Last year Google announced a nifty new feature to Google Analytics called Benchmarking
. Benchmarking allows you to compare your website to similar-sized websites in the same industry vertical. Websites are grouped based on the number of visitors they receive and are classified as small, medium or large.
You can only view statistics for websites of a similar size to yours, for instance if you have a medium-sized website you can only view benchmarking data for medium-sized websites. In any given vertical there are a minimum of 100 websites participating and their information is used to aggregate the benchmarking data for that specific vertical. Below are some of the areas for which benchmarking data is available:
- The number of visitors over a certain time period to your website compared to the average number of visits to similar-sized websites during the same period
- Your websites bounce rate compared to other websites of a similar size
- The number of page views your website received over a certain time period compared to the number of page views of similar sized websites over the same period
- The average time visitors spent on your website in relation to competitor websites
- The number of new visitors to your website compared to the number of new visitors to competing websites
In order to have access to the benchmarking feature you have to opt-in and share your data with Google. Google removes all information that can be used to identify your website and your data is combined with hundreds (or even thousands) of other anonymous websites in your vertical. This information is then made available to all participants and allows website owners to identify potential opportunities by allowing them to analyse trends in their and other industries. Very handy indeed!