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• GDPR Compliance Checklist : A Detailed Walkthrough

  14 septembre 2023, par Erin — GDPR

  As digital transformation drives global economies, data has become a valuable currency to businesses of all shapes and sizes. As a result, the complex issue of data privacy is often in the spotlight.

  The General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) is the key legal framework in the European Union to protect individual privacy and regulate business data handling. 

  Compliance with the GDPR is not just a legal mandate, it’s also good business. An 86% majority of users want more control over their data and 47% of users have switched providers over data privacy concerns.

  To help guide your business decisions around user privacy, this article will cover the key principles of GDPR, including a comprehensive GDPR compliance checklist.

  The key principles and requirements of GDPR

  Before we can translate GDPR’s objectives into practical steps, let’s begin with the defining features and key principles.

  GDPR : An overview

  The GDPR bolsters and unifies data protection standards for everyone within the EU. Enacted in 2018, it represented a seismic shift for companies and public authorities alike in protecting personal information. Its primary objective is to offer greater control to individuals over their data and to hold organisations accountable for its protection.

  GDPR establishes a legal framework that mandates corporate compliance with key principles to ensure user data security, transparency and choice. It sets the terms for your organisation’s privacy practices and the landscape of legal obligations you must navigate in data handling. 

  Key principles of GDPR

  There are seven core principles pivotal to GDPR compliance, which provide a roadmap for ethical and legal data practices.

  

  • Lawfulness, fairness and transparency : This principle demands lawful and fair processing of personal data. Companies should be transparent about their data processing activities, providing clear information in an accessible form.
  • Purpose limitation : Personal data should be collected for explicit, legitimate purposes and not further processed in a way incompatible with those purposes. This demands careful planning of data processing activities.
  • Data minimisation : Companies should only collect personal data that are necessary for their specified purposes, as anything more than this is illegal. This principle emphasises the importance of limiting scope, rather than performing blanket data collection.
  • Accuracy : This principle calls for maintaining data that is accurate, up-to-date and not misleading. Regular internal audits and updates are crucial to following this principle.
  • Storage limitation : Personal data should only be kept for as long as necessary for the purposes for which it was collected. This underscores the need for a detailed retention policy in your GDPR compliance efforts.
  • Integrity and confidentiality : Companies should protect personal data from unauthorised or unlawful processing and accidental loss or damage. Your organisation’s technical security measures play a vital role in this.
  • Accountability : Organisations should be able to demonstrate their compliance with GDPR principles. This underscores the importance of records of processing activities and regular audits as part of your compliance checklist.

  The importance of GDPR compliance for businesses

  Embracing GDPR compliance isn’t merely a matter of avoiding penalties — it’s a commitment to principles that reflect integrity, transparency and respect for personal data. At Matomo, we champion these principles, empowering companies with powerful and compliant web analytics. We make the compliance journey accessible and straightforward, making sure website analytics aligns with legal obligations and ethical practices.

  The implications of non-compliance

  It’s easy to highlight the dramatic fines imposed on tech giants such as Google and Meta. However, it’s essential to recognise that GDPR compliance extends to all companies, including small businesses — for whom even smaller fines can have a significant impact.

  The implications of non-compliance aren’t limited to financial penalties alone, either. Failing to meet obligations can tarnish reputations, erode trust and hinder business activities. Non-compliance could lead to a breach of privacy policy, causing a ripple effect that may be challenging to overcome.

  The potential benefits of being GDPR compliant

  Adhering to GDPR regulations is more than a checkbox on a form — it’s a comprehensive approach to handling personal data responsibly. It fosters trust, opens doors to European customers and builds enduring relationships with individuals whose rights are protected. In fulfilling these obligations and practices, businesses not only meet legal requirements but also foster a culture of ethical conduct and business success.

  Comprehensive GDPR compliance checklist

  Ensuring GDPR compliance may seem like a complex task, but this detailed checklist will simplify your journey. From consent management to data security, we’ve got you covered.

  

  Establish personal data collection and consent management

  When it comes to GDPR compliance, not all consent is created equal. Two distinct forms exist : explicit consent and implied consent. But what exactly sets them apart, and why does it matter to your organisational measures ?

  Explicit consent from users means that the individual has unequivocally agreed to the processing of personal data. It’s an unambiguous agreement, often obtained through a deliberate action like ticking a box. Details are paramount, as the person giving consent must be fully informed about the processing activities.

  • Inform clearly : Use plain language to explain how data will be used and be transparent about processing practices.
  • Obtain active agreement : Use forms or checkboxes (not pre-ticked boxes) to ensure active participation and that you are obtaining explicit user consent.
  • Document it : Keep records of consent, including when and how it was obtained, as a crucial part of your compliance efforts.
  • Facilitate withdrawal : Use consent mechanisms that allow for easy withdrawal of consent for users who decide to opt out.
  • Manage consent forms : Tools like Matomo’s Consent Management Platform can provide accessible forms that not only enhance transparency but also empower individuals, allowing them to feel in control of their details and rights.

  Facilitate data subject rights and access requests

  GDPR emphasises individual rights by empowering users with control over their personal data processing. Here’s a succinct breakdown :

  • Know the rights of individuals : GDPR outlines individual rights such as data access, error rectification, erasure and data portability, allowing individuals to guide how their details are used, processed or shared.
  • Simplify complying with access requests : Companies must respond to access requests efficiently, usually within one month, without undue delay, reflecting organisational measures of respect.
  • Employ ethical and compliant digital analytics : As a leader in ethical web analytics, Matomo subtly aids in compliance efforts, protecting privacy without compromising functionality.

  These practices align with a modern understanding of privacy, emphasising more than legal obligations. By employing Matomo, companies simplify the processing of access requests, which fosters transparency and user control over personal data.

  Implement clear data privacy practices

  Data privacy and consent mechanisms are key tools for compliance. Crafting a comprehensive privacy policy helps protect individuals’ rights and provides integrity in personal data processing. Designing sites and applications with data protection in mind ensures your compliance from the ground-up.

  • Create an easy to understand privacy policy : Create a clear, GDPR-compliant privacy policy that details processing activities, storage limitations and organisational measures, all in plain language. 

  By implementing these steps, companies not only adhere to their legal obligations but also foster an inclusive community that values privacy and ethics. Whether you’re an IT professional or marketer, Matomo’s platform can guide you through the maze of GDPR complexities, inspiring positive change towards responsible data handling.

  Implement data storage limitations and robust security

  Data storage and security are foundational elements of compliance efforts. Companies must foster a proactive approach to preventing data breaches by understanding potential cyberthreats and enforcing appropriate security controls across applications and infrastructures.

  

  • Implement storage limitations : Define limitations on time and scope to avert undue retention and protect personal details.
  • Embrace technical security : Utilise secure processes like encryption, access controls, firewalls and so on, bolstering protection by design.
  • Establish a comprehensive security policy : Align security practices with privacy laws and regulations, including GDPR.
  • React swiftly to personal data breaches : A security breach requires an immediate response, without undue delay, to honour legal obligations and maintain customer trust. Develop a plan for notifying supervisory authorities and affected individuals promptly in the event of a personal data breach.

  Security measures for personal data are about more than just fulfilling legal obligations — they’re about building a safe and ethical digital ecosystem that instils confidence in customers.

  Keep cross-border data transfers in mind

  Cross-border data transfers present a unique challenge, with increased complexity due to varying data privacy laws across regions. You must understand the respective regulations of participating countries and align your compliance practices appropriately to respect all that are relevant to your organisation. 

  For example, data privacy laws in the US are generally more lax than the GDPR so US companies taking on EU customers must hold themselves to a higher standard, with stricter controls placed on their data processing practices.

  • Evaluate third-party services : For companies utilising global networks of third-party services, be sure to select providers that maintain ongoing knowledge and vigilance towards privacy law compliance. Platforms like Matomo that innately prioritise transparency and privacy, have implemented robust security measures, and document transfers diligently are worth considering. 

  Conduct internal audits and compliance checks

  Compliance is not a “one and done” setup, but an ongoing journey requiring regular internal audits. Systems settings can drift over time, and datasets can become increasingly complex as companies scale. Human error happens, too. Audits identify gaps in your compliance efforts to guide actionable improvements. 

  • Conduct regular audits : Stay proactive with internal audits and systematic monitoring, adapting policies to align with privacy laws. Clarity in privacy notices and cookie banners fosters confidence, while regular assessments ensure alignment with GDPR requirements.
  • Ensure transparency : Platforms like Matomo simplify audits, offering valuable insights and support for ethical web analytics and transparency. The right platform can increase visibility and make generating your reports easier. Integrating these processes guarantees GDPR-aligned measures while emphasising data ownership and customer-centric values.
  • Educate and train staff : Engage in ongoing staff education and training on GDPR compliance, privacy policies, and their related responsibilities.

  

  Case study : GDPR compliance in action

  Achieving compliance with the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) stands as a paramount concern for businesses worldwide. Both small and large companies have embarked on this journey, implementing measures and revising privacy policies to conform to these regulations.

  Typeform

  Based in Ireland, Typeform, a company dealing with online forms, took GDPR compliance very seriously. Here’s how they achieved it :

  1. Conducting a data protection impact assessment (DPIA) : This vital step helped them assess personal data breach risks and enabled systematic monitoring of potential challenges.
  2. Implementing technical and organisational measures : Security measures such as encryption, access control and drafting a security policy reinforced their personal data processing mechanisms.
  3. Revamping privacy policy : They transformed their privacy policy with accessible, plain language, making it clear and user-friendly.
  4. Appointing a data protection officer (DPO) : This aligned with their core activities and strengthened their compliance efforts.

  The benefits for Typeform were profound :

  • Enhanced customer trust and confidence
  • Reduced risk of fines and penalties
  • Bolstered data security and privacy
  • Improved brand reputation, positioning them favourably among European customers

  Ensuring GDPR Compliance with Matomo Analytics

  Matomo is more than just an analytics platform ; it is a trusted guide in the realm of data privacy. Our mission is to empower users with full data ownership, fostering an inclusive digital community built on trust and transparency. Our suite of features has been meticulously designed to align with GDPR regulations, ensuring that businesses can navigate the complexities of compliance with ease and confidence.

  1. Data Anonymisation

  Matomo’s focus on ethical digital analytics means the platform allows for the anonymisation of user data, ensuring that individual identities remain protected.

  2. Robust GDPR Management

  Beyond just a GDPR Manager, Matomo provides an encompassing framework to streamline compliance activities. From managing user consent to meticulous record-keeping of processing activities, Matomo ensures you are always a step ahead.

  3. User Empowerment with Opt-Out Capabilities

  Matomo respects user choices. The platform offers users an easy way to opt-out of all tracking, giving them control over their data.

  4. First-party Cookies as the Standard

  By using first-party cookies by default, Matomo ensures data remains with the website owner, minimising potential breaches or misuse.

  5. Transparent Data Collection Practices

  Users have the right to know their data. With Matomo, they can view the exact data being collected, reinforcing a transparent relationship between businesses and their users.

  6. Visitor Data Management

  Upon request, Matomo offers capabilities to delete visitor data, aligning with the GDPR’s right to be forgotten.

  7. Data Ownership and Privacy Assurance

  Unlike other web analytics platforms, with Matomo, you retain full ownership of your data and can rest assured that it is not being used for other purposes such as advertising.

  8. IP Anonymisation

  Protecting user location details, Matomo anonymises IP addresses, adding an additional layer of privacy.

  9. Customisable Data Visualisation

  Recognising that not all data is essential, Matomo allows the disabling of visitor logs and profiles, giving businesses the flexibility to decide what data they track.

  By taking a holistic approach to GDPR compliance, Matomo streamlines the processes for you and ensures you follow the legal and ethical best practices.

  

  Start your GDPR compliance journey today

  The global focus on data privacy requires using a GDPR compliance checklist. With 137 countries implementing data protection laws (UN), companies must align with international standards. Compliance, after all, goes beyond avoiding breaches— it’s about upholding privacy and building trust.

  As your trusted guide, Matomo invites you on this GDPR journey. With us, you’ll uphold privacy obligations and manage your processing activities effectively. Compliance isn’t a one-time task but a continuous journey to enhance practices and align with individual rights. Start this vital journey with Matomo today. Try it free for 21-days. No credit card required.

  Disclaimer

  We are not lawyers and don’t claim to be. The information provided here is to help give an introduction to GDPR. We encourage every business and website to take data privacy seriously and discuss these issues with your lawyer if you have any concerns.

• CRO Audit : Increase Your Conversions in 10 Simple Steps

  25 mars 2024, par Erin

  You have two options if you’re unhappy with your website’s conversion rates.

  The first is to implement a couple of random tactics you heard on that marketing podcast, which worked for a business completely unrelated to yours. 

  The other is to take a more systematic, measured approach. An approach that finds specific problems with the pages on your site and fixes them one by one. 

  You’re choosing the second option, right ?

  Good, then let’s explain what a conversion rate optimisation audit is and how you can complete one using our step-by-step process.

  What is a CRO audit ?

  A conversion rate optimisation audit (CRO audit) systematically evaluates your website. It identifies opportunities to enhance your website’s performance and improve conversion rates. 

  During the audit, you’ll analyse your website’s entire customer journey, collect valuable user behaviour data and cross reference that with web analytics to find site elements (forms, calls-to-actions, etc.) that you can optimise.

  

  It’s one (and usually the first) part of a wider CRO strategy. 

  For example, an online retailer might run a CRO audit to discover why cart abandonment rates are high. The audit may throw up several potential problems (like a confusing checkout form and poor navigation), which the retailer can then spend time optimising using A/B tests. 

  Why run a CRO audit ?

  A CRO audit can be a lot of work, but it’s well worth the effort. Here are the benefits you can expect from running one.

  Generate targeted and relevant insights

  You’ve probably already tested some “best practice” conversion rate optimisations, like changing the colour of your CTA button, adding social proof or highlighting benefits to your headlines. 

  These are great, but they aren’t tailored to your audience. Running a CRO audit will ensure you find (and rectify) the conversion bottlenecks and barriers that impact your users, not someone else’s.

  Improve conversion rates

  Ultimately, CRO audits are about improving conversion rates and increasing revenue. Finding and eliminating barriers to conversion makes it much more likely that users will convert. 

  But that’s not all. CRO audits also improve the user experience and customer satisfaction. The audit process will help you understand how users behave on your website, allowing you to create a more user-friendly customer experience. 

  A 10-step process for running your first CRO audit 

  Want to conduct your first CRO audit ? Follow the ten-step process we outline below :

  

  1. Define your goals

  Start your CRO audit by setting conversion goals that marry with the wider goals of your business. The more clearly you define your goals, the easier it will be to evaluate your website for opportunities. 

  Your goals could include :

  • Booking more trials
  • Getting more email subscribers
  • Reducing cart abandonments

  You should also define the specific actions users need to take for you to achieve these goals. For example, users will have to click on your call-to-action and complete a form to book more trials. On the other hand, reducing cart abandonments requires users to add items to their cart and click through all of the forms during the checkout process. 

  If you’re unsure where to start, we recommend reading our CRO statistics roundup to see how your site compares to industry averages for metrics like conversion and click-through rates. 

  You’ll also want to ensure you track these conversion goals in your web analytics software. In Matomo, it only takes a few minutes to set up a new conversion goal, and the goals dashboard makes it easy to see your performance at a glance. 

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  2. Review your analytics

  With your goals in mind, the next step is to dive into your website analytics and identify pages that need improvement.

  Consider the following conversion metrics when analysing pages :

  • Conversion rate
  • Average time on page
  • Average order value
  • Click-through rate

  Ensure you’re analysing metrics aligning with the goals you set in step one. Average order value could be a great metric to track if you want to reduce cart abandonments, for example, but it’s unsuitable to get more email subscribers.

  3. Research the user experience

  Next, you’ll want to gather user experience data to better understand how potential customers use your website and why they aren’t converting as often as you’d like. 

  You can use several tools for user behaviour analysis, but we recommend heatmaps and session recordings.

  Heatmaps visually represent how users click, move and scroll your website. It will show where visitors place their attention and which page elements are ignored. 

  Take a look at this example below from our website. As you can see, the navigation, headline and CTA get the most attention. If we weren’t seeing as many conversions as we liked and our CTAs were getting ignored, that might be a sign to change their colour or placement. 

  

  Session recordings capture the actions users take as they browse your website. They let you watch a video playback of how visitors behave, capturing clicks and scrolls so you can see each visitor’s steps in order. 

  Session recordings will show you how users navigate and where they drop off. 

  4. Analyse your forms

  Whether your forms are too confusing or too long, there are plenty of reasons for users to abandon your forms. 

  But how many forms are they abandoning exactly and which forms are there ?

  That’s what form analysis is for. 

  Running a form analysis will highlight which forms need work and reveal whether forms could be contributing to a page’s poor conversion rate. It’s how Concrete CMS tripled its leads in just a few days.

  Matomo’s Form Analytics feature makes running form analysis easy.

  

  Just open up the forms dashboard to get a snapshot of your forms’ key metrics, including average hesitation time, starter rate and submission rates. 

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  5. Analyse your conversion funnel

  Next, analyse the conversion funnel to see if there’s an obvious bottleneck or several pages where visitors abandon your desired action. Common conversion abandonment points are shopping carts and forms.

  

  For example, you could find there is a drop-off in conversions between checking out and making a purchase or between booking a demo and signing up for a subscription. Understanding where these drop-offs occur lets you dig deeper and make targeted improvements.

  Don’t worry if you’ve got a very long funnel. Start at the bottom and work backward. Problems with the pages at the very end of your funnel tasked with converting customers (landing pages, checkout pages, etc.) will have the biggest impact on your conversion rate. So, it makes sense to start there. 

  6. Analyse campaigns and traffic sources (marketing attribution)

  It’s now time to analyse traffic quality to ensure you’re powering your conversion optimisation efforts with the best traffic possible. 

  This can also help you find your best customers so you can focus on acquiring more of them and tailoring your optimisation efforts to their preferences. 

  Run a marketing attribution report to see which traffic sources generate the most conversions and have the highest conversion rates. 

  

  Using marketing attribution is crucial here because it gives a fuller picture of how customers move through their journey, recognising the impact of various touchpoints in making a decision, unlike last-click attribution, which only credits the final touchpoint before a conversion.

  7. Use surveys and other qualitative data sources

  Increase the amount of qualitative data you have access to by speaking directly to customers. Surveys, interviews and other user feedback methods add depth and context to your user behaviour research.

  Sure, you aren’t getting feedback from hundreds of customers like you do with heatmaps or session recordings, but the information can sometimes be much richer. Users will often tell you outright why they didn’t take a specific action in a survey response (or what convinced them to convert). 

  Running surveys is now even easier in Matomo, thanks to the Matomo Surveys third-party plugin. This lets you add a customisable survey popup to your site, the data from which is automatically added to Matomo and can be combined with Matomo segments.

  8. Develop a conversion hypothesis

  Using all of the insights you’ve gathered up to this point, you can now hypothesise what’s wrong and how you can fix it. 

  Here’s a template you can use :

  

  This could end up looking something like the following :

  Based on evidence gathered from web analytics and heatmaps, moving our signup form above the fold will fix our lack of free trial signups, improving signups by 50%.

  

  Make sure you write your hypothesis down somewhere. Matomo lets you document your hypothesis when creating an A/B test, so it’s easy to reflect on when the test finishes. 

  9. Run A/B tests

  Now, it’s time to put your theory into practice by running an A/B test.

  Create an experiment using a platform like Matomo that creates two different versions of your page : the original and one with the change you mentioned in your hypothesis. 

  There’s no set time for you to run an A/B test. Just keep running it until the outcome is statistically significant. This is something your A/B testing platform should do automatically. 

  A statistically significant result means it would be very unlikely the outcome doesn’t happen in the long term.

  

  As you can see in the image above, the wide header variation has significantly outperformed both the original and the other variation. So we can be pretty confident about making the change permanent. 

  If the outcome of your A/B test also validates your conversion hypothesis, you can implement the change. If not, analyse the data, brainstorm another hypothesis and run another A/B test. 

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  10. Monitor and iterate

  You need to develop a culture of continuous improvement to succeed with conversion rate optimisation. That means constantly monitoring your conversion goals and running tests to improve your metrics. 

  While you don’t need to run a conversion audit every month, you should run audits regularly throughout the year.

  How often should you conduct a CRO audit ? 

  You should conduct a CRO audit fairly regularly. 

  We recommend creating a CRO schedule that sees you run a CRO audit every six to 12 months. That will ensure you continue identifying problem pages and keeping your conversion rates competitive. 

  Regular CRO audits will also account for evolving consumer behaviours, changes in your industry and your own business goals, all of which can impact your approach conversion rate optimisation. 

  Run your CRO audit with Matomo

  A CRO audit process is the only way you can identify conversion optimisation methods that will work for your site and your target audience. It’s a methodical, data-backed strategy for making targeted improvements to send conversion rates soaring. 

  There are a lot of steps to complete, but you don’t need dozens of tools to run a CRO audit process. 

  Just one : Matomo.

  Unlike other web analytics platforms, like Google Analytics, Matomo has the built-in tools and plugins to help with every step of the CRO audit process, from web analytics to conversion funnel analysis and A/B testing. With its accurate, unsampled data and privacy-friendly tracking, Matomo is the ideal choice for optimising conversions. 

  Learn how to increase your conversions with Matomo, and start a free 21-day trial today. No credit card required.

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• How to Implement Cross-Channel Analytics : A Guide for Marketers

  17 avril 2024, par Erin

  Every modern marketer knows they have to connect with consumers across several channels. But do you know how well Instagram works alongside organic traffic or your email list ? Are you even tracking the impacts of these channels in one place ?

  You need a cross-channel analytics solution if you answered no to either of these questions. 

  In this article, we’ll explain cross-channel analytics, why your company probably needs it and how to set up a cross-channel analytics solution as quickly and easily as possible.

  What is cross-channel analytics ? 

  Cross-channel analytics is a form of marketing analytics that collects and analyses data from every channel and campaign you use.

  The result is a comprehensive view of your customer’s journey and each channel’s role in converting customers. 

  Cross-channel analytics lets you track every channel you use to convert customers, including :

  • Your website
  • Social media profiles
  • Email
  • Paid search
  • E-commerce
  • Retargeting campaigns

  Cross-channel analytics solves one of the most significant issues of cross-channel or multi-channel marketing efforts : measurement. 

  Research shows that only 16% of marketing tech stacks allow for accurate measurement of multi-channel initiatives across channels. 

  That’s a problem, given the staggering number of touchpoints in a typical buyer’s conversion path. However, it can be fixed using a cross-channel analytics approach that lets you measure the performance of every channel and assign a dollar value to its role in every conversion. 

  The difference between cross-channel analytics and multi-channel analytics

  Cross-channel analytics and multi-channel analytics sound very similar, but there’s one key difference you need to know. Multi-channel analytics measures the performance of several channels, but not necessarily all of them, nor the extent to which they work together to drive conversions. Conversely, cross-channel analytics measures the performance of all your marketing channels and how they work together. 

  What are the benefits of cross-channel analytics 

  Cross-channel analytics offers a lot of marketing and business benefits. Here are the ones marketing managers love most.

  Get a complete view of the customer journey

  Implementing a cross-channel analytics solution is the only way to get a complete view of your customer journey. 

  Cross-channel marketing analytics lets you see your customer journey in high definition, allowing you to build comprehensive customer profiles using data from multiple sources across every touchpoint. 

  

  The result ? You get to understand how every customer behaves at every point of the customer journey, why they convert or leave your funnel, and which channels play the biggest role. 

  In short, you get to see why customers convert so you can learn how to convert more of them.

  Personalise the customer experience

  According to a McKinsey study, customers demand personalisation, and brands that excel at it generate 40% more revenue. Deliver the personalisation they desire and reap the benefits with cross-channel analytics. 

  When you understand the customer journey in detail, it becomes much easier to personalise your website and marketing efforts to their preferences and behaviours.

  Identify your most effective marketing channels

  Cross-channel marketing helps you understand your marketing efforts to see how every channel impacts conversions. 

  Take a look at the screenshot from Matomo below. Cross-channel analytics lets you get incredibly granular — we can see the number of conversions of organic search drives and the performance of individual search engines. 

  

  This makes it easy to identify your most effective marketing channels and allocate your resources appropriately. It also allows you to ask (and answer) which channels are the most effective.

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  Attribute conversions accurately 

  An attribution model decides how you assign credit for each customer conversion to different touchpoints on the customer journey. Without a cross-channel analytics solution, you’re stuck using a standard attribution model like first or last click. 

  These models will show you how customers first found your brand or which channel finally convinced them to convert, but it doesn’t help you understand the role all your channels played in the conversion. 

  Cross-channel analytics solves this attribution problem. Rather than attributing a conversion to the touchpoint that directly led to the sale, cross-channel data gives you the real picture and allows you to use multi-touch attribution to understand which touchpoints generate the most revenue.

  How to set up cross-channel analytics

  Now that you know what cross-channel analytics is and why you should use it, here’s how to set up your solution. 

  1. Determine your objectives

  Defining your marketing goals will help you build a more relevant and actionable cross-channel analytics solution. 

  If you want to improve marketing attribution, for example, you can choose a platform with that feature built-in. If you care about personalisation, you could choose a platform with A/B testing capabilities to measure the impact of your personalisation efforts. 

  1. Set relevant KPIs

  You’ll want to track relevant KPIs to measure the marketing effectiveness of each channel. Put top-of-the-funnel metrics aside and focus on conversion metrics. 

  These include :

  • Conversion rate
  • Average visit duration
  • Bounce rate

  1. Implement tracking and analytics tools

  Gathering customer data from every channel and centralising it in a single location is one of the biggest challenges of cross-channel analytics. Still, it’s made easier with the right tracking tool or analytics platform. 

  The trick is to choose a platform that lets you measure as many of your channels as possible in a single platform. With Matomo, for example, you can track search, paid search, social and email campaigns and your website analytics.

  1. Set up a multi-touch attribution model

  Now that you have all of your data in one place, you can set up a multi-touch attribution model that lets you understand the extent to which each marketing channel contributes to your overall success. 

  There are several attribution models to choose from, including :

  

  Each model has benefits and drawbacks, so choosing the right model for your organisation can be tricky. Rather than take a wild guess, evaluate each model against your marketing objectives, sales length cycle and data availability.

  For example, if you want to focus on optimising customer acquisition costs, a model that prioritises earlier touchpoints will be better. If you care about conversions, you might try a time decay model. 

  1. Turn data into insights with reports

  One of the big benefits of choosing a tool like Matomo, which consolidates data in one place, is that it significantly speeds up and simplifies reporting.

  When all the data is stored in one platform, you don’t need to spend hours combing through your social media platforms and copying and pasting analytics data into a spreadsheet. It’s all there and ready for you to run reports.

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  1. Take action

  There’s no point implementing a cross-channel analytics system if you aren’t going to take action. 

  But where should you start ?

  Optimising your budgets and prioritising marketing spend is a great starting point. Use your cross-channel insights to find your most effective marketing channels (they’re the ones that convert the most customers or have the highest ROI) and allocate more of your budget to them. 

  You can also optimise the channels that aren’t pulling their weight if social media is letting you down ; for example, experiment with tactics like social commerce that could drive more conversions. Alternatively, you could choose to stop investing entirely in these channels.

  Cross-channel analytics best practices

  If you already have a cross-channel analytics solution, take things to the next level with the following best practices. 

  Use a centralised solution to track everything

  Centralising your data in one analytics tool can streamline your marketing efforts and help you stay on top of your data. It won’t just save you from tabbing between different browsers or copying and pasting everything into a spreadsheet, but it can also make it easier to create reports. 

  Think about consumer privacy 

  If you are looking at a new cross-channel analytics tool, consider how it accounts for data privacy regulations in your area. 

  You’re going to be collecting a lot of data, so it’s important to respect their privacy wishes. 

  It’s best to choose a platform like Matomo that complies with the strictest privacy laws (CCPA, GDPR, etc.).

  Monitor data in real time

  So, you’ve got a holistic view of your marketing efforts by integrating all your channels into a single tool ?

  Great, now go further by monitoring the impact of your marketing efforts in real time.

  

  With a web analytics platform like Matomo, you can see who visits your site, what they do, and where they come from through features like the visits log report, which even lets you view individual user sessions. This lets you measure the impact of posting on a particular social channel or launching a new offer. 

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  Reallocate marketing budgets based on performance

  When you track every channel, you can use a multi-touch attribution model like position-based or time-decay to give every channel the credit it deserves. But don’t just credit each channel ; turn your valuable insights into action. 

  Use cross-channel attribution analytics data to reallocate your marketing budget to the most profitable channels or spend time optimising the channels that aren’t pulling their weight. 

  Cross-channel analytics platforms to get started with 

  The marketing analytics market is huge. Mordor Intelligence valued it at $6.31 billion in 2024 and expects it to reach $11.54 billion by 2029. Many of these platforms offer cross-channel analytics, but few can track the impact of multiple marketing channels in one place. 

  So, rather than force you to trawl through confusing product pages, we’ve shortlisted three of the best cross-channel analytics solutions. 

  Matomo

  

  Matomo is a web analytics platform that lets you collect and centralise your marketing data while giving you 100% accurate data. That includes search, social, e-commerce, campaign tracking data and comprehensive website analytics.

  Better still, you get the necessary tools to turn those insights into action. Custom reporting lets you track and visualise the metrics that matter, while conversion optimisation tools like built-in A/B testing, heatmaps, session recordings and more let you test your theories. 

  Google Analytics

  

  Google Analytics is the most popular and widely used tool on the market. The level of analysis and customisation you can do with it is impressive for a free tool. That includes tracking just about any event and creating reports from scratch. 

  Google Analytics provides some cross-channel marketing features and lets you track the impact of various channels, such as social and search, but there are a couple of drawbacks. 

  Privacy can be a concern because Google Analytics collects data from your customers for its own remarketing purposes. 

  It also uses data sampling to generate wider insights from a small subset of your data. This lack of accurate data reporting can cause you to generate false insights.

  With Google Analytics, you’ll also need to subscribe to additional tools to gain advanced insights into the user experience. So, consider that while this tool is free, you’ll need to pay for heatmaps, session recording and A/B testing tools to optimise effectively.

  Improvado

  

  Improvado is an analytics tool for sales and marketing teams that extracts thousands of metrics from hundreds of sources. It centralises data in data warehouses, from which you can create a range of marketing dashboards.

  While Improvado does have analytics capabilities, it is primarily an ETL (extraction, transform, load) tool for organisations that want to centralise all their data. That means marketers who aren’t familiar with data transformations may struggle to get their heads around the complexity of the platform.

  Make the most of cross-channel analytics with Matomo

  Cross-channel analytics is the only way to get a comprehensive view of your customer journey and understand how your channels work together to drive conversions.

  Then you’re dealing with so many channels and data ; keeping things as simple as possible is the key to success. That’s why over 1 million websites choose Matomo. 

  Our all-in-one analytics solution measures traditional web analytics, behavioural analytics, attribution and SEO, so you have 100% accurate data in one place. 

  Try it free for 21 days. No credit card required.

  Try Matomo for Free

  21 day free trial. No credit card required.

  
  

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