Back in July 2010 we launched a brand new website for Nashua Community College using Joomla. Now that the site has been live for a few months I thought it would be interesting to take a quick peek at some basic traffic metrics from the last three months (August – October), them compare 2010 to 2009 to see how our work has been performing for them in these first few months of operation. The key metrics below are some of the most basic in nature, but it paints a pretty complete picture of how the site is really starting to show a dramatic improvement and how it can continue to evolve.
Visits
Up almost 18% from last year. In plain terms, more people are finding the site regularly. This means that our search engine optimization work and overall content organization has been quite effective thus far.
Page Views
Up almost 47%! Wow this is a big one! In the same time frame as last year visitors to the Nashua Community Website have viewed almost double the amount of content they did in the same period last year. Definitely a product of overall traffic increase and better information accessibility and organization.
Pages per Visit
Up 25%! Not a huge increase here, but when you consider it’s based on an average of total traffic to the website which is around 180,000 visits you can see what a big deal this is. If each one of those visits goes to just one more half a page ALL of your other statistics will positively increase accordingly. It is all about the content at the end of the day. The better the content the more one wants to interact with it. This is one of the critical key features using Joomla allows and it makes it VERY easy for Nashua Community College to publish great content.
Bounce Rate
Down almost 20%! Put very simply, means more people who come to the new Nashua Community College website are where they are supposed to be and finding what they are looking for. Again, a product of vastly improved content organization and accessibility.
Average Time On Site
Up 15% Now twenty seconds doesn’t sound like that much but it’s a start. And shows a general positive trend where visitors are coming to the new Nashua Community College website and finding what they need and digesting that information. This is due to the part of the project where we have replaced a lot of their legacy PDF files with actual website content which allows people to get their content faster without downloads. Make it easy and they stick around!
% of New Visits
Down 42%! Wait what? That’s a bad thing right? Actually in Nashua Community College’s case it isn’t. Yes, a primary concern of the community college is to keep new students coming in to keep tuition numbers high and revenue flowing for the school. On the other hand the website should also be a primary point of communication between the central offices, teachers, administrators and the students. The previous website was definitely NOT doing this, and this number tells me loud and clear that people at the school campus are getting the message that if they need something, have a question, or just want to check out what’s new or coming up on the schedule that the website is now the place to do this.
This is just the beginning…
While these numbers are encouraging in a host of exciting ways, the real excitement lies in the future potential for the site including Mobile application integration, direct course schedule search tools and custom online program planning. There are so many more ways we will be able to continue to improve this site to make even more successful for Nashua Community College!
Does this sound like something your school could use? Are you looking to enhance your online presence? Give us a call today at 603-924-1978 or fill our our website development request form and tell us more about your challenges and goals. We can’t wait to hear from you and discuss your project possibilities.
