Data Intelligence of Google Analytics

This week, we have used the Google Analytics to analyse the visitors of MIS Department website. By using the GA tool, we can know that which countries or cities they are from, which key words they use to land the homepage, how long they stay on each page, etc.

There are many kinds of data in the GA report. However, to understand what status the data indicate or what the results they demonstrate, we need to dig deeply into these data to make use of them.

In order to practice, we used the partnering opportunities page to analyse the visitors. Basically, we had three recommendations for improving this page:

• Using more precise keywords
• Adding redirect link on relevant page
• Using social media and LinkedIn

We do have data to support these recommendations. However, when other teams presented their recommendations in the class, we found that our data are not sufficient and deep enough. For example, Even though some of the visitors come from Facebook, most of them are students. The partnering opportunities page is supposed to be visited by the companies or recruiters. Thus, the visitors who use social media like Facebook are not the target market.

From this homework, we understand that thinking more critically and comprehensively will help us to get better results.

KPIs & Google Analytics

In the class of this week, we have learned the terminology - KPI. It stands for Key Performance Indicator and is a significant factor for a business that wants to improve themselves via Business Intelligence. To make it more professional, I have searched the website and found out that the definition of KPI: "KPIs are quantifiable metrics which reflect the performance of an organization in achieving its goals and objectives" (Bauer, 2004).

For example, if we want to analyze the visits flow of a website, we need to use a KPI first to determine how the success could be. In the warm-up exercise and homework 1, I think the KPI for the MIS website should be the pageviews and bounce rate. If the pageviews are high and the bounce rate is low, then the webpage can be successful.

In order to find out the result, we need to use the Google Analytics. This is a software that can report the visits flow of a website. After I used this software, I found out that the master section has the most pageviews and low bounce rate. It means that people come to the MIS department website to see some information of masters of MIS. Besides, the alumni and partnering opportunity have lower pageviews and higher bounce rate. Therefore, in order to improve the performance, we need to search more information by using the Google Analytics.

KPI and Google Analytics are very useful methods for analyzing website, and they will definitely help us with the GOMC project in the future.








Works Cited
Bauer, K. (2004, 09 01). KPIs – The Metrics that Drive Performance Management. Retrieved 01 18, 2012, from Information Management: http://www.information-management.com/issues/20040901/1009207-1.html

New to BI

Before I take this BI course, I have heard about how busy this class is going to be.
However, I still want to choose BI because I am interested in this field.
I would like to learn how data shows the result of previous operation methods and predicts the future of a company.
Since making decision based on the data can be more accurately and rational than intuition, data is become more and more significant today.
Nevertheless, how to collect data and how to make data useful enough for the business is also a knowledge that needs to be learned.
In the MIS 587 class, the professor has given the syllabus to us and there are two projects, several assignments, etc. for us to practise the analytical skills in real business.
I believe that after this semester, I can understand how to collect and analyze data from social media technologies and use them effectively in business.