Remember the classic question: “What’s the one thing you’d bring with you if stranded on a desert island?” Let’s apply a similar thought experiment to website analytics. If you could only have one report to manage your website, what would it be? For me, it’s a trending report that shows page session tracking by month—as illustrated in the table below.
Why Sessions Is the Right Metric
In this scenario, we’re not dealing with an eCommerce website, so metrics like revenue, orders, or units don’t apply. I also wouldn’t choose user or visitor metrics because frequent cookie deletions make unique or returning user tracking unreliable.
The sessions metric stands out as the most reliable option. It aligns closely with a “jobs-to-be-done” analysis, helping us understand how visitors are using the site. A single visitor may have multiple reasons (or “jobs”) for visiting your website in a day, and sessions capture this behavior effectively.
Why Page Title Is the Right Dimension
Understanding how your content performs is critical, and the Page Title dimension offers two distinct advantages:
- It helps you evaluate the SEO naming of your pages alongside performance metrics.
- It’s more concise than using the full Page URL, making reports cleaner and easier to read.
For instance, in my reports, I’ve removed the “| Marketing with Dave” suffix from all non-homepage titles for clarity.
Insights from Page Sessions Data
While data tables may not be as visually appealing as charts or graphs, they often provide deeper insights. Below are five key takeaways from the data on my website, which I’ve recently started driving more traffic to:
- Unusual Traffic Spikes
The anomaly of 551 sessions on the homepage in February—and a smaller spike in March—caught my attention. After investigation, I discovered it was caused by unwanted referral traffic from Poland, which affected many websites. While I’ve filtered this traffic out in my reports, I’m showing the raw data here for transparency. - Steady Growth in Monthly Traffic
The data reveals a slow but steady increase in monthly sessions, with notable growth starting in October. A closer look shows that in November, traffic was driven by my Christmas book promotion, and in December, a blog post on SWOT analysis gained traction. This suggests that I should build out more suporting content covering SWOT - Home Page Dominance
Approximately 73% of my website traffic lands on the homepage. However, this is somewhat misleading because my homepage features a pinned blog post. Recognizing this, I’ve decided to implement a dedicated home page (coming soon). - Tracking New Page Performance
My LinkedIn book page is a great example. The data shows when the page went live, how it performed in its first month, and how it has fared since. Promotions and marketing efforts have influenced traffic spikes, but this report helps identify when a page’s performance starts to decline, prompting decisions like optimizing existing content instead of creating new pages. - SEO and Visitor Interest Opportunities
Reviewing page titles alongside session data naturally leads me to consider whether page titles could be improved for SEO or to better capture visitor interest.
Why This Report Matters
By consistently monitoring page-level session data, you can make informed decisions about content creation, optimization, and overall website strategy. This single report combines quantity (total traffic) with quality (specific page performance), making it an invaluable tool for managing your website effectively. Another way to enhance this report is by including the Page Type dimension, which categorizes pages into types like blog posts, navigation pages, or the homepage. This addition provides deeper insights into which types of content are driving the most traffic and informs where to focus optimization efforts.