Content Marketing Metrics

Content Marketing Metrics You Should Be Monitoring

Content marketing is about creating and distributing valuable, relevant content your audience wants to engage with. But it’s not as simple as creating a few blog posts and hoping for the best. You need to know how your content performs, and one way to do that is to use content marketing metrics.

The importance of content marketing metrics can’t be overstated. If you don’t know how well your content is performing, it’s impossible to know whether it’s meeting your goals or needs.

And if you can’t measure the success of your content marketing efforts, how do you know when it’s time to make changes? Here are some metrics you can use to measure your content marketing performance:

Bounce rate

The bounce rate is a valuable metric that measures how many people leave your site after visiting only one page. It’s a good indicator of whether visitors found what they were looking for on your website or were disappointed with their experience.

A high bounce rate means your content isn’t compelling enough to keep readers around, so they hit the back button. A low bounce rate indicates you’re doing something right — people are sticking around to read more of your articles or blog posts.

The bounce rate is calculated by dividing the number of visitors who viewed only one page on your website by the number of visits. If you have 100 visitors who visit only one page, your bounce rate would be 100%. This means every visitor left after viewing just one page on your website. Not what you want!

A high bounce rate is a sign you need to improve the content on your site, so it’s more engaging and relevant for users. You can add more relevant keywords, improve user experience, and enhance search engine optimization (SEO).

Average time on page

Average time on page is a metric that shows how long your audience stays on your site. It’s a great way to gauge how effectively your content engages your audience.

For example, if you are using video and your average time on the page is one minute, most people who visit your page watch the video before leaving. However, if you have an average time on a page of 20 minutes, that means people spend much longer on your site, which shows they’re engaging with what you’ve created and want to read more.

Average time on a page can give you insights into what content is most interesting to your visitors. This is helpful if you’re trying to decide what content to create or curate to keep them engaged longer. If people stay on your site for a long time, it may mean they’re finding the information they need and engaging with it. But if people are leaving quickly, it might mean they don’t find what they’re looking for, or that there’s something about the site that’s not working — such as slow load times or confusing navigation.

You can find out how long users stay on your website by using Google Search Console, a tool every content marketer should use — and it’s free. 

Backlinks

Backlinks are one of the best ways to measure content marketing success. For example, if another website links to your site, they believe the content you posted is valuable. The more backlinks you have toward your website, the more credible it is. So, if you post a piece of content and it earns backlinks, it shows your content marketing was successful.

Google uses this information when ranking websites in search results. So, if your site has a lot of high-quality backlinks, it will rank higher than other sites with fewer or lower-quality backlinks (or no backlinks at all).

Not all backlinks are created equal. A link from an authoritative website is worth more than a link from an obscure one. The same goes for links from high-quality sites versus low-quality ones. The more valuable the site, the higher its PageRank score will be, and thus the more weight it carries. Backlinks from sites with a high PageRank score carry more weight than those from sites with lower scores.

The easiest way to find out how many backlinks a website has is by using Google Search Console or tools such as Ahrefs, Majestic or Moz Open Site Explorer to find backlinks for any website.

Number of Social Shares

This is one of the most important metrics you can track. The number of shares a link receives on social media is a good indicator of whether your content resonates with your target audience. Social media is an easy way to spread the word about your content; this metric shows you how well it works.

You can also track the number of times someone has shared your content on Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, and Pinterest and see which social media sites are performing best for you.

Conversion Rate

Conversion rates are an essential metric for evaluating the success or failure of a content marketing campaign. Conversion rate is the percentage of people who took a specific action after being exposed to your content. You can calculate it by dividing the number of conversions by the number of users exposed to your content.

For example, if you have 1,000 visitors and 10 bought your product, your conversion rate is 1%. If you have 1,000 visitors and 5 bought your product, your conversion rate is 0.5%.

It’s essential to have a clear definition of what a conversion is before you start measuring it. A conversion can be as simple as an email sign-up or as complicated as a sale, but it needs to be measurable and actionable.

A low conversion rate could mean people aren’t finding what they need when they come to your site. It could also mean they’re not finding enough information to make an informed purchase decision. Either way, it’s essential to identify what’s going wrong, so you can fix it!

The Bottom Line

You need to monitor content marketing metrics because they are the only way to effectively measure your progress.

It’s easy to say, “I want to grow my blog,” or “I want more traffic.” But without a plan for how you’re going to get there, your goals are just that: goals. But with careful planning and monitoring of your content marketing metrics, you can know exactly where your strategy works and where it’s falling short — and change course accordingly.