How to measure a website’s success…other than SEO
This article can be useful for any website but was written specifically for those with a primary focus on constituent relationships, i.e. donor relations, stakeholder relations, member relations, etc. Website owners for libraries, museums, alumni groups, historical societies, and the like, will especially find this applicable to their work.
What is SEO?
SEO, or Search Engine Optimization, is the process of improving your website to increase online traffic to the site. Key terms or phrases from your website are recognized by search engines. When done correctly, SEO will help your site rank higher in the results that search engines display, leading to more traffic to your website. For most websites, the goal is to rank as high as possible in online searches for key phrases or words used by your potential audience.
However, not all sites benefit from being easily searched and highly ranked in search engines.
SEO is important for websites that have the goal of reaching new audiences. Not all websites are seeking new audiences, or at least that is not a top priority. This is especially true for websites that serve as archives for niche audiences.
In a world where SEO is praised and touted as the primary metric for analyzing a website’s success, it actually leaves out scenarios where an audience of new users is not the desired outcome for a website and may leave you wondering, “how do I measure my website’s success besides SEO?”
Why would a website not need an SEO strategy?
A perfect example of websites that benefit from being omitted from search results the archival websites built by Philanthrosphere®.
Philanthrosphere® is a customizable digital story-telling platform that allows organizations to present interconnected content. It gives these organizations the tools to turn lists and visuals into graceful storylines, tours, and directories for key constituencies to easily explore.
On the Philanthrosphere® websites, the content serves primarily as an archive to be accessed by people already connected to the organization hosting the content. It is not necessary, nor is it desired in many cases, for the general public to be able to easily search and find the content. While publicly available, the content is meant for use within a specific audience. It makes more sense to drive traffic to the sites via print and digital media and word of mouth rather than attracting a wide range of relative strangers to the website.
So, this begs the question:
What are other benchmarks for the metrics of success for a website besides a strong SEO strategy?
While this is not an exhaustive list, here are 5 other benchmarks for a website’s success other than SEO.
#1. The website simplifies an organization’s archival process, providing niche content for a specific group of people.
In this benchmark of a website’s success, complex projects and data are easily stored and readily accessible to those who need it in a system similar to a digital archive. The success is determined by how the key constituents feel about the ease of navigation and the ability to store complex information in a simple way. A great example of this as mentioned above is Philanthrosphere®.
#2. The website generates a positive emotional response
There are times when a website is meant to be utilized by a specific group of people, and the goal is to generate a positive emotional response of some kind. Examples may be memorial websites, in honor of a loved one; class graduation websites, designed to celebrate special memories; digital story-telling platforms; or wedding pages. In these instances, it is not necessarily desired for the websites to be easily searched and ranked. It is however important that they generate a positive emotional response of some kind for the viewer.
This is often accomplished through effective storytelling (more on this to come) with accompanying visual imagery, a key feature of sites created with Philanthrosphere®. Unlike a strong SEO game, the emotional measurement of success is often intangible but incredibly important to the key stakeholders.
#3. The website creates a greater sense of community and assists with relationship-building
When a website is created specifically for a targeted audience, it may serve the goal of helping create a sense of community. This is especially helpful when the stakeholders are physically spread out over large distances. Like benchmark #2, this one is often intangible, though it can be measured through qualitative surveys of the community members (more on this below).
When done well, a website can serve as a “home away from home” for the community members to connect and bond in ways they cannot do without the site. When Facebook first started and was designed specifically for college students to connect with classmates, this served as the perfect example of this type of benchmark. While the content at the time was private, it helped connect classmates in ways that traditionally would have been more difficult without the assistance of the website.
Similarly, sites created using Philanthrosphere® help fundraisers build stronger donor relationships through easily accessed content and archiving that strengthens bonds and helps foster a sense of ownership and commitment.
#4. The website provides convenience
How long does it take a frequent user of the website to find what they need? Does your website provide the user with a simple and easy experience for them to access what they are looking for? The less time your audience has to spend searching for what they need, the more successful the site.
Simple improvements include:
Featuring content that gives users a starting point
Having both search and browse functionality
Effective use of tags and keywords to aid searching and connect similar information
Using images versus text when appropriate/applicable
Using numbers when possible, versus their written counterparts (i.e. 44 vs forty-four)
Reducing superfluous language
#5. The website improves your storytelling
Storytelling can be an effective tool for accomplishing many goals, including brand awareness and community connections. When done well, your target audience can leave your website with a better understanding of your story – and why it's important to them. Effective storytelling often involves visuals that make it easier to quickly digest the content.
Good storytelling can also result in:
Higher audience retention rates
Improved affinity (love) for your brand, community or subject matter
Enhanced audience engagement
These website success metrics that often get overlooked in traditional measures of website success, but can be a better gauge of your website’s ability to reach its target audience and provide a meaningful experience for them.
How do you measure these qualitative types of website success metric benchmarks?
Besides the obvious step of surveying/interviewing key constituents, you can also analyze it on your own.
Ask yourself the following 3 questions:
Does the website make it easier for you to do your work?
An effective website will make your job easier. This may mean there is a well-documented FAQ section, an easily accessible archive of pertinent information, a member section for streamlined communication, etc. This will be unique to you and your needs, but if you are clear on what’s needed in order for the website to support you in making your job easier, then you can better ensure the website offers those features.
Does the website serve to uphold promises to key constituents?
What promises does your brand aim to uphold for your stakeholders? Are you a non-profit looking to recognize your donors? A museum intending to help members access archives even beyond the physical hours of the location? An alumni organization hoping to connect members in a meaningful way?
Getting clear on the promises and goals you have for your key constituents helps you decide if your website is doing the job you aim to accomplish.
Is it easier and more effective to deliver tools to others?
When looking at the goals from question #2, are you accomplishing these goals in an effective way or is it clunky and difficult to navigate? If key constituents need to access online tools like archives, libraries, charts and databases, does your website make it easy for them to access what they need? A good guiding question is: “How can I make this as easy as possible for my stakeholders?” Ask yourself this question while exploring your site and jot down the ideas that come to mind. If you find a way to make it even easier to navigate than it already is, that is well worth the effort you put into it. Anything you can do to improve your site’s usability for your ideal audience also improves your website’s effectiveness.
We’d love to hear your thoughts and comments, especially if you found a method for measuring your website’s success in a way we haven’t mentioned in this article. Let us know in the comments below!