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Read expert articles with insights about e-commerce profitability from analyzing thousands of e-commerce businesses' data.
Business data analysis4 Benefits of Customer Retention Analysis for Your Shopify StoreCustomer retention is essential for the success of any Shopify store as it helps you increase your sales, customer referrals, and customer lifetime value. Essentially, you create a loyal customer base and build long-term relationships. In turn, you understand their needs better and provide them with tailored services and products.
After managing various Shopify stores, I discovered that a cohort analysis is a good place to start analyzing customer retention, because it gives me valuable insight into customer behavior. I find areas where I can improve and try out new ways to keep customers coming back. This helps to drive the direction and strategy of my business.
What is a Customer Retention Analysis?
Customer retention analysis is a method of tracking customer engagement and loyalty over time by grouping customers based on when they first made a purchase.
It sure is an eye-opener to discover how certain types of customers, according to their demographics and interests, would interact with my store. It even helps me identify the best times to run promotions and other campaigns to increase customer retention.
I rely on the data in Shopify's analytics and advanced reports to conduct my customer retention analysis. Once my customers are grouped based on their purchasing history, I can track customer engagement and loyalty over time (data from the customer cohort analysis report is particularly useful).
» Follow these steps to conduct a Shopify cohort analysis
1. Easily Identify When Your Customers Churn
As a starting point, I use these metrics to find out when my customers churn (i.e., where do I lose customers along the way):
Repeat purchase rate
This measures the percentage of customers who make a second purchase after their first one. If this metric goes down, it means customers were unhappy with their first purchase and aren't likely to come back.Customer lifetime value
This is the total amount of revenue that a customer is expected to generate for your store over their lifetime. If this number goes down, it means customers aren't coming back as often or aren't spending as much.Abandoned cart rate
This measures the percentage of customers who add items to their cart but don't complete the purchase. If this number goes up, it means customers are losing interest in your products or having trouble with the checkout process.
You can use third-party apps to track customer behavior and engagement with your store. For example, I faced a situation where the abandoned cart rate increased. So, I installed an abandoned cart recovery app and followed it up with an automated email that I triggered a day later offering a 10% discount. The abandoned cart rate decreased as a result.
2. Understand Why Your Customers Churn
Once you know where you're losing your customers, you can investigate why. I like to gather and analyze data from many different sources to get a full picture of the problem and test any theories.
Analyze customer data
Look at customer data such as purchase history, demographics, and behavior on your website to identify patterns or trends.Test the checkout and customer service processes
Test your checkout and customer service processes to ensure they're fast and user-friendly. Consider running A/B tests to test different processes.Conduct surveys or interviews
Reach out to customers who have left the store and ask for feedback on why they decided to stop shopping.
» Improve your customer retention strategy with email marketing
3. Manage Your Marketing Budget More Effectively
Doing a customer retention analysis also helps me save marketing costs. Why? Because ROAS and customer retention and directly related and, more importantly, it's usually cheaper to keep customers you already have than to get new ones. A study I recently read by Invesp showed that acquiring a new customer can be as much as 5 to 25 times more expensive than retaining an existing customer.
So, by focusing on retaining my customers, I further reduce my marketing costs because I'm creating targeted ad campaigns with a higher likelihood of conversion. According to Business.com, repeat customers spend on average 67% more than new customers. As an extra, I've also found that my repeat customers are more likely to refer their friends and family to the store—reducing costs further and boosting revenue.
» Learn about customer acquisition cost in e-commerce and how to find yours
4. Boost Your Revenue and Business Growth
Repeat customers help boost revenue and business growth through two main factors: reduced price sensitivity and being more open to new products and services.
Pricing
By engaging with my customers and building a community, my repeat customers trust my brand. This makes upselling and cross-selling easier and increases my average order value (AOV). New products or services
Because of trust in my brand, repeat customers are more open to trying new products or services. This keeps them engaged and simultaneously helps to attract new customers because it shows my business is relevant and competitive.
For example, I added a new product and ran a marketing campaign for 2 weeks where I offered my existing subscribers an additional discount for ordering the new item. It worked like a charm and boosted my revenue by 20% for that month.
» Follow these extra tips to boost Shopify sales
Solidify Your Customer Base With BeProfit
I cannot overstate the importance of customer retention analysis. Retaining your customers and building a solid customer base are key to a successful Shopify store. When you take full advantage of the data that your Shopify store gives you, you can experience the benefits I've discussed.
To simplify your analysis and improve customer retention rates, invest in BeProfit's solution and make data-driven decisions while viewing all your metrics at a glance.
Business data analysisThe Best Apps for Shopify Cohort AnalysisAnalytics is one of the most valuable tools for anyone starting a Shopify store. The right reports and data insights can provide a behind-the-scenes look into the success of your omnichannel strategies for marketing and sales, or tell you which of your products are achieving the most sales.
One of the most important forms of analysis from a marketing and sales perspective is cohort analysis. This is a form of behavioral analytics that takes data from an e-commerce platform and breaks it down into specific segments.
Cohort analysis provides you with a comprehensive view of how well your website is performing and which of your customers have the highest lifetime value or engagement levels.
Google Analytics for Cohort Analysis
One of the easiest ways to conduct a cohort analysis is to connect your Google Analytics account to your Shopify store in the admin center. Simply go into the “Settings” page, then “Apps and Sales” channel, and click on “Online store”. In the “Google Analytics” section, you can paste your code from your Google Analytics account to make the connection.
Once connected, you’ll be able to access a range of reports to help improve your Shopify conversion rate, discover your best sources of traffic, and develop opportunities to increase customer loyalty.
Google Analytics has its own dedicated “Cohort Analysis” report, available to anyone using the Universal Analytics service. Simply sign into Google Analytics, select “Audience” and then “Cohort Analysis”. The report will show the behaviors of various user groups on your website, offering insights to help you increase organic traffic and increase profit margins.
Shopify Apps for Cohort Analysis
While Google Analytics is one of the most popular tools for conducting a cohort analysis in Shopify, it’s not the only option. In the Shopify App store, you can find a range of other valuable tools for conducting a customer profitability analysis, or evaluating customer lifetime value.
Some of the top-rated options include:
1. Lifetimely
Lifetimely is an analytics and reporting app that allows Shopify users to track profits and losses in real-time. This includes a custom dashboard for tracking your preferred KPIs and marketing metrics.
Lifetimely has precise cohort analysis tools to help you discover your most profitable segments. The lifetime value model is even powered by AI to help you accurately project the potential lifetime value for each cohort. Plus, benchmarking tools show you how your metrics compare with competing brands.
There’s a 14-day trial available for beginners, after which paid pricing starts at $19 per month for the basic package.
2. Customer Intelligence
The Customer Intelligence app by RetentionX ensures Shopify users can collect valuable information about their customers and segment them based on their value or behaviors. The all-in-one platform offers deep insights into the key customer segments responsible for driving business profits, and tips for how to identify your ideal market.
The tool can help pinpoint customers at risk of churn, so you can reconnect with them. It can also show your most valuable products, so you can upgrade your sales strategies.
Customer Intelligence integrates with a range of other apps, so you can link it to your loyalty program for Shopify and your Facebook Ads. What’s more, you can use this app for up to 250 active users without paying anything. The advanced package for more than 250 customers starts at $10 per month.
» Find out how you can use cohort analysis tools for your Shopify store
3. BeProfit
BeProfit is an all-in-one analytics application for Shopify that specializes in offering real-time profit calculations with an intuitive and customizable dashboard. You can automate reports, or access insights on-demand into order metrics, shipping, inventory, and marketing costs.
The service makes it easy to analyze the profitability of different customer groups and track customer lifetime value for your most crucial segments. You can also create custom reports based on your most important metrics, and export them in a range of different formats.
BeProfit offers a 7-day trial to beginners, followed by premium packages starting at $25 per month. The basic plan includes a comprehensive profit and expense dashboard, unlimited ad integrations, order and product metrics, and daily data updates.
Provides a complete business and financial overview.Access to real-time data and custom reports.Link multiple platforms and shops for an aggregated view.
Leveraging Shopify Cohort Analysis
Cohort analysis allows e-commerce store owners to understand their target audience, and which customers deliver the most value for their business. Not only can you more accurately distribute your marketing budget with these insights, but you can also improve your chances of retention by finding out exactly what each customer needs from your brand to enjoy a fantastic experience.
Business data analysisHow to Conduct Cohort Analysis for Your Shopify StoreA cohort analysis is one of the most valuable tools Shopify store owners can use to understand their customers, top-selling products, and revenue growth opportunities. The more you care about your data, the more you’ll learn about growing your company.
Perfecting analytics using cohorts allows Shopify store owners to answer important questions about their company such as how much you should be investing in specific marketing strategies, or which customers deliver the most revenue.
» Struggling to analyze your customer's journey? Perfect your sales funnel with GA4
What Is a Cohort Analysis?
Cohort analysis involves tracking data from your store by segmenting users into groups. You can filter your “customer cohort” by a specific time period, marketing platform, or discount code.
By using cohort analysis, business leaders can generate meaningful insights into how well a product or service is performing over time. It’s also possible to learn more about the individual groups of customers you’re targeting, and how much value they bring to your brand.
Therefore, a successful cohort analysis will assist you in making intelligent decisions about how to adapt your marketing, sales, and pricing strategies, to create the most revenue.
» How do you calculate customer profitability? Follow this step-by-step guide for customer profitability analysis
Benefits of Cohort Analysis for Your Shopify Store
Cohort analysis can help you understand how different changes to your store impact your business, how specific marketing campaigns increase sales, and which customer segments are the most relevant to your business.
With a cohort analysis you can:
Find your most valuable customers: Determine which of your customers are generating the most revenue, so you can work to improve customer retention with these clients.Identify why and when purchases drop off: Effectively prevent lost sales and boost your chances of constant conversions.Improve marketing campaigns: Determine how much you should be investing in customer acquisition, and which of your lead generation efforts are paying off. Implement new business strategies: Identify and implement new strategies like changing pricing structures and monitoring the impact on customers.
» Battling to monitor your store's profitability amidst these changes? Use these tips to perform a profitability analysis
How to Perform Your Own Cohort Analysis
Cohort analysis tools are the easiest way to collect, aggregate, and access the data you need. There are various solutions available, but some offer greater insights than others. For instance, BeProfit goes beyond the basics of simple lifetime value calculations to provide business leaders with insights into the core elements of profitability.
To perform a cohort analysis, you’ll need to:
1. Integrate Your Shopify Data
Use a cohort analysis tool that allows you to integrate your data directly from Shopify into your analytics system. This will make it easier to track all the information without copying and pasting tables and raw data into different environments.
2. Choose Your Cohort
Decide which group of customers you want to focus on. For instance, you might look into customers purchasing a specific product, or those who come to your Shopify store after clicking a Google or Facebook ad.
3. Select a Time Period
Cohort analysis involves looking at the behavior of customers over a specific period of time. For instance, if you want to see how customers respond to a new marketing campaign over a period of 1 month, you can use your cohort analysis tool to analyze the appropriate metrics over 30 days. BeProfit allows you to choose your time period on a weekly, monthly, or yearly basis.
4. Adjust Your Filters
Use your cohort analysis tool to focus on the information you’re most interested in. For instance, you can adjust your “base metric” to look at ROAS, gross profit, or repurchase rate. You can also update your data progression to an accumulated or marginal overview. BeProfit also allows you to change your “Calculation Scheme” between “Average Per Customer” or “Total Cohort”.
5. Conduct Your Analysis
Once you’ve added all the correct information to your cohort analysis tool, you’ll be able to view your metrics and make decisions based on the data provided. For instance, if you see that the ROAS of your target cohort increased gradually over the course of a month after you implemented a new marketing strategy, you’ll know this advertising effort is working for your brand.
If you’re struggling with reading your results, hover your mouse over each cell to view a tooltip that translates the numerical data in the cell into an easy-to-understand sentence.
» Discover the best apps for a Shopify cohort analysis
Exploring Cohort Analysis
Cohort analysis is an important tool for Shopify store owners, but it can also be a daunting concept for beginners. Using the right cohort analysis tool to synchronize and organize your data, like BeProfit, will help you to minimize the complexity involved in understanding your customer base.
» Want to explore what BeProfit has to offer? Browse BeProfit's features
Business data analysisHow to Calculate WooCommerce COGS to Analyze Sales, Inventory & Gross MarginsAs a WooCommerce store owner, there are a number of metrics you’ll need to track to ensure your business is successful. Learning to calculate Cost of Goods Sold (COGS) means you can understand how much you’re actually spending on doing business. You'll also be able to determine which products in your portfolio are the most or least profitable, so you can take steps to optimize your bottom line.
Here’s what you need to know about calculating and using COGS.
How to Calculate WooCommerce COGS
There are various tools and plugins WooCommerce offers to enhance stores, such as sales report plugins and COGS plugins. Below are steps you can follow to calculate COGS yourself.
1. Identify Direct and Indirect Costs
The costs involved in running a business can be both “direct” and “indirect”. Direct costs are those specifically associated with selling the product, such as the materials involved in making an item and the shipping fees. Indirect costs include overheads like sales and marketing strategies designed to bring people to your store.
When calculating COGS, most companies will exclude indirect costs, as these are often associated with customer acquisition cost.
2. Determine the Beginning Inventory
“Beginning inventory” for the year refers to the inventory left over from the previous period. You’ll need to calculate a total dollar value for all of the items you have in stock during the current accounting period, before adding on additional purchases.
3. Add Up Inventory Purchases
The next step is adding up any inventory purchases which you may have made throughout the period of the calculation. For instance, you may have bought additional packaging utensils or more raw materials for high-selling products. Remember to consider the cost of shipping and manufacturing for each product as well.
4. Determine the Ending Inventory
“Ending inventory” refers to the remaining sellable inventory at the end of a sales period. For instance, if you started the period with 200 products, and added another 100, then sold 200 of your products, your ending inventory would be 100 products. You would then calculate the dollar value of these products.
5. Plug the Values into the Equation
With all of your values in place, you can calculate your WooCommerce COGS. The formula is as follows:
COGS = Beginning Inventory + Purchases – Ending Inventory
For instance, in a situation where you had a beginning inventory of 200 products equaling a value of $2,000, spent $500 on shipping and manufacturing throughout the period, and were left over with 50 products equaling a value of $1,500, your formula would look like this:
($2,000 + $500) – $1,500 = $1,000
» Struggling with high COGS? Learn how to reduce your COGS
Value of COGS Calculation for Your WooCommerce Store
COGS is an important metric on any company’s financial statement, as you’ll subtract it from your revenue to determine your “gross profit”. COGS also helps you to determine whether you’re using your budget effectively.
The benefits of COGS calculations for your WooCommerce store include:
Indicates Efficiency of Resource Management
If you discover your COGS is higher at the end of a period than the amount you spent on labor and supplies, this is a sign you’re not using your existing inventory efficiently. You may find you can cut down on the supplies you use at a later stage to increase your profits.
Serves Legislative and Tax Purposes
COGS can be included when calculating the taxes for a given period. COGS is a business expense, which means it can be used to offset the amount of revenue you create during the tax season. Knowing how much you spent on goods reduces your tax burden.
Supports Product Pricing
COGS can help you determine when to make adjustments to your products' selling price. By analyzing your profit margin, you can see whether your COGS and selling price are in relation. For example, if any of your direct costs have increased, making it more expensive to manufacture your products, you can adjust your selling price in accordance with this to ensure you maintain a healthy profit margin.
Streamlines Future Planning
By analyzing your COGS, you can more easily identify shortcomings in your current strategy and opportunities for increased sales. For example, it can highlight which of your products are the most popular and which aren't performing as well as they should. You can adjust future strategies accordingly to capitalize on popular products and either discontinue unpopular products or utilize one-click upselling methods to boost sales.
Conclusion
Calculating COGS for Shopify, WooCommerce, or any other store is an important strategy to ensure your business is profitable, because it gives you in-depth insights into your store's sales, inventory, and gross margins. You can use the same strategies mentioned above to calculate and improve COGS for Amazon stores and marketplaces too.
Business data analysisDoes Your Shopify Store Need Automated Expense Reports?Traditionally, expense reports could only be generated by people with a specific skill set. But now there are various other options, such as mobile apps and web-based platforms, that can automate expense reports to help streamline the process. These automated expense reports can be a resourceful tool for e-commerce businesses like Shopify stores.
» Thinking about using Shopify? Find out how to start a Shopify store
What Are Automated Expense Reports?
Automated expense reports are generated using software that analyzes and categorizes employee or owner expenses. The software can use pre-defined rules to ensure that the report has no missing information and that the expenses abide by the company’s policies.
There are various advantages of using an automated process, such as:
Saving timeImproving accuracy with less room for human errorIncreasing visibility into expenses
Employees can easily capture receipts on their mobile devices or desktop computers. The automated software then uses artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning algorithms to recognize and extract data from receipts, invoices, and other documents, making them more efficient and accurate. This data is then categorized and populated into expense reports.
» Learn more about keeping track of your e-commerce expenses
Why Does Your Shopify Store Need Automated Expense Reports?
You may want to focus on improving aspects like sales techniques or customer retention for your Shopify store, so here's how automated expense reports can help give you the space to direct your focus where needed:
Reduce Time and Effort
Automation saves time and requires less effort from employees and business owners since it removes the need for human intervention. This can minimize opportunities for errors. Additionally, it can help with other business processes, like sales reporting, by providing faster more accurate overviews that can inform whether your revenue can sustain your current expenses.
Better Accuracy and Compliance
With a lower risk of errors because of AI and machine learning algorithms, businesses easily can gather detailed expense reports that align with their policies. For example, let's say an employee goes on a business trip and the business wants to reimburse him. The employee captures the expenses manually and doesn't include all costs accurately. With automation, the employee can capture receipts, and the software will automatically categorize the expenses. Automation also helps in business planning and fraud prevention.
Make Informed Business Decisions
By leveraging expense data in combination with sales data, employee data, and other key performance indicators (KPIs), Shopify store owners can gain a comprehensive view of their business and make data-driven decisions to improve it. For instance, if a Shopify store owner wants to improve profitability, they can use automated expense reporting software to analyze expenses by categories, such as advertising, inventory, and shipping. Using this information, the owner can reallocate resources based on necessity and cut costs if needed.
Streamline Accounting and Tax Reporting
Because automated reporting provides accuracy quickly, there's less likelihood of facing tax audits. Additionally, these reports can be integrated into your accounting or tax reporting software to save time. Let’s say an e-commerce business wants to file its taxes for the year. Previously, the owner would have to gather all the receipts, invoices, and other documents and feed them manually into tax reporting software. Automated expense reporting can streamline this process by categorizing expenses, detecting duplicates, and calculating taxes.
» Explore the most common e-commerce expenses and how to reduce them
Streamline With Automated Expense Reports
Automated expense reports offer several benefits to Shopify store owners. They can save time and effort by automating data entry and calculations, improving accuracy, and providing real-time data. It is a must-have tool as it effectively manages and tracks expenses and provides insight to make improved business strategies.
With BeProfit's help, you can easily assess your Shopify store data all in one place. You can conveniently track expenses, monitor your profitability, and break down complex data to make more informed decisions that can help your business grow and stay compliant.
» Curious to know how BeProfit can help? Book a demo today
Business data analysisHow to Track and Boost Amazon Sales Using Google AnalyticsAmazon is undoubtedly a powerhouse for selling products online across continents. That's its strength. But Amazon does have a few weaknesses. One of those weaknesses is that it doesn't harness external traffic. It is so effective in harnessing internal traffic that external traffic becomes the proverbial "runt of the litter."
Internal traffic covers the 310 million active customers on Amazon.External traffic is the world outside of Amazon.
So, how can you improve both internal and external traffic to help improve Amazon sales? You can use Google Analytics to gain valuable metrics and insights into your sales strategies. This can help you adjust where needed to help your internal and external traffic perform optimally, resulting in increased sales and revenue.
Why Is Tracking Your Amazon Sales So Important?
Tracking your sales is vital for any e-commerce company, regardless of what platform you use or the industry you are in. So, it goes without saying that tracking your Amazon sales is critical to the success of your business.
Did you know that almost 40% of first-time sellers lose money on Amazon? This is because they haven't calculated their true profit.
Amazon FBA calculator can help with this. This and various other tools Amazon offers can help you track your sales funnel achievements. For one, the Amazon ads reporting tool measures and reports advertising campaigns, while dropshipping on Amazon can remove your logistical burden altogether.
These tools are available (some for free) and can really help you understand your internal Amazon traffic and sales, so use them to your advantage. But for maximum effect, you can use Google Analytics with Amazon functionality.
How to Track Amazon Sales in Google Analytics
1. Open your free Google Analytics account if you don't already have one.
2. Copy your Google Analytics tracking script. To do this, you need to go to Admin.
3. Once you have opened Admin, click on Tracking Code. Copy the script that you find under the heading Website Tracking.
4. The script you copied now needs to be pasted into your Global Site Tag section. You can do this for all the landing pages you want to track.
5. If you want to track promotions, paste the code script you copied into your thank you page scripts.
6. View your data and metrics to analyze sales and more.
How Google Analytics Can Boost Your Amazon Sales
Google Analytics opens your eyes to a bigger picture—the whole picture. You can calculate COGS (cost of goods sold), promote your Amazon products, and most certainly boost your sales.
Here are some ways in which Google Analytics can help:
Identifies the best referral sites and then aggressively pursues them: it's targeted, not just spray and pray methods.Finds keywords and uses those keywords to drive more conversions.Optimizes your content with on-site searches that work. This will help your customer get what they are looking for as fast as possible and supports the sale.Helps you understand the customer journey so that you can optimize sales. It's about tracking their habits and then gently directing them to buy your products.Gives you a look into what your customers are thinking and what their interests are. If you know what their interests are, you can give them more of what they want.Gives you a path report with timelines, so you know how long it took for your customers to convert. It shows how many interactions happened before the sale and what those interactions were. This all gives you clues to removing obstacles to sales.Tells you your customers' lifetime values. This tells you how loyal they are and how long they are expected to stay a customer.
There are so many more benefits—it all depends on the products you sell and your industry. For example, Google Analytics can be integrated with Google Ads. This way you can monitor the performance of your Google Ads, adjust where needed, and create remarketing lists for more targeted advertising.
You Can Have Your Cake and Eat It Too
Tracking sales analytics can help you better understand the success of your business, as well as where your sales approach may need some work. Google Analytics is a great tool to help with this as it can seek and help implement conversion tactics, like keywords and referral sites, to help improve sales for your Amazon store. Additionally, by understanding customer behavior through metrics, you can make informed strategy changes to boost sales.
Another all-in-one platform to help make tracking your sales metrics and profit easier is BeProfit. BeProfit can integrate all your stores into one customizable dashboard. With real-time monitoring and insights, you can adjust your sales practices to maximize conversion and profit.
Business data analysisBest-Selling Jewelry Products: Insights from BeProfit’s AnalysisAre you an online jewelry seller looking to stay ahead of the competition? Then it's time to take a closer look at what your customers want.
Nowadays, shoppers are moving out of their comfort zones and trying more than just traditional diamond or gold jewelry. Additionally, jewelry preferences vary according to the occasion.
At BeProfit, we analyzed hundreds of products from leading jewelry stores and found some interesting insights about what sells best. In this blog post, we'll share two of the best-selling jewelry products based on our analysis.
Custom Name Necklaces
Custom name necklaces are a type of personalized jewelry where customers can choose a name and get it engraved on the necklace's surface. These necklaces are available in various materials, but the most common ones are sterling silver.
Custom name necklaces are extremely popular among the younger population, especially teenagers. They're also a common preference for gifting purposes, as many people get their partner's name on the necklaces for personalized gifts.
Coen Fredriks, an eCommerce Growth Strategist at Code, offers some valuable tips for sellers:
Customized jewelry is personal and unique, and shoppers are more willing to purchase such jewelry. Think about birthdays, family bonding, and seasonal gifts like Valentine's Day. Vedder&Vedder specializes only in personalized jewelry and is the leading jewelry brand in the Netherlands.
Initial Necklaces
Initial necklaces are a type of necklace with initials on its surface. These designs are trending for their implication of special meanings for the wearers. Sometimes, the necklaces are combined with other elements to provide a modern and innovative touch to the overall look.
Custom initial necklaces are worn by many A-list stars. It makes a great choice for loved ones, plus they offer much-needed minimalist elegance.
In fact, one of the strategies recommended by Rakefet Yakobi, CMO at Mayple, based on +50 jewelry brands they've worked with, is to personalize products.
Customization allows your customers to create unique pieces and express themselves. It could be a unique wedding ring or a recreation of a sentimental jewelry piece.
Conclusion
As personalized products become more popular in retail, these items are aligned with the trend.
According to a recent study, one-fourth of consumers would be willing to pay more for a customized product or service, and in some categories, more than half are interested.
Do you offer custom jewelry? If not, you should consider incorporating this trendy style into your catalog.
To get even more exclusive insights from our analysts, we invite you to download our eBook on eCommerce jewelry insights. Based on our analysis of hundreds of online jewelry stores, this eBook reveals the top-selling products, biggest expenses, and typical profit margins in the industry.
Business data analysisGoogle Analytics Cohort Analysis: Simply Explained (+examples)Are you looking for a better way to understand and analyze customer behavior? Look no further than Google Analytics Cohort Analysis!
This powerful tool allows you to gain insights into the habits of your customers by grouping them into cohorts, or groups that share similar characteristics. With cohort analysis, you can identify customer behavior trends over time and use this data to make informed decisions about product development, marketing strategies, and more.
Anatomy of a Google Analytics Cohort Analysis
At its core, cohort analysis involves grouping customers into cohorts based on specific characteristics, including purchase date, product type, or any other attribute that you’d like to track.
Google Analytics has a range of data filters you can use to track and create your cohorts, including cohort type and size, metric, and date range.
Cohort Type
Your choice of cohort type tells Google Analytics how you want to group your users. But at this point, you can only choose acquisition date. Cohort Size
The size of your cohorts is displayed as a time period (day, week, month). Generally speaking, larger cohorts (weeks or months) provide more detailed insights, while smaller cohorts (days) can be easier to manage and analyze. Metrics
Your chosen metric tells Google Analytics what activity you want to measure. This includes customer loyalty and engagement, conversion rate, average order value, and more. But remember, you can only select one metric at a time.Date Range
Your date range and cohort size form a pair. If you choose to measure in days, then your date range will determine how many days are measured. Each cohort size has a maximum data range: 30 days, 12 weeks, and 3 months.
Once you've completed all of your data ranges, Google Analytics will produce a chart and table.
Chart
The chart shows the collective results of your cohort analysis. You need to study the table for a better breakdown.
Table
The table drills down deeper into your cohort data. The first column shows your cohort type (i.e., acquisition date) and the number of users in each cohort. The rest of the columns reflect your cohort size (i.e., days). The first row is the data that you see in the chart (i.e., the collective data). The rest of the rows and cells show the metrics of the individual cohorts.
You'll also notice that Google Analytics uses color coding. The darker the color, the higher the metric.
» Do you have a Shopify store? Learn how to conduct cohort analysis for your Shopify store
Using Google Analytics Cohort Analysis
At this stage, Google Analytics is only providing you with data, but you need to find out what the data means and put it to practical use. This is where segmentation can help.
At the top of your analysis is the option to add a segment.
Now, you can choose to begin with the segments the system has automatically generated for you or you can create custom segments.
If you're creating your own, your segments can either be user or session based. A user-based segment focuses on the visitors your website has and their activity (which can be spread over several sessions). Your visitors can be defined by age, gender, location, device, etc. A session-based segment focuses on the activity of a visitor in a single session.
From your segments, you can determine things like:
Which segments carry the most weight and should receive more marketing effortWhere most of your traffic comes fromAt what point your visitors leave your website (why don't they convert?)How the engagement between new and returning visitors compare
» These apps can help you with cohort analysis
Benefits of a Cohort Analysis
The biggest benefits of a cohort analysis include:
Increasing your user retention by understanding their behaviorPerforming more targeted marketing to your unique segments based on their patternsAnalyzing whether users are responding positively to your changes (e.g., A/B testing)
By creating cohorts, tracking user metrics, and segmenting customers into different groups, you can get a better picture of how your product or service is performing. This allows you to make informed decisions about how to optimize your product or service for maximum performance.
Example 1: User Retention
User retention is the default metric Google Analytics sets for you. This shows you how many of your users come back to your website in the days after their first visit.
This can help you to increase the general traffic to your website, but it can also tell you so much more. For example, it can tell you whether most of your traffic is coming from new users or returning users. This is worth investigating because it costs more to acquire new users than to keep old ones. You might be investing money into the wrong efforts.
Alternatively, this analysis can show you if something about your website is putting users off: miscommunication, poor content organization or navigation, broken links, etc.
» Consider doing a customer retention analysis to boost your cohort analysis findings
Example 2: Revenue Per User
As an e-commerce store, revenue per user is a useful metric to investigate. It's closely linked to conversion rates and how successful your marketing campaigns are, especially if the action you want your visitors to take is to buy a subscription or product.
By setting your cohort size to weeks or months, you can look at your revenue per user metrics retrospectively and determine how long your campaigns are typically effective before users are no longer responsive and the metric declines. So, you can optimize your campaigns and save some marketing costs by not investing in activities that aren't paying off.
» Are you using the right marketing technique? Learn the difference between remarketing vs retargeting
Simplify Cohort Analysis With BeProfit
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Business data analysisPerfecting Your Sales Funnel With Micro & Macro Goals on GA 4If you have worked with older versions of Google Analytics—such as Universal Analytics—you will know all about the Google Analytics micro and macro goals. In short, this is what Google Analytics called conversions before GA 4 arrived. So if we exchange "goals" for "conversions," you'll have GA4's micro conversions and macro conversions.
All important interactions that you are leading your customers to complete are called conversions. Therefore, micro conversions are those interactions that lead your clients to finalize a macro conversion. A macro conversion is an ultimate conversion, such as the sale of a product.
Let's look at an example: you have an online shoe store. A micro conversion is when your customer subscribes to your email newsletters. The email newsletters contain special discounts and deals that lead your client to a macro conversion—the sale of a pair of your shoes.
How to Set Up Micro & Macro Conversions on GA4
There are three ways that you can set up micro and macro conversions on GA4. First, we will take a look at the three options, and then break each option down into step-by-step guides. Additionally, consider taking a look at our guide to increasing Shopify conversions with Instagram.
Option 1: Create a New Conversion Event Using Events Already Collected in GA4
Log into GA 4Choose the propertyNavigate to the left-hand side menuClick on "Conversions"Click on "New Conversion Event"Type in the name of the eventSave, and you're done!
Option 2: Set up a New Conversion Event Using a Custom Event
Go to "All Events" on your propertyClick on "Create Event" Enter the name of the eventConfigure the parameters in the "Matching Conditions" sectionNavigate to "Conversions"Click on "New Conversion Event"Enter the name that you chose for the event—just remember that it needs to be the same as the name of the event that you createdSave, and you're done!
Option 3: Using Google Tag Manager
Click on "Tag"You'll find it in the left-hand side menuClick "New" > "Tag type" > "Google Analytics: GA4 event"In the tag, you must specify the name of the event, add your parameters and then create a trigger to assign to your tagSave the tagThe GA4 container will start to populate with the new custom eventJust remember to tell GA4 to mark this event as a conversion
Examples of Micro & Macro Goals Driving Funnel Conversions
Let's go look at an online store that sells kid computers as an example:
Macro Conversions (Goals)
This might be the sale of a kiddies' computer.
Micro Conversions (Goals)
Following a sales funnel order:
Interaction with your landing page (clicking on sections)Viewing a video that explains how the computer can benefit childrenSigning up for your marketing emailerReading reviews from customersAdding a computer to a wish listAdding a computer to the cart
Selecting the Best Micro & Macro Conversions for Your Business
Choosing the right macro conversions will depend largely on what industry you are in and your platform for selling—dropshipping in 2022 is vastly different from running an in-store bakery. However, micro conversions are generally common in all industries. Let's look at three examples of macro conversions per industry:
E-commerce
The finalization of a sale using, for example, Google Ads conversion trackingSocial media platforms
The opening of an accountBrick and mortar stores
Signing up for a newsletter
So, Which Should You Choose?
There is no one-size-fits-all solution for selecting the best micro and macro conversions. It's important to remember that they need to work together to give you insights into building a successful sales funnel. In other words, your micro goals should follow your customer journey to reach the main goal of macro conversions. This will tell you what is catching your customer's attention and what is leading to an interaction, and that's where you need to focus your attention. It also means that your micro goals will change organically over time, while your macro conversions are not likely to change. Just remember to check out the best Shopify sales funnel apps for optimum results.
To set your conversion goals, you need to plot the full customer journey. Once you have a typical journey of your website, you will need to decide which digital touchpoints or milestones may lead to macro conversions. Remember, this is not set in stone. As you analyze your metrics and data, you will set new micro conversions because they are developed over time.
Concluding Thoughts
It's never a walk in the park to optimize the data and analytics of an e-commerce store. The key takeaway is that you will learn over time, and it will become easier as you learn more. There is also so much information on the internet; you just need to google your questions and take the time to read up on the answers. The point is that not having micro and macro conversions is like walking with blinkers on—you will eventually be left behind.
Challenge yourself, learn, grow, and give your competitors a run for their money! And always remember that goals are just one method of boosting conversions—read How to Increase Your Shopify Conversion Rate and How to Use Facebook Conversions API for Your Shopify Store.