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April 30, 2024 • 16 mins

Ever wondered how understanding the analytics of digital strategy matters? Well, get ready to gain a whole bunch of insights as we welcome the remarkable Philippa Gamse to our podcast stage.

From turning analytics into compelling narratives to dodging the snares of vanity metrics, there is a lot to unpack in this episode.

Join us for a chat that promises to enlighten, engage, and empower you to harness the full potential of data in your business strategy.

You can reach out to Philippa Gamse here:

LinkedIn: www.linkedin.com/in/philippagamse
Website: www.WebsitesThatWin.com
Get here FREE ebook here: www.websitesthatwin.com

Support the show

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Transcript

Episode Transcript

Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Kaylee Johnson (02:52):
Philippa has over 20 years of experience in
translating metrics intocreative ideas to move
businesses forward and creatingeffective data-driven digital
strategies.
Now they're designed to achievegoals and maximize return on
investments, and all inunderstandable English, not
techie jargon.
So that's key, becausesometimes people can throw

(03:15):
around words so much you're likeI have no idea what that means.
So super excited to have you on.
Thank you, yeah, it's great tobe here Now.
I'd love to just hear yourstory.
Tell us how you got to whereyou are today, just kind of the
path that led you there.

Philippa Gamse (03:37):
So well, I am kind of an analytics geek around
the Internet but I also dodigital's sake.
But one of the things I can saythat I enjoy is that I've been
around for a bit.
I shouldn't say that, but youknow, the advantage that gives
you is you can see what worksand what doesn't work and you
you can sort of see the trends.
But I was actually probably oneof the first women involved in

(04:02):
this whole piece because,honestly, it's, and it's still
to a large extent is, more of aguy's world.
Yes, in in data and the wholesort of technology, I mean,
there are lots of women inmarketing, but they tend not to
go for the more geeky stuff.
Yes, so so I also kind of enjoybeing being a woman, a woman in
this world, yeah, that'sawesome.

Kaylee Johnson (04:26):
That's awesome.
So were you always into data,or is that something that
developed later on?

Philippa Gamse (04:32):
yeah, I, I'm actually an information
scientist by training.
Whoa, that's so cool that is socool yeah, well, I sort of you
know on the librarianship kindof side, but, um, but I've
always enjoyed kind of what isinformation and what can it do
for us and how do you structureit so that it comes out useful?
But that sort of blends intomarketing.

(04:52):
The thing I love about it isactually that, because of what I
do, so we get the data and weget the analytics, and that's
all lovely and, yes, we have tomake sure the data is clean and
do all that stuff, becauseobviously, if you're working
with bad data, you're going tomake bad decisions, right.
But then there's the so what?

(05:13):
So you know, we find out thatsomething on our website isn't
working properly, or you knownobody's responding to our
social media posts or whateverit is, and then the question
becomes so what?
What are we going to do aboutit?
And that's where you can getcreative.
Um, because you've got to comeup with some ideas, yeah, or you

(05:34):
see an opportunity.
Hey, look, there's all sorts ofpeople who are looking for x.
Um, I've seen this a lot withmy clients, actually, and x
isn't something that wecurrently provide, but we could.
So, you know, maybe that's anew piece of content or even a
new product or service, um, andthat's where again you can get
creative.
So I one of the things I reallyenjoy about analytics for me is
is that it's a blend of of thesort of geeky with with the

(05:57):
creative skills.

Kaylee Johnson (06:00):
I.
I love that.
I started off um doing socialmedia through an internship and
when I started they were likegiving me metrics and analytics
and I was like I don't know whatany of this means, much less
what to do with it.
So it was a process of beinglike OK, looking at them isn't
just OK, we're doing great, ok,we're not, and leaving it there.
It's like you know, looking atmetrics and analytics like has a

(06:22):
point, and if you're notwilling to take action off of
what you learn, then it'spointless.
Right, and you know people talka lot about vanity metrics and
you know what really matters.
So what are some vanity metricsand what do you really need to
pay attention to when you'relooking at all of it?

Philippa Gamse (06:40):
So well, ok, on a website, you know, one of the
biggest vanity metrics wasbounce rate, so bounce rate in.
So Google Analytics, which iswhat I mostly work in now, has a
new version and they mightstill have bounce rate at some
point.
They didn't.
But you know, most of us whoactually want to do analytics
properly thought the bounce ratewas a pretty useless metric

(07:01):
anyway.
Actually want to do analyticsproperly thought the bounce rate
was a pretty useless metricanyway.
What it was or is is is thenumber of people who who see
something that so maybe it's asocial media post or whatever,
but they, they, they barely lookat it and they're off.
Um, they leave.
So in old web metrics, um, thatmeant somebody who only looked
at one page and actually couldcould have meant that they read

(07:23):
a whole blog post, but then theyleft, but because they didn't
go anywhere else, it didn'trecord another hit.
So therefore it had to say theybounced because it didn't know
any better, which is why in thenew version of Google Analytics
for the web, well, at first theydidn't include bounce rate.
I think they do now.
But what they're much moreinterested in, which I agree is,

(07:43):
is engagement rate.
So because, if you think aboutit, the people who come to your
website or your social media andthey stay for one second and
they're gone are not your idealclient right, they're not
interested in your stuff andpeople obsessed about bounce
rate Like, oh my God, my bouncerate is 50%, what do I do?
Whereas what they should havebeen doing is saying, oh look,

(08:07):
50% of our visitors at leaststayed for some point and they
did some, maybe some things.
And what can we do to get themmore engaged and hopefully, to
actually do what we want them todo?
You know, on our side or oursocial media or whatever, right?
So they were focusing on thebad stuff as opposed to the good
, making the good stuff better.

Kaylee Johnson (08:28):
Kind of changing that mindset there.

Philippa Gamse (08:30):
Right.

Kaylee Johnson (08:30):
That makes sense .

Philippa Gamse (08:31):
I mean, and again, another vanity metric is
literally the number of visitors.
Right, so we got X number ofthousand visitors.
Great, were they the right typeof visitor?
Did they do anything?
You know?
Because if they didn't, then sowhat?
Yes, so that you know the sowhat, as you, as you just said,

(08:53):
is is really important and andthat's something I think for
your audience to really get, isthat we can talk about.
You know what's good metrics,what's useful metrics, but for
every single different business,there's different things that
they're really wanting tomeasure right now, different
things that they're trying to do, because there's no point
measuring anything unless you'regoing to do something about it

(09:16):
very true um because you knowyou can sit there and feel good
because you got more visitorsthan week, but what does that
actually do for your business,right?
So, um, it's really importantfor for business owners to think
about what is it we want tohappen here, um, in order to
approach the metricsintelligently, because otherwise
, you know, like you said, it'soverwhelming.

(09:37):
There are just numbers andcharts and figures and heaven
knows what, right and it is.
People glaze over and you can'tblame them, right?
So the way in is to is to startthat thought process of saying
what I want to happen is thishow do I make that happen?

Kaylee Johnson (09:55):
Right, that's right, because without that call
to action, you're not going tobe it.
It's, you know, the website orsocial media platform isn't
going to do any good justbecause people see you.
It's, it's when you you makethem realize that they need or
want your product, or say thisis how you can learn more.

Philippa Gamse (10:11):
This is the action you should take, um,
because you know people viewinformation, but unless they
take action upon it, and youknow, if you're using social
media or your website for salesspecifically, then you're
wasting your time right if, ifyou're just creating it and
people are just viewing it andthen moving on by um and so
engagement is also importantbecause you know there's also,

(10:32):
for example, um, you can dothings like measure how much of
your content people are actuallyengaging with.
So you know, are they actuallywatching the videos that you
make?
And I can't tell you how manypeople I've worked with on like
youtube statistics right, andpeople make the most amazing
videos and full of really greatcontent but the problem is they

(10:52):
start the video by saying hello,my name is, and blah blah, blah
blah, and it's really boringand people tune out because they
just don't have the patience togo through that and so by the
time they get to the good stuff,they've lost 90% of their
viewers, which is not helpful.

Kaylee Johnson (11:06):
I call it the three second rule.
I'm like you have about threeseconds in audio or video to
catch the person's attentionbefore they skip past it, which
is sad that that's ourengagement rate now, or the
amount of time we're willing toengage in something, but it's
true and that's why I'm alwayslike make sure it's catching
your attention within the firstthree seconds, because if it's
not catching your attention,it's definitely not going to

(11:28):
catch someone else's attention.

Philippa Gamse (11:30):
Right, and what's great about the data is
that it's so.
The numbers are then there,right, because I mean, I've had
people argue with me and say, no, no, that can't be true.
And the nice thing about thedata is it proves it.
Right, so you're going to haveall sorts of theories, but
unless you actually have thenumbers, then you can actually

(11:51):
see what's going on.

Kaylee Johnson (11:52):
Yeah, numbers are a lot harder to argue with
than ideas.

Philippa Gamse (11:55):
Right, yeah, and I mean I can't tell you how
many people like they find outwhat I do.
They say, oh, could you take aquick look at my website?
And I'll say no, no, not notonly because you know it would
be nice to get paid to do that,but also because, honestly it
there's no point me looking atyour website without looking at

(12:15):
the actual inside numbers.
Um, because you know otherwise,it's just my opinion, which is
only as valid as anybody else's,and I could take all sorts of
guesses about what's going on.
Ok, my guesses might be a bitmore educated than than a lot of
people, because I've done thisfor a long time, but it's still
a guess.
So so, again, without theactual hard data, you know

(12:38):
you're shooting in the dark.
You're just yeah no, very true.

Kaylee Johnson (12:43):
One of my friends is starting his first
youtube channel and he was like,can you look at it?
I was like, well, I have to seethe data.
I was like I'm not gonna beable to just watch a video and
tell you how it's doing, youknow.
And then he's actually becomepretty enthralled with data now,
which has been, which has beencool to see.
But you know, it's like youcan't take things at face value.
Um, you have to be willing tolook into that deeper stuff if

(13:05):
you're really wanting yourcontent to succeed.
Thanks for listening to theepisode.
We're going to take a quickpause, real fast, and I have a
question for you.
Are you overwhelmed andstruggling with your business's
social media is?
Are you putting so much?
Thank you so much for listeningto the podcast.

(13:25):
We're going to put a quickpause on it and I have a
question for you.
Are you struggling with socialmedia?
Are you overwhelmed by whatplatforms to be on, what to post
?
We talked a little bit abouthow, knowing where you should be
, I can help you.
Digital Journey is an exclusivegroup mastermind that teaches

(13:46):
you how to grow your socialmedia, to find where your target
audience is on, so that you canspend less time on social media
and increase your profits andgain new respect from clients
and grow your product in general.
You deserve that.
So if you're interested, I'dlove for you to set up a call
with me.
You can reach out atwwwdigitaljourneynet and you'll

(14:11):
be able to find me there.
If this is something you'reserious about, I want to hear
from you.
If you have a question, maybeyou're still trying to figure
out where in the world should Ibe for social media.
Let me help, and we're going toget back to the episode.
So if you could tell theaudience one final tip, what
would be your tip for them whenit comes to analytics and

(14:32):
metrics?
Jump?

Philippa Gamse (14:34):
in, don't be worried about it.
You know, give it a go, seewhat, or ask somebody like me to
help you a little bit.
So one thing I wanted to offerthe audience so to maybe ignite
your imagination a little bit.
So on my website uh, which iswebsites that wincom, uh,
hopefully you can put that inthe notes, right I love that

(14:55):
yeah um, there's a free ebook,so it's called uh, five digital,
five hidden gems, and it's it'sfive stories from my experience
of um of of insights that wefound in analytics that we
wouldn't have found otherwiseand what we did about it.
So, like I said earlier,creating a new product or

(15:17):
service or doing somethingdifferent in the business, big
things that we could change,that really made a difference,
based on stuff that we wouldn'totherwise have known, and my
goal is to help business ownerssort of there's no, this is not
techie stuff, there's no techie,it's all in English, there's no
charts and there's no numbers.
Right, it's, but it's.
It's hopefully to sort of givepeople ideas so that they can

(15:38):
say, hey, maybe that issomething I could check for on
my site and we talk about.
I show you how to look for it.
Um, so if anybody would likethat ebook, please feel free, go
ahead and get it, it'sabsolutely free.

Kaylee Johnson (15:51):
On my website amazing and we'll have that
linked below also.
And if they want to reach outto you, where's the best place
for them to find you?

Philippa Gamse (15:59):
on linkedin, um and uh, so I'm the only person
with my name on LinkedIn, so soplease feel free to go ahead and
connect.
I always really enjoyconnecting with people on
LinkedIn.

Kaylee Johnson (16:12):
Awesome.
Well, we'll have all thatlinked down below and thank you
so much for coming on today.
This was really insightful.
I appreciate it.
I hope you enjoyed that episodeand that you learned something
new and interesting today.
Go ahead and hit that likebutton, smash that subscribe
button so that you never miss anepisode of Digital Journey with
Kaylee Johnson.
Also check out some of ourother videos up here.

(16:32):
They're pretty great.
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