5 Data Tips - Understanding Your Ecommerce Data

Peter MeleskaMay 15, 2019

4 Min. Read

Even with all of the tools that are available today, there are two huge problems that exist when it comes to understanding your ecommerce data.

The first is numbers decoration or sometimes called “data puke”. This is the barrage of numbers with the purpose of making data look full and appealing.

In our world of digital analytics often these things are called dashboards…

It’s pretty cool, isn’t it?

But think of what’s on it for a moment. Can you understand anything from your ecommerce data except the cursory superficial information? Would you get anything actionable out of this ecommerce data?

The main problem with generic dashboards is that they do not go beyond the numbers. The numbers they present are not put into context.

You just see numbers, but don’t know what to do with them, even if they are the most important KPIs. With that being said, here are 5 ways to contextualize your ecommerce data:

Ecommerce Data Benchmarks (You vs. Others)

How can you compete if you don’t know what you’re up against? Knowing how you stack up to the rest of the competition lets you know where you’re coming up short and where you have the advantage.

Roger Federer and Rafael Nadal, Mike Tyson vs Evander Holyfield, Lionel Messi and Cristiano Ronaldo are examples of great rivals in their respective sports.

They certainly studied each other to stay at the top of their game and to constantly push boundaries. eCommerce business owners can also benefit from that competitive spirit.

Long term trends

Short term gains are great but longer term trends in business are more important.

If you have a tool that can show you long term trends, you can use that information to make the necessary changes that will help you serve your customers better.

Changes vs Absolute numbers

Just like forecasting, looking back and seeing how things have changed is just as important. Understanding your growth is part of the journey to being excellent.

In Conversific, the dashboard emphasizes important changes by highlighting them, and de-emphasizes less important changes by showing them in gray. The more clarity you can have in your business, the better.

Comparison with previous time period whenever possible

As mentioned above, being retrospective and being able to compare growth (or lack thereof) with different parts of your business is important.

Just like gauging how you stack up with your competitors allows you to outdo them, comparing your own growth allows you to outdo yourself!

Easy-to-understand text and explanations

If the above numbers just mentioned that revenue was at $423,560 and nothing else, that would be just half the battle.

You would have to dig into other data to compare it to last year and you’d have to look for information on which channels were the most effective in the revenue boost.

Conclusion

Data-based decision making is what will take your business to the next level.

Lucky for you, you don’t have to spend 14-hour days in front of the computer untangling complicated data or pulling your hair out regretting this whole online business thing. You can rely on tools that make your life simple and free up time for you to focus on other aspects of your business.

Tools like Conversific puts all of this data in simple to understand terms and all in one convenient place

The author

Istvan Kovacs

CEO, Conversific

Istvan is the CEO and Head of Analytics of a Conversific. With the team, they found that there’s a direct correlation between trying to understand data