This is the last post in my series on metrics for evaluating the effectiveness of web site content. Over the last five weeks I’ve presented five metrics that you can use to benchmark site performance basaed on content and navigation effectiveness. Today's metric, Task Completion ROI, is built on the first metric I presented: Task Completion Effectiveness (TCE). It is actually pretty easy to calculate, and it is a great way to introduce concepts of value to content in organizations where this connection isn't seen clearly, such as government, healthcare, non-profits or corporate intranets.

Task Completion ROI: Measures ROI in Web site operations, content, applications, and labor relative to the budget spent on these initiatives.

Calculation of Task-Completion ROI: Number of task...

The Content Distribution Index (CDI) is another engagement measurement that you can use for benchmarking.  The CDI gives you a sense whether visitors believe content is valuable and interesting enough to share through Facebook, Twitter, email and other sharing links that you have on your site, such as AddThis.This is an easy to calculate metric and one that can help you rate overall relevancy of your site.

Content Distribution Index:  Measures whether content holds value and relevance based on visitor opinion.

Calculation: Content shares based on total number of sharing links usage divided by page views. A higher percentage of content shares indicates that content was distributed more successfully.

Calculation Note: Sharing events will need to be captured by tagging the article sharing links. As with the other metrics in this series, you’ll have more accurate results if you do not include navigation, search and...

Let’s return to the topic of content as being a measure of success. In my last post on Task Completion, I said that only sites that sell advertising can consider content viewing to be a goal. I admit that I overstated this a bit…if you’re a non-profit or government site, this could actually be pretty important. 
For non-profits, content that leads to donor contributions, program funding, volunteerism, and advocacy is highly important. Government agencies, branches and divisions have clearly stated missions against which they are funded.  I think of this as Mission Critical Content.

What is Mission Critical content? Content that directly or indirectly supports funding and revenue. For example, showing donors the readership of articles that they’ve funded.

Defining mission critical content can be a...

In your organization, what stakeholder group is most under-served by web analytics?

Certainly not marketers and product managers…they are an analysts’ best set of friends because the reporting can show real ROI.

The user experience designer or information architect? No, they get data that can really help with site optimization that brings visitors to the marketing and product focused site sections. 

I’m thinking it’s the content manager…the operations guy/gal whose job it is to manage the production, updating, archiving and retiring of content. Is there someone in this role where you work? Maybe they are a subject matter expert who has control over a particular site section. Maybe they manage a team of writers whose job it is to crank out the content. Maybe they are your intranet managers…a part of the site that generally flies beneath the radar when it comes to analytics. Maybe it’s the overall site manager. And maybe it’s you.

In much of my work with...