Your users are telling you that your website is broken. They’re telling you what content they like and what they don’t. They tell you who they are and what they need. They’re even telling you how to prioritize your web initiatives. You have their stories and the ability to listen to them. Those stories, of course, are contained in your data.

Web analytics is often defined and accepted as measurement and reporting – numbers that tell us about traffic volumes and website performance. Although measurement is one of the more powerful components of digital (the ability to cheaply measure things in fine detail, with high accuracy, and in a real-time basis should not be overlooked), that on its own does not define analytics.

The true value of analytics is in telling your users’ story. It’s in uncovering insights that enable you to think about your site from a user-centric point of view and take action so that you are creating an experience that meets their needs. The power of data isn’t only in telling you what happened, it’s in informing the decisions you are about to make.

If you were to rank all your marketing channels and properties in order of importance, your website would probably be at the top of the list: you have a highly trafficked platform that speaks to new audiences, re-engages existing patrons, showcases your organization and your events, and sells directly to your constituents. If we can agree that your website is very important to your digital (and organizational) success, the logical conclusion is that it is equally important to understand how your website is performing, and, more importantly, to identify ways of making it perform even better.

If you use analytics properly – if you have the right data in place and if you place the right value in your data – you can very quickly have better insight into what your users are doing, what they want, and how to take action to meet their behavior. It is necessary and important that you use data to create reports that let you monitor your performance, but the real power of your web analytics data is only unleashed once you analyze it to tell the user story.

Yosaif Cohain is speaking during the preconference Plugging In: Digital Marketing Strategy for a New Era during the National Arts Marketing Project Conference 2015. REGISTER before this Friday, 10/23!