Google certified – And why that matters

If you’re keeping an eye on the “Likes” on your most recent LinkedIn post, or watching a clever ad campaign wrack up engagement online, you know that analytics directly impact our success in the digital world.

The growing importance of data over the past few years can’t be argued, and anyone involved in online marketing shouldn’t ignore the importance of Google Analytics. While it’s likely that almost every marketer out there is using the tool, the question that begs to be asked is: Are they certified? And does it matter?

As a data-driven firm, at the heart our agency are tools like Google Analytics. It’s essential that our consultants understand how to use Google Analytics not only correctly, but strategically.

And at NATIONAL’s Calgary office, over 85% of staff – no matter what role – are Google Analytics certified, and here’s why that certification is important to our clients:

It informs the strategic and creative solutions we offer

Think about the last time you made a big purchase, like a car. Before you commit to spending the money, you likely have a general idea of what the right car for you looks like. But the most important part of the process is the analysis you’ll do to inform how successful that purchase might be for you. What’s the fuel mileage? What’s the horse power like? What’s the safety record? What does the engine look like? What are other people’s reviews about it? Does it fit your lifestyle? This analysis helps you make the right decision, and achieve your goal of buying the right car. This process of asking questions, collecting information and identifying what works and what doesn’t is applied when we develop a digital marketing strategy for a client. Google Analytics is an important tool that we use at each stage of the process. Being Google Analytics certified allows us to get under the hood of our client’s digital platforms with confidence, applying the skills we have learned to assess what’s actually going on and what may need to be tweaked.

The stats don’t lie; they educate and inspire. With certification, we understand how to get the most out of what we see on our dashboards. We use the data collected through Analytics to generate the creative and strategic solutions that NATIONAL is known for. We can test new messaging, explore different channels, identify audiences, and set goals for our clients, allowing us to integrate the most valuable insights into our work.

It allows us to communicate better, internally and externally

There’s a misconception that developers and communicators are cut from different cloths, and are practically speaking different languages. As effective consultants, we must be able to transition between competencies, and Google Analytics keeps our multidisciplinary teams in sync. Clients trust us to offer our knowledge and expertise into an integral part of digital communications. So whether our client is an analytics veteran or someone completely new to the discipline, we accommodate different knowledge levels when we share information.

Internally, our knowledge in analytics reduces the amount of time our developers spend explaining the analytics basics, and our communicators are better equipped to understand the data and what it means.

It’s part of the NATIONAL mandate

If you’ve navigated the NATIONAL website, you undoubtedly know that we practice “Data-Driven Communications”. Our mandate is a commitment to grounding our work in insight, research, and deep sector understanding. Our success is based on our ability to connect people in a meaningful way, and data is a crucial part of selecting the right channel to communicate with the right people.

As Jonathan Litwack, our Vice-President of Marketing Technology, says in this previous post:

“The process of data-driven communications starts with establishing a challenge, moves to identifying the opportunity and establishing the right plan, and finally measuring the results.”

At the core of this process are tools like Google Analytics.

Interested in the health of your website or online campaign? We encourage you to visit our Marketing Technology page or get in touch with our Calgary team – until then, we’ll be tracking that Marketing Technology link!