Aaron Baker, Digital Analytics Lead – Harvard University, is one of the 12 presenters of the 2017 Higher Ed Analytics Conference (the 5th edition!).
In this 3-question interview, Aaron tells us about an interesting analytics challenge and a favorite Google Analytics before discussing what will make a big difference for higher ed analytics in 2017.
1) What’s the most challenging yet interesting part in your work with analytics?
The most challenging part about analytics in my current role as an analyst for a public relations and communications office is finding the right things to measure and the right way to report the results. Unlike many universities we’re not measuring enrollment as a web analytics KPI. Instead, we look toward engagement with our pages and posts, we strive to share the right content with the right audience, and we report on broad ideas not granular content.
2) What is your favorite GA feature, why and how do you use it at your school?
I use many custom dimensions in reporting stats for news stories. My favorite is word count which, when combined with the standard time-on-page metric, allows me to calculate words-per-minute. This is a useful engagement metric that helps me understand whether our content is being skimmed (high wpm) or is perhaps hard to understand (low wpm).
3) What do you think will make a big difference for higher ed analytics and measurement in 2017?
I think the changes and new additions that Google is making to its suite of analytics tools (360º) is something to watch. They are making it much easier to setup page optimization experiments via Tag Manager which we in higher education should use to constantly improve our evergreen content.
A conference on digital analytics for higher education?
The HEA conference has become a must-attend event for digital marketing and communication professionals in higher education looking for new ideas and best practices.
Read below what a few of your higher ed colleagues who attended the past editions of the Higher Ed Analytics Conference say about the event.
Tags: Higher Ed News