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You are here: Home / analytics / Cruising through SharePoint with Content Analytic Reports

Cruising through SharePoint with Content Analytic Reports

August 11, 2015 by Marlee Long Leave a Comment

Image courtesy of Comfreak via Pixabay

Image courtesy of Comfreak via Pixabay

We’ve been cruising along on our SharePoint analytics journey looking at your implementation and optimization of your portal, it’s now time to dive deep into the nitty gritty. That’s right- it’s time to talk about content in SharePoint and why you should care about measuring and optimizing it!

A central tenant for developing a useful and interesting SharePoint portal, is ensuring that there is not just “content”, but quality content. Creating engaging content in the portal, however, is easier said than done and while it’s easy to write about the essential information that must be made available to all users, you often don’t know what other content will speak to your SharePoint users.

Why Content is King

Before you start chewing at the end of your metaphysical pencil, it’s worthwhile working out which of your articles are of value to your users, what content is essential for them to access (even if they aren’t clicking on it) and what content is of no value or interest to them.

Lucky for you, you’ve come to the right place! Today we’re going to provide you with some of the best practices for monitoring optimizing content that will speak to your SharePoint users. Your trending content can act as a catalyst to feed ideas into your future content plan as you spot topics that always trend or result in engagement. This will help you to identify the departments, groups, and individuals who are able and willing to contribute content.

We all know that creating compelling content, as well as providing a space for your users to create relevant content, gives them the tools to allow them to easily use SharePoint and be more productive. Content is the direct source of what will not only draw your users in, but keep them coming back for more.

Analyzing the content that is created by users, and how they interact with it, can give enterprise decision makers deep insights into the overall employee experience. These insights are valuable and effective in helping to understand the needs of employees, as well as their strengths and pain points within the SharePoint portal.

Questions to consider before creating analytics reports on your SharePoint content:

  • What kind of content is most commonly contributed?
  • What departments are contributing the most content?
  • What types of content are “trending” within the portal?
  • Where do weak spots exist in terms of content?
  • What areas on the page are more effective locations for placing content links?
  • What content is getting the most views? What content is getting the least views?

The Bread and Butter of your SharePoint Portal

The brick and mortar of any SharePoint portal is what users can identify with and what brings other users in to discuss the latest topics within an organization’s portal. Content is one of the key drivers in influencing users to gravitate towards the portal. However sifting through it all can be an overwhelming task. By utilizing an advanced analytics solution, you can acquire tangible data on the most pressing content that has been accessed, discussed, shared, posted, and more.

What’s all the Rage?

Interested in learning what everyone’s posting, uploading, discussing, and downloading? Then you’ll need to find out what’s all the rage in SharePoint by using Most Popular Content Reports. Determining which content is most popular is both necessary for identifying which documents, issues, and discussions are occupying the time of your SharePoint users’ and can provide invaluable information about your users.

Ranging from; documents, to discussions and posts regarding policies, newly implemented organizational changes, suggestions for improving efficiency and more. You can get a detailed look at whether business goals need revising or addressing, and which issues have potentially been overlooked. Once you have acquired this information, you can take the appropriate business steps to ensure productivity within the portal.

Screenshot of most popular content in SharePoint portal from Cardiolog

Look Who’s Counting

Utilize Page Views Reports to understand which pages in the portal are attracting users you can understanding which content is most popular in the portal. If you’re trying to drive users to a specific site/page this report allows you to see if they’re accessing it or not. If they’re clearly not accessing it then a new strategy needs to be well thought out and implemented to drive users to this page. For example, creating a button on the home page to direct users to a specific page or piece of content is one way of approaching this challenge.

Screenshot of page views using Cardiolog for SharePoint

If it’s Unused- Toss it!

An Unused Content Report displays the content that has not been viewed within a specific time period. Once you have a clear understanding of which content in the portal is not being used, take action! If the content is not needed then you can delete or archive it to save portal space and decease content overload.

If the content is unused but still needed then it’s possible that your users don’t know how to access it. Make sure you have linked this content from your homepage to other main pages to make the content accessible for your users!

Visualize Where Your Users Click

A Click Map Report allows you to visually measure traffic, conversion, and success metrics within the pages of your SharePoint portal. If you’re wondering how individuals click on links within individual pages, and where exactly they’re clicking, you’ll find these answers here.

Overlaid metrics on top of the page’s links will answer critical questions, including:

  • Which locations on the page are bringing the most traffic?
  • Which links are valuable to users as they navigate on pages?
  • Which links are least relevant to visitors, or aren’t even being accessed?

Once you’ve created reports to assess how content is being accessed on the page, you can quickly and easily use A/B testing to increase adoption rates. A/B testing allows you to understand how subtle design changes in various versions can improve visitor interactions. Ultimately increasing portal adoption and ease of access. You’d be amazed to discover how some of the slightest changes can drive your users to specific content, and improve how they are interacting within the portal.

Clickmap Image

Create Something People want to Share

Now that you’ve discovered some of the most important reports for assessing the status of your SharePoint portal’s content, you can analyze and optimize away. You can take these insights, and then use them to help you create exciting trends and content within the portal.

Monitoring and influencing portal content isn’t a complicated endeavor, however it does take time and attention to detail in terms of what content is trending the most. Taking these first steps will push you right along your SharePoint analytics journey. With just a few clicks you can create a simple report that will lead you into a whole new world of portal insights!

Filed Under: analytics, CardioLog, Content Curation, SharePoint Tagged With: Analytics, CardioLog, content reports, SharePoint

About Marlee Long

Marlee Long is the Marketing Manager at Intlock, developer of CardioLog Analytics, a leading Web Analytics software designed for SharePoint intranets, internet and extranet sites. Originally from Atlanta,GA, she now resides in the technology start-up hub, Tel Aviv. She has worked in the fields of Marketing and Digital Communications for the past two years, and is currently excited to contribute to blogs worldwide with Intlock.
Connect with Marlee via LinkedIn

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