User Engagement

User engagement or customer engagement is basically assessing an individual’s response to a digital offering: a service, a product or a website. It is important because highly engaged users are the ones who are likely to try, buy or share feedback about the product or service. It is measured by tracking the users’ activities such as downloads, clicks, shares, and more. 

User engagement might imply different concepts in different industries:

  • Retail: Page views, product views, detail views, add to cart, wish lists
  • Media: Daily views, time spent on pages, comments and shares
  • Travel: Pageviews, searches, enquires, clicks on offers, wish lists.

Why User Engagement is Important:

It is highly correlated with the overall profitability of your business. Time is a finite resource and if your users choose to spend their time on a particular web page or on your product, then they are indicating that they find significant value in it. This allows your business to make money from the product or service by engaging your users with ads, subscriptions, or sales.

When compared, highly engaged users are more likely to buy, return, and share the product or service with their friends. Product and marketing teams that measure user engagement use comprehensive product analytics to understand which factors contribute to higher customer engagement. 

Metrics such as daily active users, cost-per-acquisition, and ROI are fairly straightforward while engagement always depends upon the company’s business model. High user engagement via views or clicks might be good for a news and publishing site but not for a medical insurance business, where more usage might suggest that a customer is about to file a claim.