When it comes to creating content for your website, few systems are as versatile as WordPress. However, it takes more than just writing excellent posts to enhance the success of your site.
Statistical information will help you focus on everything from content to overall functionality.
Here are five WordPress website stats you should pay attention to and why they are important to your future success.
1. Page Views
Page views are collected in a number of ways. Most commonly, people will use Google Analytics or Jetpack’s Site Stats to monitor this site traffic. This information shows you how often your pages are viewed by others.
Each time someone accesses a webpage, analytic tools record the visit. It’s important to note that some systems will also record bot activity scanning your pages.
This data will show you if people think your content is worthwhile. A low count may signify that the material is less interesting to your target audience. You may find it’s a waste of your time to continue developing content along the specific topic if people are avoiding the post.
It could also mean you need to add more interesting content to the topic to increase visitor activity.
2. Bounce Rate
In Google Analytics, there is a metric called “Bounce Rate.” This is when someone access your website, but then leaves it without exploring. A bounce happens quite often as many people are only interested in the information they are looking for at that moment.
An exceptionally high bounce rate of over 90 percent may demonstrate that your content isn’t grasping the attention of the visitor and inspiring him or her to explore the site.
You may need to make adjustments to the content or even the layout of your pages.
Of course, a bounce can also happen if a visitor finds exactly what he or she is looking for and simply leaves. Take a look at the time visitors spend on your pages as well as the bounce rate.
When something like this occurs, you need to focus more on what you can add to keep the visitor exploring the site rather than just leaving.
3. Text to HTML Ratio
The text to HTML ratio shows the amount of text you have against the characters within website programming. Free browser apps such as WooRank can show you this information from systems such as Google Chrome.
Some search engines will penalize a site if the ratio between text and HTML is too low. These are often seen as high-risk sites because it’s easy to include malware within pages.
You can avoid this by reducing the coding in your site or increasing the amount of text – such as writing more content.
While the text-to-code ratio is not as much of a ranking factor for engines like Google, creating more content is still a good practice to get into.
4. Load Times
Each time someone visits the site, the web hosting company sends the individual packets of information. The faster a website loads for various users, the better. Always focus on speeding up your website.
There are many things that can affect the load time ranging from HTML coding to the use of large images.
The load time is greatly influential in search engine rankings as well as personal experience. In fact, users are more likely to abandon a website if pages take too long to load.
Humans love instant gratification, which is why you need to make sure everything is quick and easy for the target audience.
5. Inbound Links
Inbound links, or backlinks, play a prominent role in search engine optimization and overall popularity. The more often you get links to your site, the better. Keeping an eye on these can help your site evolve into an online powerhouse.
Getting backlinks often requires directly interacting with other site owners, guest blogging, participating in forums and many other venues. Just make sure your links are from legitimate sources.
Some forms of “black SEO” purposely try to bury your site by linking to it from questionable sources. The end result is often a site that performs poorly in search results.
However, situations like this are easy to avoid if you carefully keep an eye on your links and stats.
Use the Available Tools
You can use a wide array of tools ranging from WordPress plugins to browser apps that can help you discover many different things about your website. You can create the most alluring site possible by using these tools.
If you don’t spend a bit of time pouring over the data, the competition could easily surpass you. Don’t underestimate the importance of these five stats. Your success could rely on what you do with the data.
What statistics do you find as the most informative for your website? What kinds of data collection apps or plugins do you use?