Google SEO Training – Understanding Your Website’s Visitors

Google offers many services to help you create and share exceptional content with your users as well as better understand your website and competitors in your market space. Sometimes, your site could improve with just a bit more pizazz or with additional activity.

Google’s Services

You’ll want to check out Google Services such as:

• YouTube – Use for video sharing
• Picasa - Use for organizing and editing digital photos
• SketchUp – Use to create, modify and share 3D models.
• Calendar – Use for events listings. Calendar can be commented on by its users and the calendar can be viewed from many locations.
• Maps and Earth – Use for directions to your business and annotated tours.
• Blogger - Use for the latest announcements relating to your website, business or industry.

And with all the fabulous content on our site, understanding your visitors’ interaction with that content is key. There are two free tools that Google offers that can help you see how your site is currently performing with your visitors and how a few variations might enhance it’s over all performance.

Google Analytics

Google analytics provides helpful information on where your visitors come from, how they interact with your site and how often they are performing actions you want such as purchasing one of your products or subscribing to your news letter.

Google Website Optimizer

And while Google Analytics lets you have a look on how your site has performed, Website Optimizer helps you to test out different variations and combinations of content on your site so that you can see which version will be best for your visitors.

Google Trends

It makes sense to spend a fair amount of time improving your website, but it’s also essential to pay close attention to your market space and what your competitors are up to. Google can definitely help you with the job. You can use Google Trends to compare the prevalence of news articles and searches for different keywords and for discerning which product garners more attention or which issue excites more of your visitors.

Google Reader

Google Reader allows you to stay current on the latest articles that interest you without having to jump around from site to site by following specific topics or keywords from popular newspapers, blog posts or even your favorite video websites.

Google Alert

Google Alert provides yet another way to track what is important to you as well as keep you ahead of the marketing game. Within minutes of being published, you can receive links from informative blog entries, news articles or other web pages that mention your name, your company’s or any other phrase that you choose.