(5-minute Read) 
Having a website that grabs (and holds) a visitor’s attention is a big plus in today’s hyper-competitive online landscape.
But that begs the question: What’s the best way to find out if you’re getting the attention you need to grow your brand?
This is where metrics come into play. It’s a great way to measure your online presence, find out where things are going right, and also snoop out the areas that could use improvement.
Let’s explore the metrics of user engagement.
What is user engagement?
Simply put, it means that the folks visiting your site (or “users”) are enjoying your content and sticking around. The more they’re engaged by your content, the higher the odds they’ll become customers.
Websites with high engagement are more likely to attract and retain visitors, turning them into loyal followers, subscribers, and customers.
On the other hand, sites with low engagement struggle with visitors leaving without taking any actions. To ensure your website operates as a powerful marketing and sales tool, you’re going to want to focus on increasing those engagement levels.
What Are the Metrics of User Engagement?
Engagement is the holy grail for brands these days. Companies are constantly searching for ways to understand and improve it.
User engagement metrics provide a great place to start – they measure different aspects of your website to help you determine how successfully you’re drawing people in and holding their attention. By using these metrics, you can unlock valuable insights to better understand whether or not your marketing strategies are working, and make changes as needed.
Here are some key engagement metrics to consider:
Page Views
This is one of the most common metrics. It’s simple and it can open the door to gaining a lot of insight into how your website is performing.
Put simply, page views measure how many times a webpage is loaded or reloaded.
Think of it like a popularity contest. Say you’ve got one product page that’s getting way more views than the other ones. Why? Why is that one product page performing so well? And why are the other product pages lagging behind?
Page views lets you know there’s something going on, and it can help you to dig deeper for the answers you need.
Then, there are “unique page views.” This counts the number of times each webpage is clicked by a unique user – versus the page that’s been visited by the same user 100 times (no idea why they’d do that; maybe they’re just having a bad day).
Tracking unique page views can give a clearer picture of how many people are interested in your product or service. And that can help you make more informed decisions about everything from marketing campaigns to product launches.
Conversion Rate
This is the percentage of people who complete an action while on your website’s page. The action itself can vary, depending on your company’s goals and strategies, but include:
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- Making a purchase
- Signing up for your email newsletter
- Landing on your website’s product page
- Registering for a free trial
- Downloading a tool, app, or ebook
But what percentage are you aiming for? Well, numbers vary depending on your industry of course, but the average conversion rate for ecommerce websites is between 1% and 4%.
Calculating your conversion rate is fairly straightforward: Take your total number of conversions (those sales, downloads, sign-ups, etc.) and divide them by the number of visitors – then multiply by 100 for the percentage.
For example, say 600 people visit your site, and 30 complete an action.
30 divided by 600 (times 100 for the percentage) = 5%. Not bad!
Clickthrough Rate
Clickthrough rate, or CTR, measures how often people who see your ads, listings, and keywords end up clicking them to visit your site. It’s a valuable metric in determining whether your keywords and ads are resonating with your target audience.
While a high CTR isn’t a guarantee of success, it can act as a sign that your marketing is engaging and relevant to those who are seeing it. Understanding your clickthrough rate can help you optimize your online strategies and drive more traffic to your website.
User Stickiness
In today’s competitive market, getting a new customer is only the beginning of the battle. Retaining customers is the key to long-term success – and “stickiness” helps reveal your returning users by measuring how often they keep coming back to your website again and again.
The more often people return to your website, the more likely they’ll become loyal customers. And that’s when the real benefits kick in.
When a customer buys something from you, it increases the likelihood they’ll come back and buy again. On average, returning customers spend a staggering 67% more than new customers. And loyal customers will often stick with your brand for years to come.
To calculate your website’s stickiness, divide your daily active users by your monthly active users (and once again multiply by 100 for percentage). That will tell you how well you’re retaining users over time.
As always, different industries pull in different numbers, but if you’re averaging 20% stickiness or higher (for every 100 users, at least 20 of them are actively visiting your website every day), then you’re doing good.
Optimize Your User Engagement with Smart Link Solutions
By analyzing data such as page views and conversion rates, you can gain invaluable insights into how your audience is interacting with your website.
Are they simply browsing or actually taking action? Are they discovering new products and services or leaving after just a few seconds?
The answers to questions like these can help you identify opportunities for growth.
When it comes to optimizing user engagement, look no further than Smart Link Solutions. Our team of experts is dedicated to helping you harness the power of these metrics, and take your online presence to the next level.
Click here to start your journey!