date 22 June 2018 update Upd: 21 June 2023 reading time 6 min views 440 views

Why you will want to use it and what you must know about analytics for web applications

Nothing beats web analytics if you want to know how people use your website, how they find their way to it, and what stops them from paying you. The same works for any web application. For poker application, specifically. Surprisingly, not everyone knows that. But Google Analytics do may be integrated into the apps directly and track users’ actions from within.

 

How can Google Analytics help you?

  • You’ll know exactly from which website, page, or source people come into your app. Thus, you will have better knowledge about conversion and your website UX quality.
  • You will be able to track users’ actions in the application. You will see how they move across it, at which points they make purchases, and how the UI can be improved.
  • You will see when and where your users leave.

This knowledge is really powerful! Let’s see how to get it.

The Difference between Website and Application Analytics

The main difference between the site and the app data follows from their structure. The website contains web pages with unique URLs, while application does not. The main objects you’ll be tracking inside the web application are screens and events – important actions completed.

This might sound a bit confusing and somewhat “advanced” for a newbie, but it will take only a few days to get the idea and to learn the main tools.

How to Setup Google Analytics for a Web Application

If you are dealing with EvenBet Gaming online poker software and don’t have anyone with GA skills at hand, no need to worry. We will help you with integration and analytics setup.

Otherwise, if you need to get such a skill or want to dig the details, we’d recommend using official Google documentation. It is very extensive, well-structured, and covers everything necessary.

The official Google Analytics knowledge base on web applications and single-page websites can be found here.

The Main Things You’ll Want to Know

If you are a newbie in web analytics, it’s better to start with analyzing a limited set of data. The entire amount of data provided by GA would be simply too much for the first couple of months.

What’s the most useful for a poker website owner or marketer?

  • Tracking new users and active users numbers, and new users sources. These data help to estimate the general strategy for players’ acquisition and retention.
  • Audience reports on geography (vital for every operator!).
  • Info about sessions: time spent in the app (you’ll want this to grow over time or not to decrease at least), number of screens per session (the same).
  • General information on preferred devices and cross-device overlap.
  • Visitors flow map to know how they move across the application.
  • Conversions to see if your players reach the goals (say, making a deposit).

How Can You Use These Data?

Let’s see that on the examples – from the most simple to the most difficult ones.

1. You will know whether you are moving in the right direction with your marketing.

While checking active and new users numbers you notice that a number of active users remains stable or grows, and a number of new users drops. This means that your acquisition strategy is becoming ineffective. You’d better start looking for the new traffic sources.

or…

You launch a new notification and email marketing model. After a few weeks, you check your active users and a number of sessions per user. They both should grow to prove that a new model works. If they don’t you’ll want to tweak your actions not to waste money.

or…

You make changes in bonusing and adding new gaming options that should result in egagement positive changes. Data mentioned above will help to see if they do, as well as the data on sessions’ time and a number of screens per session.

2. You will know whether you are working on a target market.

All audience information will help you learn this. The most important and obvious are geographic data. If you are targeting players from, say, Australia, and only 20% of your users are Australian – something has definitely gone wrong. You can find it while using traffic sources information. They will or show if your SEO and advertisement work fine, if your efforts in social media bring anything in return, etc.

3. You will know what makes users leave.

Using flow map you may see which screens on which stages make your users leave. For example, you choose mobile users entering lobby then using “Play Now” option. They sit at the table, play for a while and then quit without looking for another game to play. That might give you some ideas on how to make these users stay. For example, using pop-up notification with a special offer on quitting, or any other in-app tool. Or you may consider that automated sitting needs to be tweaked.

4. You will know which users pay and when.

Of course, you will get financial reports in the backoffice. You will know all user accounts with purchases. But this will not show you where do they come from, or how many time they spend in the app, or how many sessions they needed to start paying. All these data are very powerful. If you know exactly what makes your players pay and which ones are most probably to make a purchase you’ll have the most effective marketing and business insights.

Aren’t The Website Data Enough?

But wait, some will say. Most of this does not require having any application analytics – I have it in my website stats.

Think of this. On your website, you see all visitors. Including the ones that didn’t start to play; people who got to your website accidentally and by mistake; competitors; software vendors, and more. The conversion on a website is an app installation or launch, and it is not reached every single time.

The website data are extremely useful, but they are not enough to see the full picture. After all, the most interesting thing is not what people do on your website, but how they play your game.

By Ekaterina Giganova, EvenBet Gaming CMO