My last article involved using Google Analytics to create a conversion funnel so you could measure drop-offs during the steps in checkout. With these statistics, you can track your checkout conversion rate. You can also calculate your overall site conversion rate if you know the number of visitors to your site and the number of orders you've gotten (Orders divided by Visitors).

So you know your conversion rate, but how do you know if your conversion rate is as high as it should be? Enter the Fireclick index, a free web analytics benchmark index. The Fireclick index tracks 12 key metrics and includes breakdowns by 6 market segments. You can use the Fireclick index to compare your site to others in your industry.

Metrics measured include:

  • Conversion Rate: Global
  • Conversion Rate: First Time Visitors
  • Conversion Rate: Repeat Visitors
  • Cart Abandonment Rate
  • Conversion Rate: Keywords (paid search like Google Adwords)
  • Conversion Rate: Emails
  • Conversion Rate: Affiliates
  • Average Session Length (pages)
  • Average Session Duration (min)
  • Average Page Display Time (s)
  • Average Page Read Time (s)
  • Average Connection Speed (Kbps)

The site even graphs out the metrics so you can see trends. You can compare these graphs to your own to see how closely your site compares to the industry average.

How do you stack up?