Total Technology Costs: $0.00
Total Setup Time: <1 hour
Estimated Wait time (data collection): 96 Hours (minimum)
Digitalization has made having a modern, efficient website is crucial for any entrepreneur, even non-technical, wanting to remain relevant in their industry. This guide focuses on leveraging free, powerful tools to gain insights into how your target audience(s) interacts with your website, understand acquisition channels, and improve user experience. By integrating Google Analytics, Microsoft Clarity, and optional Lead Mining tools with your CRM, you'll gather invaluable data without needing pulling out your credit card. These tools are not just about collecting data; they're focused on helping you make informed decisions that enhance your website's effectiveness and streamlining your audiences journey.
About The Build:
Analytics Tool (Google Analytics)
Google Analytics is the cornerstone for understanding website traffic and user behavior. It's crucial for identifying which acquisition efforts are paying off and how users interact with your site. This data forms the basis for all subsequent optimization efforts, tracking information like; visitor acquisition sources, user behavior (e.g., pages visited, session duration), and conversion data. Adobe Analytics offers similar capabilities with more advanced segmentation and integration options but at a prohibitive cost.
Behavioral Analytics Tool (Microsoft Clarity)
Clarity offers in-depth insights into how visitors use your site, highlighting what they click on, how far they scroll, and where they spend their time. This information is invaluable for improving user experience and eliminating friction points by producing heatmaps, session recordings and click tracking. Subscription services like Hotjar or Mouseflow can be used as alternatives, providing similar heatmap and session recording functionalities but with varying limitations on their free plans.
CRM Tool (Your Cloud-Based CRM)
Integrating your CRM to your website allows for the seamless tracking of leads and customer interactions. This enables personalized marketing efforts and a deeper understanding of customer behavior patterns, pain points and persona-level insights through tracking customer interaction data, lead conversion tracking, and targeted user journey data. If you have not yet selected a CRM, we recommend one of Hubspot, Salesforce or Dynamics 365, each offering robust CRM functionalities with different integration capabilities and pricing.
Lead Mining Tools (Leadfeeder or Leadinfo - Optional)
Though not essential, these tools add a layer of insight by identifying potential B2B leads visiting your site by collecting the visitors IP address and match it against their database of company IP's. This type of tool is valuable to companies seeking government, large enterprises, and mid-market clients. They help tailor your content and outreach strategies to industries or specific companies showing interest in your offerings. They collect company information of website visitors, their website engagement levels, and potential lead contact data. A few alternatives to the aforementioned solutions are Zoominfo, Clearbit and Albacross. They offer similar functionalities, providing B2B insights based on visitor IP addresses, though they do not offer any free capabilities.
The Recipe (Website Technology Stack):
Ingredients:
Google Analytics
Microsoft Clarity
Your CRM (Customer Relationship Management)
Leadfeeder OR Leadinfo (optional)
Instructions:
Google Analytics Setup [15 min]
Click here to register or login with google analytics.
Copy your "G- ID" to your website platform. Use this link if you need help finding your G- ID or instructions on where to input your ID in your website platform.
Microsoft Clarity Setup [10 min]
Click here to find the Clarity app for your website builder.
Sign into your Microsoft account via the integration app.
Click here to go to the Clarity projects page (https://clarity.microsoft.com/projects).
Click settings (gear icon), Setup tab, Google Analytics.
Sign into Google to link your Analytics account.
CRM Tracking Setup [20 min]
Login to your CRM.
Go to your search bar and lookup "tracking code", and click the link.
Copy the code. Select the corresponding guide to adding code to your website:
Wordpress Guide + WPCode App (Easiest way to add code snippets)
Shopify Guide + XO Code App (Easiest way to add code snippets)
Typically, this type of code should be placed under the "head" tag.
If prompted, click save or confirm.
Setup Your Chosen Lead Mining Tool (Optional) [15 min]
Follow your setup guide
Connect to your CRM
Connect to Google Analytics
How to Use This Website Technology Stack:
Congratulations on modernizing your website technology stack! Now that Google Analytics, Microsoft Clarity, your CRM, and possibly Lead Mining tools like Leadfeeder or Leadinfo are integrated, here’s a few ways you can turn that data into actionable insights:
Use macro data from Google Analytics and Microsoft Clarity to initially assess the general performance and identify broad issues affecting your website. Keep in mind, this level of analysis might include data from non-relevant sessions (e.g., bots, non-ICPs, sales reps from other companies). To fix these issues, you'll someone with technical skills to need to modify your website.
Large Contentful Paint (LCP)
Formula: Measure the render time of the largest content element visible in the viewport.
Summary: LCP assesses loading performance by marking the point in the page load timeline when the main content has likely loaded—a critical metric for understanding perceived load speed. You can find this in your Microsoft Clarity main dashboard.
Troubleshooting:
Optimize image sizes and formats.
Utilize lazy loading for non-critical resources.
Improve server response times and resource delivery efficiency.
First Input Delay (FID)
Formula: Time from a user's first interaction with a page (i.e., when they click a link, tap on a button) to the time when the browser is actually able to respond to that interaction.
Summary: FID measures the responsiveness of your site, highlighting the user's experience when trying to interact with unresponsive pages. You can find this in your Microsoft Clarity main dashboard.
Troubleshooting:
Minimize (or defer) JavaScript execution.
Remove any non-critical third-party scripts.
Use a web worker if heavy computation is needed.
Page Load Time
Formula: Total time from the start of the page load to when the entire page has been rendered on the screen.
Summary: Directly impacts user satisfaction and engagement, with faster load times leading to better user experiences. You can find this in Google Analytics under Page Timings report > Explorer & Map Overlay tabs > Site Usage subtab.
Troubleshooting:
Optimize content delivery with compression and caching.
Streamline the number of HTTP requests.
Ensure your hosting solution meets your bandwidth and resource needs.
Cumulative Layout Shift (CLS)
Formula: Sum total of all individual layout shift scores for every unexpected layout shift that occurs during the entire lifespan of the page.
Summary: CLS measures the stability of your site, indicating how often users experience unexpected shifts in page content. You can find this in your Microsoft Clarity main dashboard.
Troubleshooting:
Ensure images and other media have defined dimensions.
Load ads or embeds after the main content.
Avoid inserting new content above existing content, unless in response to a user interaction.
Transitioning to micro data analysis, the focus turns to segmenting user experience data by persona, conversion status, and further into converted vs. won categories for targeted and comparative analysis. This approach aims to uncover patterns and key signals within your target audience's journey on your website. You'll need to map CRM-registered sessions of specific personas to their corresponding sessions in Clarity/Analytics may require some elbow grease. Once mapped, create distinct segments in Clarity for each primary audience of interest. The essence of this approach is ensuring that each analyzed session is accurately associated with a defined target persona, enabling actionable insights to enhance user experience. Here’s how you can structure and leverage these insights:
Clickthrough Rate (CTR) by Persona
Formula: (Number of Clicks on a Visual Element / Number of Views of the Element) * 100
Summary: Measures how effectively visual elements capture attention and prompt action, segmented by persona. High CTR indicates successful engagement. Assess this through targeted persona(s) segmentation in Microsoft Clarity.
Troubleshooting:
Enhance the visibility and appeal of low-CTR elements.
A/B test different designs or placements.
Ensure clarity in the value proposition of clickable elements.
Churn Points by Persona
Formula: Identify common last engagement points before a churn, using Clarity heatmaps and session recordings.
Summary: Pinpoints where and why potential conversions falter, offering insights into content or navigational elements that may not resonate with specific personas.
Troubleshooting:
Optimize content and navigation based on churn point analysis.
Introduce engagement hooks or reassurances at identified churn points.
Leverage session replay insights to understand the context of churn.
Website Real Estate Optimization
Formula: Analysis of heatmap engagement to identify hot and cold points on the website.
Summary: Assesses how effectively your website’s layout engages users, indicating areas of high interest versus sections that are consistently skipped or underutilized. Assess this through targeted persona(s) segmentation in Microsoft Clarity.
Troubleshooting:
Reallocate or redesign underperforming sections based on heatmap insights.
Test variations of content presentation to enhance engagement in cold areas.
Prioritize prime web real estate for high-value content and CTAs.
CTA Conversion Effectiveness
Formula: (Number of Conversions from a CTA / Total Number of CTA Impressions) * 100
Summary: Evaluates which Calls-To-Action are successfully driving users to take the desired action, segmented by persona and conversion status. Assess this through targeted persona(s) segmentation in Microsoft Clarity.
Troubleshooting:
Refine messaging or design of underperforming CTAs.
Consider the placement and context of CTAs within the user journey.
Tailor CTAs more closely to the interests and motivations of each persona.
Bounce Rate Analysis by Persona
Formula: (Total One-Page Visits / Total Entries to the Site) * 100, segmented by persona
Summary: Identifies the percentage of visitors by persona who leave after viewing just one page, signaling potential mismatches between visitor expectations and site content. I recommend segmenting down to converted vs churned visitors to get a better grasp on .
Troubleshooting:
Align landing page content more closely with persona expectations.
Improve the immediacy and relevance of content presented to first-time visitors.
Optimize page load speed to prevent early departures.
Acquisition Source Efficiency
Formula: Conversion rate analysis by acquisition source (google analytics), segmented by persona.
Summary: Reveals which channels are most effective at bringing in valuable traffic that aligns with your target personas and their conversion journey. I recommend further segmenting your personas by conversion outcome to get a better grasp on what source is driving action-ready conversions versus ideal persona visits alone.
Troubleshooting:
Allocate more resources to high-performing channels.
Refine messaging and targeting strategies for underperforming sources.
Explore new channels that may align with persona preferences.
Engagement and Conversion Journey Analysis
Formula: Comparison of total visits vs return visits and average visits to conversion, segmented by persona and conversion status.
Summary: Offers insights into how frequently users visit before converting and the role of repeated engagement in the conversion process. If you have a robust data set to work with, start to identify commonalities between visits (e.g. visit 1 dataset, visit 2 dataset). This can be a great exercise to tie engagement factors to their stage in their customer lifecycle.
Troubleshooting:
Develop strategies to increase return visits through engaging content or offers.
Analyze the touchpoints and content consumed prior to conversion to enhance the journey.
Implement retargeting campaigns to encourage return visits and nurture leads.
Author's Notes:
For sites with high traffic, streamline session mapping by setting up an API connection between your CRM and Clarity. Guide on API structuring coming soon.
Cross-Analysis of Conversion vs. Churn: Examine the difference in the journey of visitors who converted versus those who churned. Key differences often lie in their buying cycle stage. Look for indicators like scroll depth and engagement levels, then tailor CTAs to offer value throughout their lifecycle.
We've moved past session time in favor of heatmaps and session recordings for more precise insights into engagement and pinpointing churn moments.
Optimize for both mobile and desktop. If resources are limited, prioritize the platform preferred by your key audience.
Utilize Google Ads’ segmentation for detailed analysis of CRM-driven campaigns.
High volumes of repeat dead clicks suggest users are looking for more content in those areas.
Rage clicks indicate frustration with slow response times. This signals a need for faster website element reactions.
Customer Journey Analysis (Continued). In order to keep this article shorter in length, I excluded the following metrics as they focus on more in-depth analysis. See the following:
Total vs. Return Visits: Enhance content to boost repeat visits.
Average Visits Before Conversion: Streamline the journey to reduce steps to conversion.
Persona-Specific Engagement: Tailor content and CTAs to each persona for higher relevance.
Content Engagement Depth: Use Clarity to adjust content based on actual engagement.
CTA Conversion Effectiveness: Refine CTAs based on performance data to improve conversion rates.
If you have any comments or questions about this stack, or if you have substituted or added any technology, let us know!
Comments