One of the most powerful Google Analytics tools is search analysis. It provides data on the keywords people enter into search engines to find your blog and the actions they take after they arrive.
This information includes the number of visits, the number of pages visited and the bounce rate for any particular keyword. Knowing the bounce rate for a particular keyword (rather than the overall figure) gives you a better indication of how sticky your blog is. If your blog ranks well for a keyword phrase you haven’t deliberately targeted and your blog gets traffic for that keyword phrase, people are more likely to leave your site without visiting any other page. Thus increasing the bounce rate.
Dave Sparks has written an article for Six Revisions on how to analyse the Google Analytics search analysis data so you can get a better understanding of what is happening on your blog.
Perhaps the most useful part of the post is how to set up Google Analytics to record the phrases people enter into the inbuilt search engine for your blog. This is invaluable data. It shows what people are looking for and creates guidelines for you to use when researching subjects to write about.
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I personally prefer Clicky (http://getclicky.com) for tracking my stats. I find it easier to use, more visually appealing and doesn’t give me all kinds of stats I really don’t need.
One thing I really like from Google is the Google Insights tool. I use it, along with a few other tools, to do keyword research. It’s invaluable.
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