Which Metrics Really Matter for Ecommerce Success?

When ecommerce businesses measure success, they rely on search engine optimization (SEO) metrics and key performance indicators (KPIs). By measuring and monitoring metrics and KPIs, they can make smart, data-driven decisions that lead to marketing success. These metrics are the most important ones to follow.

• Organic traffic
• Organic goal conversion
• Organic conversion rate
• Organic return on investment (ROI)
• Brand vs. non-brand keyword traffic
• Keyword rankings
• Returning visitors by brand traffic
• Bounce rates

For the greatest and most rapid results, work with an ecommerce SEO agency to improve your campaigns and launch your SEO success. Let us look at each of these metrics and see how these apply to your ecommerce strategies. Let’s go!

Organic Traffic

Organic traffic is one of the most important metrics to monitor for ecommerce. ‘Organic traffic’ refers to the visitors that come to a website from unpaid sources or free traffic. Traffic from organic sources comes from search engines such as Google, Bing, and Yahoo.

This kind of traffic is more important than paid traffic, since having high organic traffic means SEO strategies are working. To measure organic traffic, marketers use Google Analytics. This free tool can provide detailed reports that consider source data and relevant keywords.

Organic Goal Conversion

This metric shows how much organic traffic led to conversion or the business's goal. Whether the goal is to purchase a product, order a service, sign up for a newsletter, or attend an online event, having high organic goal conversion rates means the company's efforts are paying off.

Similar to monitoring and measuring organic traffic, marketers measure organic conversions using Google Analytics. This tool helps marketers get a multi-channel view of the customer's journey using its “Attribution” feature. They can learn which customer touchpoints create higher organic conversions and prioritize these in their marketing campaigns.

Organic Conversion Rate

The organic conversion rate of a website tells marketers how many people who visited the website using organic search took steps toward the marketing goal. 

Marketers look at micro and macro conversions when considering organic conversion rates. Microconversions are the steps visitors take that lead them to their goal, for example, signing up for special offers or subscribing to a newsletter. Macro conversions are actions that signal conversions such as purchasing, ordering a service, or joining a contest.

The average organic conversion rate for an ecommerce site is 3.3%. To measure the organic conversion rate, you need the number of conversions and the number of visitors. Multiply this by 100 to get the percentage, like so:

Conversion Rate = Conversions / Total Visitors x 100

A high conversion rate means the business's SEO strategies are working.  Dropping conversion rates can be due to many reasons. Poor navigation, incorrect keyword targeting, and irrelevant content are just a few possible causes for decreasing conversions. By determining what SEO factors need improvement, you can increase conversion rates and improve ecommerce sales.

Organic Return On Investment (ROI)

Organic ROI is the return that a business gets for its SEO expenses. Marketers check and analyze SEO goals and website performance metrics to measure organic ROI. They use this formula to calculate SEO ROI:

ROI = [(Return - Investment) / Investment] x 100

• The investment is how much the business spends on a campaign. 
• The return is the amount of money earned from the campaign. The return can be tricky because it includes estimating the volume of organic search traffic for the different keywords, the click-through (CTR) rate per position in the organic search, and the value of every visit. Create a more accurate SEO ROI by estimating the traffic and revenue according to search volume.

Every business, big or small, wins with SEO benefits. A higher ROI means the company is successful at using its investment in an SEO campaign.

Brand vs. Non-Brand Keyword Traffic

Another vital ecommerce metric is knowing the traffic between the business' branded and unbranded keywords. A branded keyword has the website's or company's brand name, or it could be any variation of the brand, for example, Sony TVs, Sony flat screens, or How to Configure a Sony TV.

Non-branded keywords, such as “television,” “TV sets,” or “flatscreen TV,” do not contain the brand name. Marketers use tools such as Google Search Console to measure and analyze the performance of brand and non-brand keywords. This tool analyzes keyword traffic based on date, query, and clicks.

The tool offers insights beyond distinguishing between brand and non-brand keyword traffic. Additionally, it assists in identifying crawl errors, indexing issues, and optimizing site performance, helping ecommerce marketers in overall website health and user experience enhancement.

Keyword Rankings

Businesses must track how their products and services perform for relevant keywords. Using this data, they analyze changes in ranking and how these changes affect traffic.

Marketers use analysis tools such as Google Search Console to measure keyword rankings. Choose the report date range from the tool's Performance Report to sort and filter keywords. Marketers can also use this tool to find page-one ranking keywords and quick-win terms and optimize the website using these words.

Returning Visitors by Brand Traffic

As the name implies, returning visitors are those who have been to your site before. Having high numbers of returning visitors from brand traffic indicates good customer engagement.

Like most metrics for ecommerce SEO, marketers use Google Analytics (GA) through the Audience Overview Report. GA's Overview Report shows the total number of visitors, including new visitors who viewed the website for the first time.

Bounce Rates

The bounce rate refers to the number of visitors who visit the site but eventually leave without conversion. This metric is a good indicator of the audience’s level of engagement with the website. Bounce rates can also determine if the website attracts the wrong visitors or cannot provide what they need.

To calculate the bounce rate, divide single-page visits by the total visits to the site during a particular period. The bounce rate is the percentage of the total visits during a specific time. Marketers use this formula to find bounce rates.

Bounce Rate = Total one-page visits / Total entrance visits

Bounce rates vary depending on the industry. Ecommerce sites need a low bounce rate, since their business depends on online engagement.

Ecommerce marketers constantly monitor these metrics to gauge the effectiveness of their strategies and campaigns. Tracking these indicators provides insights into customer behavior, sales performance, and overall business health. The success of all these factors is central to the business’s profitability.

Summing Up

Ecommerce businesses can make the most of their SEO strategies by monitoring and analyzing these metrics. They can make efficient data-driven decisions and adjust their campaigns accordingly to help companies achieve their marketing goals.

Partner with an ecommerce SEO agency to maximize your business’s potential. Contact Digital Authority Partners, the experts in ecommerce SEO.