help you analyze what content you’ve already is created is prospering, what content is lacking, and in what specific areas you can improve. In addition, SEO Design Chicago can help in a variety of other ways. We specialize in online advertising and social media management services, search engine optimization analysis, and website redesign assistance, in conjunction to other amazing services to help you create a better website.

Google Analytics

Although not a content performance measuring service per se, Google Analytics is a service that can give you valuable data on how to improve your content. Google analytics is a database that gives great demographic data. This includes who your audience is, what words they are searching on search engines, and what topics are trending among your audience. Google Analytics can help with content performance analytics through helping you know what your audience likes, and thus help you base your content off of that data. They are also a great service in helping you transform your search engine optimization efforts.

The Bottom Line

Creating high quality and shareable content is the key to your website’s success. To know that your content is supreme, you will have to measure its performance. To do so, you must understand where the users are coming from and how they are spending time on your site. You must also take notice of the number of likes, comments, and shares your content is accumulating. This data informs you on what content your viewers find visually appealing. This also shows what content incites some sort of reaction or desire to comment and what content they find interesting enough to share with others. This happens by reposting or mentioning your content to their following.

Get the Best ROI

Revenue metrics are imperative to make sure you are receiving an adequate ROI. How many of your users are becoming customers? SEO analytics will you help to see how your website is fairing in relation to PageRank. Lastly, Google analytics and SEO Design Chicago can help you measure your content performance metrics in the best way possible.