Google Analytics has announced the return of Benchmarking reports. The feature, which was discontinued, deprived marketers of a simple way to contextualize performance with that of their relevant market.

In a blog post heralding the return of the feature, Google explained that “benchmarking leverages the footprint of Google Analytics and can help you set meaningful targets, spot trends occurring across industries and answer a whole array of questions: Which channels should you be investing more in? How does your mobile engagement compare to your peers? How unique is your audience?”

In the revamped release, analytics users are able to compare their performance to competitors in their industry, choosing from “1600 industry categories, 1250 markets and 7 size buckets.”

Identifying Underutilized Channels, Marketing Opportunities

Google Analytics used the example of Twiddy, a vacation rentals company, which was able to use Benchmarking reports to refocus and optimize marketing resources.

“It was clear we were missing a huge opportunity in email marketing,” according to Twiddy CMO Ross Twiddy.

As seen in the image above, Twiddy was well below the travel industry average in the amount of sessions, and new sessions, attained via email marketing. This was despite the fact that Twiddy’s average session duration that they were obtaining from emails was almost double the industry average, indicating that users were finding the content they were looking for on the Twiddy website.

Twiddy used Google Analytics to identify the factors that was drawing clicks from consumers, namely price, location, and rental type, and were able to seriously improve their email marketing performance.

“We launched an email last week based on our findings, and it shattered our email marketing records: a 48% average open rate and a 40% clickthrough rate,” said Twiddy.

Conclusion

New approaches to analytics are giving us ever improving insights on consumer behavior and purchase journeys. The return of Google Analytics’ benchmarking reports will help enable marketers to identify underutilized channels, which can then propel integrated marketing efforts and performance across multiple channels.