Integrating email and web analytics on a budget

You use the reports you get after sending out an email to refine your approach next time. The more value in these reports, the better those refinements.

That's one of the reasons experts have long recommended that these reports go beyond measuring the opens and clicks an email generates. They should also track what happens when recipients visit your website through a link in the email.

After all, your ultimate goal is rarely a click. It's an action you want people to take or an experience you want them to have. And usually that action or that experience takes place on your website.

So measuring the true success of your emails depends on measuring what happens at the website, too.

After all, 500 clicks and 200 sales is better than 1000 clicks and 100 sales. If you only measure clicks, you'd falsely assume the second email was the way forward.

Traditional solutions to this measurement need are to have dedicated landing pages for email campaigns. Or integration between email applications and web analytics programs.

Both approaches have their limitations for those on small budgets. Which might explain why surveys often find few people measuring conversions, ROI etc. As Simms Jenkins noted recently:

"Marketers are missing an opportunity to use metrics in order to gain the executive support needed to grow their programs. This speaks to the continued need for measuring the impact of email on the complete customer experience."

Enter Google, riding a white horse.

Google Analytics is a free web analytics service (which I use) and you can code your email links to allow it to track those who click on them.

Dave Kearney explains how in this MediaPost article. A few weeks ago, Glenn Gabe wrote a similar piece (but with more detail) and expanded on his concept in the comments to this blog post.

Of course, those with the right resources have access to the top-end email marketing services, who have integration with leading web analytics software and services built in. Pleasingly, this functionality is spreading to the value-priced email marketing services, too.

Earlier this month, for example, both MailChimp and StreamSend announced integration with Google Analytics as part of their basic services. I'm sure others will follow.

At this rate, even niche publishers like me will have no excuse for not tracking beyond the click. Which is great, no?

More on analysis | Tags: email marketing, web analytics, google analytics

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