Once upon a time, in what seems like the Internet Stone Age, content marketing was just taking off. It was “rumored” that, by writing excellent content, one could reach audiences far and wide, but very little was done to analyze the success (or otherwise) of that content. Back then, setting up a blog was a big deal. An infographic was basically unheard of. There was much less content on the Internet and the ability to reach people was supposedly quite large. Nowadays, looking back, that seems quite a credible claim, since there was so much less content available for people online. But these claims are only as good as the ancient analytics tools used to assess them. These days, we’re armed with analytics giants that give us the power to measure how far our content reaches and what resonates with our audiences.

Why care about content marketing analytics?

Content marketing analytics can help you come to your marketing game better prepared. Back in “the day” getting your content online was about the best you could hope for. Nowadays, you can figure out whether getting that content online is even worth the hassle. If you’re spending the time and resources to create content, you better make sure it has a return on investment.

What can I learn using content marketing analytics?

Not only can you get some good top-line stats from analytics, you can dig deeper to understand fundamental business and operational questions you may have.

High-level questions you can answer with analytics include:

–       how many people read my blog post?

–       how long did people take to read my post?

–       did people who read my post visit other pages on the website?

–       how did people reading my post come to the page?

More in-depth questions you can answer include:

–       what types of content do my readers enjoy?

–       what is the best way to promote the content I am creating off-site?

–       does reading a blog or article prepare people to take a goal action on- or off-site, such as subscribe to a mailing list, make a purchase or download an app?

…and there’s tons more, but we don’t want to overwhelm with lists of questions. The possibilities really are only limited by your analytics platform and data-reading capabilities.

What to do after analysing my content?

This is the critical step- taking action after you learn something new from analyzing the data you get from your analytics. You can make lots of decisions based on the data you get, such as how often to write, what topics to write on, whether you should add visuals to your content, what pages to promote within your content, whether its time for a content audit and more.

What analytics tools work well?

We’re big fans of Google Analytics, especially for beginners. Heap is great, especially for those using mobile heavily, although we recommend cutting your teeth on Google before moving up to Heap! Content marketing analysis platforms including Moz and Hubspot are also great, one-stop tools that also offer smart recommendations for businesses, although they can be expensive, especially for small businesses.