Top user engagement KPIs to measure

November 28. 2020

One of the most common ways to check the performance of your website is to measure the engagement of its visitors. However, you need to be sure which data you need to track. These key performance indicators (KPIs) can evaluate if your website is visible to the target audience and if they are able to find what they need. It will allow you to figure out what necessary adjustments you need to make, to attract and keep more visitors. Which will, eventually, help you increase the overall profitability of your website and your business. Often times, the success of your website might depend on the choice of which user engagement KPIs to measure.

The best user engagement KPIs to measure

Generally speaking, there are numerous user engagement KPIs that can show how well your website performs. However, not all reports are always useful. Much will depend on the type of business and what you want to accomplish. If you don’t have prior experience, measuring and tracking user engagement is better left to SEO professionals. It’s probably the best option if you need firm analysis and advice about how to proceed further. Based on experts’ opinions, here are some of the most popular user engagement KPIs you should track:

• Pageviews
• Number of unique visitors
• Time spent on a page
• Page depth
• Bounce rate
• Exit page metric
• Conversion Rate

Pageviews

You can use several tools to measure how often people visit your website. Google Analytics, for example, can show you some valuable insight into the traffic data. For a set time range, you can check how many visits you had. And by comparing different data, see if your website is holding up to expectations. The reports also show which pages have the most traffic, and which one requires additional optimization. To increase the number of page views, you need to:

• follow the best SEO practices
• promote your website
• make sure your website provides a great user experience

However, remember that simple quantity results have to be used in a context. Besides showing an increase or decrease in traffic, the numbers will not have much sense without other factors.

Number of unique visitors

This number shows how many people visited your website at least once. Just like the pageviews, you can check results for a given time frame. Basically, this is a useful piece of information to distinguish the number of new visitors from the number of returning visitors. However, in some cases, results will not be accurate and can give you the wrong information. For example, if several people are accessing your website from a single device, it will still be counted as one visitor. It’s all because it’s impossible to connect the unique ID with the person, rather than the device.

Time spent on a page

This metric allows you to see how much time your visitors spend on each page. Or, the average time your visitors spend on the whole website, overall. Usually, this metric is used to see how much interest visitors have in your content. If the approximate time to read the content is greater than the time users spend on it, it shows it’s not exactly engaging. However, the results are relative. If, for example, you offer a certain product, only the time spent on that particular product page is relevant. The path users take to find that product, and the time they spend while quickly looking for it may not be important. But, it can matter when you need to check how much time they spend on the whole website.

Page depth

With this KPI you track how deep your visitors scroll your pages before they leave each page. Basically, it shows how interested they might be in your content, but also if your content is easy to consume. Usually, the results are displayed as a percentage because your content will show differently across different devices. However, if you want to know the exact place, you can use pixel depth. This can be an excellent metric to discover patterns of behavior. And to check if some parts of your pages might have a negative impact on user experience.

Bounce rate

Bounce rate results show the percentage value of engagement for a given page. If someone lands on your website on a particular page and leaves without visiting anything else it counts as a 100% bounce rate. But, if they do take an action, the bounce rate will be zero. At first sight, it might look like your content is not engaging, considering they are not taking any additional action. But, it’s not so simple. If someone is just reading the content without the need to click anything, it’s still engaging. But the bounce rate will tell otherwise. There are three types of bounce rates you can check, in general:

• The overall website bounce rate
• Page-level bounce rates
• Segmented bounce rate

By tracking all of them, you can discover how efficient is your CTA (call-to-action) or how engaging is your content. This KPI is best used in combination with traffic results.

Exit page metric

Exit page metric shows the last page someone visits before leaving the website. In essence, it’s a percentage value that shows which are the top pages your visitors see right before leaving. Similarly to the bounce rate, the exit rate can show how useful the content on the page is, or if your CTA is doing its job. However, some pages have a higher exit page rate by default. For example, after order confirmation pages for products.

Conversion Rate

This rate measurement shows how successful your particular pages are in what they are made for. For example, if it’s a product page, this metric will show you how many purchases are completed. Since the primary goal is to sell a product, you can easily track if your strategies are working. Generally, you can check if your marketing strategy is attracting more potential buyers. Or, if there is a demand for a particular product.

More often than not, user engagement is in close connection with achieving whatever goa

ls your website has to accomplish. Whether it’s selling a product or providing readers with valuable content, you can use these user engagement KPIs to measure the success. But, you need to remember that information you collect can be interpreted differently, and much will depend on the context. That’s why you should carefully think about the criteria and combine different tests to get conclusions that actually matter.