(A work in progress)
An early WIP II task was to investigate the statistics and data that is currently available that could usefully inform our work. The starting point was a conversation with Keith Bolland (Unlicensed) but more work will be required before we have useful information and it actually influences what we do.
I suggest that the ways in which it might be used include:
- IA: Making design decisions on the information architecture, especially the upper levels.
- Location of content: How far down is the most frequently used content located? Should we cull content if it is seldom/never accessed?
- Tags/search terms: How to improve the hit rate for searches.
- Validate the key drivers for WIP II: Importance of mobiles, extent of duplication, etc
- Measure success: With KPIs the analytic data might help measure the impact of WIP II. This might lead to
- New functionality prioritised higher: We are unlikely to be able to measure success using the current tools/functionality.
The following notes are based on my conversation with Keith, but include some thoughts I have had since.
- GA is the main source/tool for analytics: GA contain a whole heap of data about most of the sites in question, but little analysis is currently done on the data beyond what Google provide in the reports.
- This means the team is "data rich but information poor"
- Reasons for the lack of analysis time pressures, a lack of reason or a work driver (i.e. ability to out-work insights gained from the analysis).
- Maybe in the University there is little willingness to have empirical data guide decisions (need to validate this with team).
- Although difficult to do the following is probably essential if (good) use of analytics is to In order to make better use of this data there would have to be:
- Define a reason: For example "analyticity will inform IA and content placement decisions"
- Draft a proxy for a web strategy: To provide higher level direction. For example "The purpose of the web channel is to ..." or "Our three main products are student recruitment, service delivery and public engagement."
- Agree some KPI or success measure: Reduced number of clicks for users to get to what they want, or Lower the bounce rate to X, or Start using goal conversion (or even completion) rates?