GOOGLE ANALYTICS

UW SMC – Spring 2012

Numbers don’t lie.

What is Google Analytics For? Free web-based program that records

activity on your website. It can tell you: Number of daily/weekly/monthly visitors Most popular pages on your site Referral sources (where traffic is coming

from) Geographic location of your users How long visitors stay on your site Search keywords people are using to find

your site

Pros vs. Cons

Free Simple interface Easy

implementation Track multiple sites Integration with

Google Ad Words

Google owns the data

Limited reports No historical data

for new campaigns or initiatives

PROS CONS

The Bottom Line

Imagine you had an article published in the local paper, and then somehow you found out exactly how many people read the article, how many people looked at the headline but didn’t read it, and how many people started reading it but then lost interest in a few seconds.

Would this information change the way you wrote your next article?

Viewing Your Dashboard

Main Menu

Visitors A person that comes to your site is a visit.

That session by a user counts as a visit and as a visitor. Any future visits by the same user count as additional visits.

Unique Visitors Same as above, but all additional visits by

the same user don’t count as a new visitor. Page Views

Total number of pages viewed on your site. A visit can contain multiple page views.

Main Menu

Pages/Visit The number of pages a visitors sees during a

session. Average Visit Duration (Time on Site)

How long a user stays on your site before leaving.

Bounce Rate Users that only see one page per visit are said

to “bounce” off your site. % New Visits

The percentage of visits from first-time visits (people who had never visited your site before).

Other Key Metrics

Traffic Sources Overview of different sources that send

traffic to your site (search, direct, referral). Content

Page views, top pages, site overlay. Goals/Conversions

For non-commerce sites, goals and conversions are the primary way to measure how a site fulfills business objectives. These include receipt pages, subscription confirmations, etc.

Painted By Numbers

Marketers are rarely short on numbers.

We’re short of understanding what to do about numbers.

Analysts have a habit

of sending out data instead of insights.

Bosses need insights to make informed decisions.

Find the Story, Tell the Story

People remember stories and they rarely remember a piece of analysis.

With so much data, it's easy to get hung up on numbers and to have slide after slide containing tables and complex graphs.

Ask yourself "What's the story here?”

Often, Less is More

“67.3% of visitors…" can be too precise, and it’s certainly not memorable.

Whereas "two-thirds of visitors…" takes the data issues away and allows the audience to focus on what the two-thirds of visitors did or didn't do.

Develop an elevator speech, if it helps. Make it memorable, make it short.

Questions?

How to Get Started

You must have a Google account Create a Google Analytics account at

http://analytics.google.com Add your website to track Embed JavaScript tracking code to your

site Start monitoring! Everything under one roof:

http://www.google.com/analytics/learn/index.html

GOOGLE ANALYTICS

UW SMC – Spring 2012

Presented by Derek Belt@derekbelt