As part of the digital delivery programme, one of our first deliverables was to embed analytic scripts in our legacy systems
- to inform our new service design
- and then to provide a means of comparison when we have a new service.
We have used the information provided by analytics to great effect.
There were traditional applications:
- following customer journeys
- measuring transactional funnels
- early identification of bottlenecks & drop-offs
This information has proved invaluable in the continuous improvement of our services.
When we started gathering data via our analytics tool, we also saw opportunities to use it for more unconventional purposes.
To inform usability testing
What became fascinating was the ability to understand where our audience applied from , at a local level, by city.
This meant that with this information we could inform future usability tests to provide closer representation of our customers.
To buy the correct things
A few months ago we had the opportunity to purchase mobile devices for use in user testing. There was some speculation over what was going on in the industry and what mobiles we should purchase.
However, when we consulted our services analytics, it was evident that 3 devices gave us 90% coverage of the applications audience. Mark Twain famously said “Supposing is good, but finding out is better.” We could make informed decisions!
To get the bigger picture
Still flying on the excitement of the data driven decision making, we decided to profile the rise of the mobile & tablet usage in our application over the last year.
Daily & weekly stats are great, but looking back over 12 months really tells a story. We overlaid significant events in the students timeline to see what may have led to certain spikes.
Tablet usage was higher than mobile around application deadlines.
Mobile usage leapt up around payment dates, which makes sense, 'updates' are lightweight interactions suited to one eye / thumb.
So, over to you, what interesting uses have you found for your analytics?