Channel Analysis helps you prove the value of and perceive new investment opportunities among the digital media channels you use to bring visitors to your website. In this article, you will find information about the following:
How to create reports
You can use the following filtering and grouping options to create channel reports:
1. Selecting and grouping dates:
Here, you select the period you would like to analyze (there are some preset options, such as 6 months, 2 weeks, today, etc.) as well as how you want that period to be grouped—in days, weeks, or months.
2. Selecting the channel grouping
Here, you select the channels that you want to appear in your report. There are 10 different options that influence how your report will be filtered and categorized:
- All Conversion Channels: Shows your overall results within the selected time period (without any filter), categorized by standard conversion channels.
- Paid Media Keywords: Filters the paid media channel, showing this channel's specific results, categorized by all paid keywords (captured by utm_term).
- All Paid Media Campaigns: Filters the paid media channel, showing this channel's specific results, categorized by all campaigns carried out (captured by utm_campaign).
- Facebook Ads Campaigns: In addition to the paid media filter, the Facebook source filter (utm_source) is added. It is categorized by campaigns carried out within the tool.
- Google AdWords Campaigns: In addition to the paid media filter, the Google source filter (utm_source) is added. It is categorized by campaigns carried out within the tool.
- Email Campaigns: Filters the email channel, showing this channel's specific results, categorized by each campaign carried out (RD Station Marketing automatically adds UTM parameters to the email campaign links and automated workflows, so that you have this analysis available).
- External Referral Websites and Pages: Filters the Referral channel and shows the results of every website that has a link to yours.
- Social Media Campaigns: Filters the Social channel and shows the results of each Social Network.
- Display Campaigns: Filters the Display channel, showing this channel's specific results, categorized by each campaign carried out.
- Organic Search Keywords: Filters the Organic Search channel and shows the results for every keyword searched by users (with the changes to Google's privacy policy, any user who performs a search while logged in to a Google account has their data hidden from this report. As a result, a vast majority of the results are not attributed to any keyword (not provided).
3. Selecting the metrics to be analyzed
After selecting the channels that you want in your analysis, you can choose the metrics that best represent the results you are looking for and that best evaluate the performance of each channel. In this feature, there are 3 different groups of metrics:
- Visits – Conversions – Opportunities – Sales: In this group of metrics, you can see the number of events carried out by your leads without loss of information. For example, if a lead has 3 conversions via 3 different channels, they will appear in the 3 channels. If 3 sales were made via different channels, the 3 sales will also appear in each channel.
- Visitors – New Leads – Qualified Leads – Customers: In this group, you can see the number of new leads generated within a given period and monitor the progress of these leads through the sales funnel. As opposed to the group above, if a lead converts or is marked as a Sale or Qualified Lead on different channels, they will always be displayed as only 1 lead and will appear in their source channel.
- Visits – Leads – Customers: This group contains the leads metric—the same used in the Dashboard sales funnel—, which represents the number of leads that converted within a given period, even if the lead is not new. In this case, the leads appear in the channel via which they first converted within the selected time period. The customers metric uses a similar logic; it shows all leads that have been marked as Customer in the selected period and they are assigned to the channel of their first conversion within the selected time period.
Examples of analysis
Here are some examples of reports that can be created using this tool and how they can help answer important questions for your business:
Which channels attracted more New Leads in the last six months?
- Period: 6 months, monthly grouping
- Channel Grouping: All Conversion Channels
- Metrics: Visitors – New Leads – Qualified Leads – Customers
This report can have a variety of uses. As it is a long period of time, you can use it to prove the progress of funnel metrics over the last few months via the chart. You can also see the influence that each of the major channels has had on this progress.
It can also be used to evaluate which channel attracts the most leads to your database, that is, the best channels for top-of-the-funnel investment. It is also possible to see which channels bring the best leads, by looking at how many of those leads became Qualified Leads and Customers within the 6-month period.
Which Google AdWords campaigns generated more sales in the past two weeks?
- Period: 2 weeks, daily grouping
- Channel Grouping: Google AdWords Campaigns
- Metrics: Visits – Conversions – Opportunities – Sales
Use this report to evaluate the performance of your Paid Search campaigns. You will be able to see the total number of conversions generated by each campaign and, when one of these conversions is made right before a sale, this sale—as well as the opportunities marked—will also be counted in the campaign.
Which email campaigns generated the most conversions in the last month?
- Period: 1 month, weekly grouping
- Channel Grouping: Email Campaigns
- Metrics: Visits – Conversions – Opportunities – Sales
Just like in the above example, by using the same metrics, you are able to see how much each sent email has contributed to your results, whether via a campaign or automated workflow.
Which social network has generated the most Customers in the last 30 days?
- Period: 1 month, weekly grouping
- Channel Grouping: Social Networks
- Metrics: Visits – Leads – Customers
