Wouldn’t it be great if you could know exactly what your customers were thinking when they came to your website?
What if you knew exactly what they were looking for and how they were behaving on the site?
Fortunately, Google Analytics provides us with a feature called Site Search that captures data from the Search Form on your site and integrates that data into the rest of your site analytics (FYI… this works with nearly every search form. You don’t need to be using Google’s search bar on your site).
Site Search is like a crystal ball into the minds of your website visitors.
Yet, unfortunately, most people don’t even know it exists.
In the short video below, I’m going to show you why Site Search is so important and how you can start tracking search on your site in only about 30 seconds.
Once you’ve activated the Site Search feature, you can find all your search data by going to the Content menu and choosing Site Search.
With Site Search enabled, you can better understand what people are looking for on your site and then try to do a better job giving it to them.
Analysis of your search data will help you uncover golden insights and opportunities such as these:
- Understand behavior patterns of people who use your search form compared to people who don’t use search. Do they convert better? Do they spend more money? If the answer is yes, then think about how you can encourage more people to search on your site?
- Learn which products or content people are searching for on your site that you are not providing? If lots of people are searching for the same thing, then that provides you with a great opportunity to give it to them and make more people happy with your site (and probably make more money).
- If lots of people are searching for the same types of products using your search form, maybe you should move those products to a more prominent place on your site. There are probably other people who want those products as well but who simply didn’t search. It might be worth testing?
As you can see, Site Search is an amazing tool that gives us incredible insights into the minds of our customers. It’s something that every data-driven marketer needs to learn to use.
Are you using Site Search in your Google Analytics? What are the best insights that you’ve drawn from your Site Search data?
And, if you don’t have it set up yet, then go do it right now. It’ll literally only take a minute.