Web analytics (or web analytics) is the analysis activity through which we aim to understand the data on a website.
Born since the dawn of the Internet with a more technical than marketing key, it has quickly become a key pawn in online promotion because of the possibilities of analysis that can be conducted on actions validated by numbers, measurement and empirical observations.
In essence, Web Analytics is about measuring, collecting, and reporting web data so that through careful analysis we can understand and optimise the usability of a website, better understand the behaviours of its users, and simplify its navigation.
But Web Analytics is not just a process for measuring web traffic, it can be used as a tool for business and market research and for evaluating and improving website effectiveness.
Web data analytics can also help companies measure the results of print or broadcast advertising campaigns (so-called traditional media), but even more frequently they can be used to estimate how traffic to a website changes after the launch of a new online advertising campaign.
Such analyses provide information on the number of visitors to a Web site and the number of page views. They help measure traffic and popularity trends, highlight which users’ most frequent paths and most popular searches (just to name a few actions).
In general, data are collected based on anonymous browsing sessions.
When analysing and critically reading the data, it is important to define the KPIs (Key Performance Indicators) that are of most interest to us to evaluate the performance of our site and our online business.
There are numerous Web Analytics tools, among them the one undoubtedly best known by marketers and strategists is Google Analytics, which allows detailed and in-depth analysis on traffic data, online user behaviour, performance of activities and online marketing campaigns.
