Have you ever thought about the fact that knowledge is power? Imagine having in real time and with the right segmentation data of all users who visit your e-commerce, along with their consumption habits and what they didn't like about your products. It seems like a utopia, but it's just the careful application of the analytics to an e-commerce.

Below we will see how data analysis can transform an online business and provide tools to use information to make decisions that are truly effective.

Why is it so important to have updated data for an E-commerce?

One of the fundamental aspects of the analytics for today's e-commerce is the ability to understand customer behavior. Your customer won't lift a finger without you knowing it! This allows you to identify the strengths of the purchasing journey and improve where necessary.

Or, you can break down customers by type.

For example, there are only those who buy a certain type of product, those who buy more regularly, the high spenders… With well-set analytical metrics you will not only have this data, but also consequently the possibility of sending them targeted marketing campaigns.

Analytics Tools for E-commerce (2024)

1)                   Google Analytics

Google Analytics is one of the most used tools for web analysis. From here you can understand the source from which your user came, but also monitor key metrics such as conversion rate and average order value. Integration with Google Ads also allows you to measure the effectiveness of advertising campaigns.

2) Business Intelligence Platforms

Business intelligence (BI) platforms such as Tableau, Power BI, and Looker offer advanced capabilities for data analysis. Their best feature is the ability to combine data from different sources, such as CRM , ERP and social media. The impression that those who learn to use them correctly have is that they can be in the control room, having a real-time eye on everything that happens on their e-commerce.

3) Heatmaps and behavior analysis tools

Tools like Hotjar and Crazy Egg provide a visual representation of how users interact with your website.

The heatmap is nothing more than a map that records the most clicked areas with warm colors, giving a visual idea of ​​how much the site has been used and how. In some cases it is also possible to see session recordings, useful for understanding the user's path in detail.

How to use the analytics collected by your e-commerce

To get accurate insights, it is essential to collect quality data and keep it clean. What you need to avoid more than anything else is a data silo, that is, a container in which data is accumulated, but closed on all sides, and therefore useless to extract any kind of useful information about your customers and their behavior.

Data quality can be compromised by input errors, missing or duplicate data, which makes preliminary data cleaning necessary.

There are different methods of analysis, some that come to us from statistics, others from marketing.

For example, we have cohort analysis, a technique that allows you to segment customers into groups based on common experiences or specific time periods. This type of analysis is particularly useful for understanding customer behavior over time and evaluating the effectiveness of loyalty strategies. Or, theA/B testing, which allows you to compare two versions of a web page or campaign to determine which performs better.

The integration of machine learning and predictive analytics It also allows you to go beyond descriptive analysis and obtain accurate predictions. For example, you could train machine learning models on large volumes of data to identify patterns and make predictions about the future behavior of users of your site.

Some tips for the treatment of collected data

Integrating data from different sources can be a significant challenge. Unifying data into a single platform makes analysis easier, as we have already seen. This is where data warehousing technologies and integration APIs come in handy.

Additionally, you need to comply with GDPR and implement robust security measures to prevent breaches.

In essence, analytics are a fundamental ally to have a complete knowledge of your e-commerce and to make the right decisions. Blindfolded, it would not be possible to implement a strategy of any kind.