Higher education websites always have a steady supply of visitors. It's great to see the numbers in Google Analyics fluctuate each day and trend upwards over time, but are your visitors finding what they came for? This talk is a high-level-to-in-depth look at tracking what visitors are searching for in real time from your site. We'll go beyond the consolidated "popular keywords" list to an actual trend list with grouped phases and pages. The goal is peer into the visitor's mind and figure out why they are searching for "address" on the Contact Us page or "Professor Smith" on the Faculty Information page. Higher education websites always struggle to accommodate two audiences, internal and external. Search results based on location don't lie, it's easy to combine real internal searches with reasons why quicklinks and extra menus may or may not be functioning as optimally as they should. It's time to go beyond pageviews and user paths and look at real-time search analytics.

1. Analyzing Real-time User
Visitor Searches
Nick DeNardis
@nickdenardis
nick.denardis@gmail.com

2. Nick DeNardis
Associate Director of Web Communications at
Wayne State University
http://wayne.edu/
Host of EDU Checkup
http://educheckup.com/
Writer for .eduGuru
http://doteduguru.com/

3. Driving Decisions with Data

4. Why does your institution have
a website?

5. Blinders on our eyes
Source: http://xkcd.com/773/

6. wayne.edu

7. The Numbers
From September 10, 2009 - 2010
2,706,348 External Visits
6,060,138 Internal Visits
= 8,766,486 Total Visits
669,875 External Searches
299,780 Internal Searches
= 969,655 Total Searches
11% of all visitors use the search
25% of external visitors search

8. We used the standard tools to analyze
our site stats
• Google Analytics
• Google Webmaster Tools
• Crazy Egg
• Woopra
We weren't happy
They only gave us half the picture

9. Every visitor tells a story
Summaries of top search terms
were not cutting it

10. It starts with a first impression
External vs. Internal
10 Second Test
General Capability

11. External
Notice the visuals, orient
with the navigation, scan
and be disappointed

12. Internal
Another day, another dollar.
Need to find a list of xyz
Never seen it on the main menu
I don't have time to explore
I'll search for it.

13. Do you think you know what
the typical visitor is searching
for?

14. “what is wayne state zip code”
(It's on the footer)

15. “print out my application i
already filled out”

16. “2010 cost of tution and
expenses”

17. “what happens if i dont apply
for graduation”

18. “how to prepare for career fair”

19. “how to register for permission
required classes”

20. “where to send transcript”

21. “clifford clark”

22. How often have you seen
these in your Google
Dashboard?

23. Our Solution

24. Watching the search spy all day
• Most notable patterns
– People search for existing sites
– People search for other people (faculty)
• Unexpected patterns
– Searches for obvious information on the page

25. Categories of Search Terms
• 28% Department/Office
• 21% Program/Requirements
• 15% Faculty/Staff Member
• 12% Location
• 24% Other

26. Auto Suggest

29. 35% use auto select
(skip the results page)

30. First Week Resources
Class Schedule
Campus Map
Academic Calendar
Bookstore
Driving Directions

32. 3 hours 43 mins later
10000 visits 10698 clicks total

33. Did it work?
777 – Class Schedule
683 – Campus Map
445 – Academic Calendar
342 – Bookstore
293 – Driving Directions
2,540 – Total Clicks (0.13%)
From September 1–7, 2010

34. The typical search experience

35. It’s all in the results

36. It’s all in the results

37. Web Communications Blog
http://wcs.wayne.edu/blog/

38. Now it’s your turn.

39. QuerySpy
http://queryspy.com/

40. Data Driving Decisions
• Start collecting, start watching
• Share your numbers
• Higher Ed Analytics
http://higheredanalytics.com/analytics/
@karinejoly
• Trending Upward
http://www.trendingupward.net/
@shelbythayer

41. Thank You
nick.denardis@gmail.com
@nickdenardis
http://wcs.wayne.edu/blog/