7 steps-google-analytics-guide-smart-insights

Using Google Analytics
To Improve Online Marketing
Seven Steps to Success Guide
Author: Dr Dave Chaffey
Published: August 2012

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© Smart Insights (Marketing Intelligence) Limited. Please go to www.smartinsights.com to feedback or access our other guides.
Seven Steps to Using Google Analytics to Improve Online Marketing
!
Using Google Analytics
To Improve Online Marketing
Seven Steps to Success Guide
Contents
04 Introduction
07 Step 1. Setup and customisation
37 Step 2. Campaign tracking
44 Step 3. Working with reports to find opportunities and problems
51 Step 4. Understanding your visitors
63 Step 5. Improving reach
73 Step 6. Improving journeys and site engagement
82 Step 7. Improving conversion to lead and sale

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About our 7 Steps digital marketing guides
How will the guides help me?
We’ve created our 7 Step Guides for Expert members to be your constant companion as you
learn, review and improve your approach to digital marketing. We know you’re busy and under
pressure to get results, so they’re written to help you do just that. They take you through the ques-
tions you should be asking to improve performance and suggesting the right approaches for you.
Our Ebooks are all created to help you:
þ Improve results. A focus on getting the best results from your digital marketing.
þ Review your current approach. A unique workbook format helps identify priorities.
þ Apply analytics. Inegrated advice on using Google Analytics to improve performance.
þ Learn best practice. Strategy recommendations and practical tips highlighted throughout.
Who are the guides written for?
Our Ebooks are designed to help you and your team if you are actively managing digital market-
ing. They are also packed full of practical advice if you’re working hands-on on a company website
or campaigns like search, email or social media marketing. This is how our guides are designed to
help different types of people map, plan and manage their digital marketing:
þ Company owners and marketing managers. We help you create or refine plans so you
can invest in the approaches that matter. We help you set goals and put in place a system to
measure and improve since all our guides cover how to get more from Google Analytics.
þ Digital marketing and Ecommerce managers. We help you drive efficiencies from each of
the key digital marketing channels plus your web and social presences through reviewing your
approach using using our comprehensive workbook templates.
þ Digital marketing specialists. Whether you work on social media marketing, SEO, PPC,
email marketing or conversion rate optimisation for the website we have a guide to quickly help
you review and improve your approach.
þ Consultants and agencies. Many consultants and agencies use our guides to check and
refine their approach and recommendations to clients on digital marketing. They’re also used
to help educate team members on the latest digital marketing best practice and techniques.
Guide features
All our guides include these features to help you improve:
þ Checklists of questions to ask to review your marketing approach
þ Guidance on using Google Analytics to improve performance
þ Colour-coded definitions, key strategy recommendations and best practice tips
þ Diagrams giving frameworks to develop your strategy
þ Lots of examples of best practice through mini case studies and screen captures
Tell us what you think
Dave Chaffey and team have developed these guides based on working with many types of
companies and in training. But improvements are always possible, so we’d be grateful if you could
email: support@smartinsights.com with your comments, good or bad. In particular, we’re interest-
ed in ideas on improving these guides or for other guides you would find useful. Thanks!

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4
Introduction
About this guide
Google Analytics is a fantastic tool from the moment you arrange to have the tracking code
installed and you experience the thrill of your first reports appearing showing how real people
are interacting with your online business.
Most of this guide will show you how to take advantage of the standard features and reports,
but to get the maximum from Google Analytics, we recommend you also arrange for some
additional setup and configuration. This will help the reports fit your business better, so that
you can review performance and really drive results.
There are actually so many customisation options that you really need a strategy of what to
customise, particularly if there are several team members using the account.
Note: This guide has been updated to show reports from the new version of Google Analytics
introduced in 2011 (version 5), particularly for setup. The old version became unavailable in
July 2012.
Why another guide on Google Analytics?
Well, because it’s different – this isn’t a simple guide on where to find the menus and reports.
Instead, it’s a complete toolkit, a system for site owners and marketers who don’t see
themselves as analysts, but they have this nagging suspicion that they, and their organisation
should get much more from their Google Analytics.
As we talk to site owners and marketers we find that although most users love Google
Analytics, there is a feeling that it’s not used enough and many of the insights in its reports
are being wasted. We think this is because there is limited guidance within the system. To
use it to the max, you need to use it regularly so you know the right questions to ask and
know where to find the answers.
We’re here to help you tap into the insight so you don’t miss the opportunity by stepping you
through the questions you should be asking and pointing you to where to find the relevant
answer.
This guide shows you how to get the most from Google Analytics “out-of-the-box” using the
standard reports available in the latest update
Unlike most guides, we’re not going to focus on the setup, the config, the reports, metrics
(although we cover those too :) ). Instead we’re going to start with what we think matters
most to marketers – how to use Google Analytics to help my business to perform better.
How is this guide structured?
Here are the highlights of each of the 7 Steps
þþ Step 1. Setup and customization - we start our guide with a section reviewing setup of
a site since we find many companies fail to tailor it to their business. We also show you
how to setup Google Analytics from scratch.
þþ Step 2. Campaign tracking – understanding the effectiveness of your campaigns
sending traffic to your site starts with tagging them right, here we show you how.
þþ Step 3. Working with reports to find opportunities and problems – now we get down
to the business of improving results showing you how to use the reports in a smarter way

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þþ Step 4. Understanding visitor types – marketing is all about understanding and
meeting the needs of customers, so we show how you can understand your customer
behaviours better
The final steps of the guide look at how you can review your analytics in depth to market
better
þþ Step 5. Improving reach – expanding your audience and driving more visitors and
customers to your site
þþ Step 6. Improving journeys and site engagement – engaging visitors with content and
getting them on the path to purchase
þþ Step 7. How can we improve conversion? We look at techniques to boost conversion
for all types of site.
Increasing Visitor Value – the key to improving business success
with Google Analytics
r Q. Have we reviewed how we can create more business value?
Before we get to the first step, we’d like to introduce our approach to using Google Analytics.
For us, you have to start with how you’re using Google Analytics to improve results and for
us this is all about value. You also have to be clear on your business goals and how you
report performance. We have more advice in our 7 Steps to Goal-setting for digital marketing
Guide.
Strategy Recommendation 1 Ensure you can measure the business value created in your
online marketing through Google Analytics
Google Analytics has measures of value generated for all types of visitor, but you have to
work hard to find them.
When starting out with Google Analytics or any other web analytics tool, one of the very first
questions you should ask is how does our website, our digital marketing generate value for
our business? Your whole digital marketing strategy should be based on this, so it’s a great
place to start defining or reassessing your approach.
“Show me the value!” should also be the mantra when creating actionable summaries and
dashboards within Google Analytics or your monthly reports.
Value is THE measure that our senior colleagues who fund the investment in analytics and
digital marketing activities can relate to. They want, need to see the return on this investment
and page views and bounce rates just don’t cut it...
Ultimately what the CxOs and financial controllers care most about is profit generated by
online activities. This is more readily available in some analytics systems if you can import
cost data about each transaction, but most will enable you to show revenue if configured
right.
Where to find the value in Google Analytics. Which measures?
In Google Analytics, it’s currently only possible to import cost data for Google Adwords, so
the value across all of online marketing has to be shown in the form of revenue. But this is a
big improvement on the non-value related measures like visits, pageviews or conversion rate
that are so often reported in dashboard summaries from analytics.
Once you’re reporting on value you can then start to find the ‘value levers’ - which referring
traffic sources, pages and conversion pathways are generating value and which aren’t so you

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can take action.
The 3 key value measures within Google Analytics
The three main value measures in Google Analytics (aside from Adwords generated value
which uses cost data) are:
1. Page value. This shows the influence of pages in generating value either through
Ecommerce transactions or conversion goals with a value assigned.
Page value is available within the Top content reports. It shows you the influence of particular
pages in generating value if they were part of the path to purchase on the site. So you will
see that goal value pages or checkout pages always have the highest page value, but you
can evaluate the relative influence of category or product pages within the journey too.
It’s calculated by summing Ecommerce Revenue + Total Goal Value divided by the number of
Unique Pageviews for a given page in a visitor session as explained in this post1
.
2. Per Visit Goal Value. This is best for non-Ecommerce sites which should have a value
assigned to conversion goals. Once you have done this, you will then see the Total Goal
Value for your reports. It’s reported within the Traffic Sources reports for Referring sites,
Search Engines and Keywords, so it’s useful for comparing the value generated by other
sites and your search campaigns.
NB. It’s a little hidden since you have to select the “Goal Set” tabs within these reports
(under where it says “Explorer”):
3. Per Visit Value. This is best if you have a transactional Ecommerce site. You can see Per
Visit Value measures within Traffic sources on the Ecommerce tab if you have Ecommerce
tracking enabled.
Because both of these are a little hidden, I’d recommend surfacing them within custom
reports which can also show variation in value generated across days or weeks - a handy
application of custom reports. You can then compared actual value to target value if you have
targets set.
Best Practice Tip 1 Create custom reports showing value for regular campaign reporting
You should regularly review value to see how well the site and campaigns are working for
you. Use custom reports to make this more straightforward.
1 Google Analytics: Explanation of calculation of Page value

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Step 1
Setup and customisation
r Q. Google Analytics customisation reviewed?
You can certainly get a lot of value from reporting and analysis using the standard setup of
Google Analytics and we’ll show you how in this guide, but to really drive results for your
business, you’re much better off spending some time on customisation.
Strategy Recommendation 2 Customise Google Analytics for your business
Take time to review the customisation options so you can better understand user
behaviour
In this section, we will step you through different customisation options. You can use this
guide for first time setup or reviewing an existing setup.
We have a separate customisation audit template you can use to review customisation or
you can work through the checkboxes in this section.
We’ve seen lots of companies where there hasn’t been any customisation that can give
problems of accuracy or mean that time is wasted, for example:
ýý Not setting up on-site search so you don’t know how many are searching are for what.
ýý Not excluding employees so these numbers skew reports (a particular issue for small
companies with relatively few visitors)
ýý Not recording information about documents downloaded which can be important for
business-to-business sites
ýý User interactions not recorded with interactive options like videos or application
processed which don’t involve a separate page being created
ýý Automatic alerts not setup so time wasted looking for significant changes
With each passing month there are more customisation options available in Google
Analytics, so I believe you really need a strategy of what to customise, particularly if there
are several team members using the account. This section gives our recommendations on
a customisation strategy based on consulting work I have done and typical usage of Google
Analytics by attendees on training courses.
Understanding how Google Analytics can customise setup for
different sites
Before we review the different customisation steps it’s useful to have an idea of how Google
structures information. This diagram shows that it’s a tree-like structure:

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1. Analytics account. This is most often used for a single business, even if it has multiple
websites. If the business has different sites for different countries or a blog, then these are
contained within the single account. It can be sometimes useful to setup different accounts
for different country sites for a large business
2. Profile or web property. Profiles are specific to a site, e.g. a country site or part of a site
such as a blog in a sub-folder typically.
Users are given access at this level and different Google Analytics features are applied at
this level, so it’s worth thinking through the options for different groups of users.
Best Practice Tip 1 Consider features setup for different groups of users at the profile level
Users are assigned access to Google Analytics reports and features at a profile level, so
it’s worth planning the common features they need like Advanced Segments and Custom
Alerts.
3. Filter. Filters can be applied to include or exclude data to a single profile or multiple
profiles as shown in the diagram above.
The most common uses of filters are:
þþ to exclude employee site access from statistics
þþ to limit data reported to part of a site, such as a subfolder for a blog or product category
þþ to add information about the domain name to reports when the same tracking code is
used across several sites which will make it difficult to distinguish between pages with
common names on different profiles.
Here is a summary of the most common ways you will use these features to customise
Google Analytics:
Scope Main customisations available
Account Typically one company with
one or more web properties
Time zone
Data sharing
Account id has common 8 digits X
UA-XXXXXXXX-Y plus each web property is
unique because of additional id Y
Profile Different report scope,
typically for different
company sites in Google
Analytics. Each web property
has one or more profiles.
Goals, funnels, on-site search are setup at
this level.
User customisations like Advanced
Segments, Annotations and Custom Alerts
are applied at this level
Filter Include or exclude certain
types of traffic to one or
more profile
Include information for single site or part of
site.
Exclude employees
So, that’s our overview of the way Google reports information for different parts of the site.
Now let’s look at the different customisation or setup steps we recommend.

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Step 1. Create New Account / Review account settings
r Q. Set or reviewed time zone and data sharing settings for the account?
Account creation is relatively straightforward if you have a single site or a limited number of
sites operating in a single country. But you should pause for thought at this point if you are
using Google Adwords. In the unlikely situation that you are not using Google Analytics with
Adwords it’s best to create your Google Analytics account through Google Adwords so that
tracking is linked.
To create an account, simply click the “+ New Account” button from the Account
Administration Screen which you access using the “cog button” top right.
Strategy Recommendation 3 Ensure your Google Analytics account is linked to Google
Adwords correctly
If you’re using Google Adwords, it makes sense to create your Analytics account within
Google Adwords account administration to link tracking. Note that Google Analytics inherits
time zone settings from Adwords, so make sure those are set to your time zone.
This is how you add a new account:
As you complete the New Account Administration Screen make sure you use these options:
If you want to review an account that has already been setup, view the Account Settings to

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change the Account Name and Data Sharing settings. The other main type of setting is set
for each profile.
1. Account name and website URL. These are self-explanatory, use the relevant brand
names for clarity.
2. Time zone. It’s important to select your local time zone for meaningful tracking of response
through the day. As noted above, if your account is linked to Google Adwords this time zone
will be used. You can also change this for each web property within your account.
3. Data sharing settings. We recommend that you select both of these options. Although it
may suggest all data is shared, your site won’t enable others to directly compare to your site
– it’s anonymous, meaning that the data is shared with other similar types of site within the
sector. Note. In 2012 Google withdrew benchmarking, but with a promise it may return.
Step 2. Add tracking code to pages
r Q. Tracking code added (including domains and sub-domains if appropriate)?
Google Analytics prompts you with the relevant tracking code to add to pages after you have
created a new account.
If you’re using a content management or blogging system, it’s usually straightforward to
include the identical tracking code in all page templates used on the site.
However, it’s important to note at this point, that there are two versions of the Google
Analytics tracking code.
The current form of tracking, which is asynchronous tracking code was introduced in
2010 and is the default for sites which are newly tagged. If you’re not using this, you should
upgrade your site to this for page download speed improvements as recommended in the
Google site migration guide.�
Strategy Recommendation 4 Consider updating your site to asynchronous tracking code
Async tracking, as it’s known, makes it quicker for pages to download so you should plan
to migrate to this if you haven’t as have many sites which were tagged before 2010. It may
make sense to do this when there is a major refresh to your site.
You can check the code you are using, by Viewing the Source and searching for
“trackPageview”. The Async tracking codes start with _gaq.Push (); as shown in this example
snippet of tracking code:
Where to place the tracking code
Before Asynchronous tracking was introduced, Google advised entering tracking code at the
foot of the page. Now it is recommend that you include it at the top of page.

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Best Practice Tip 1 Insert tracking code at the top of the web page
If you’re using Asynchronous tracking, then this tracking code should be before the end of
the </head> section of code.
You can also review your recommended tracking code on the Advanced tab of the Account
Name settings page:
Special case 1 for tracking code: If your site contains multiple domains or subdomains
You can see from the screen and examples above, that if you have a single domain site
then this is straightforward since there is a simple version of the tracking code. If you have
multiple domains or subdomains, then this is a special case and then additional lines are
added to the tracking code:
Strategy Recommendation 5 You need a special version of tracking code if you use
subdomains or multiple top-level domains
Check that if you have different sites that the correct versions of the tracking code are used.
If you have multiple top-level domains that you want to share data for, it’s important to
change the hyperlinks between sites and also add a filter to identify the separate domains
for the case when file names are the same.
For one domain with multiple subdomains, this line is added to the code:

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_gaq.push([‘_setDomainName’, ‘none’]);
and for multiple top-level domains (and subdomains):
_gaq.push([‘_setDomainName’, ‘none’]);
_gaq.push([‘_setAllowLinker’, true]);
In this second case, you also have to changes links between sites and create a filter to show
domain names - this is particularly important where pages such as the home page have the
same name – otherwise they will all be grouped together.
NB. This is explained in subtle link given with Additional Steps2
- be sure to check your web
developers have read this.
Special case 2 for tracking code: Ecommerce tracking
The reports summarising E-commerce transactions and revenue within Google Analytics
require inclusion of additional tracking code on the checkout completion page specifying
order and product information.
Since this is a major step, but not relevant to all types of site we describe this in a separate
step – Step 9.
Special case 3 for tracking code: custom variables
Custom variables are an advanced techniques which are used to store information about the
type of visitors. We cover them in Step 10.
Step 3. Create profiles
r Q. Profiles reviewed?
A Google Analytics profile will typically be used to produce reports limited to an individual
site, subdomain or subfolder.
To create new profiles you have to click on name of web property, here Account Name
Since there is a risk of making errors within data it is good practice to have a master profile to
which no filters are applied.
Best Practice Tip 2 Define common approaches for data integrity within each profile
Each profile should have a master profile which has no filters applied, a test profile and a
reporting profile.
For users who are assigned a profile to review marketing activity there are these common
assets that can be shared between multiple users at Profile level:
Best Practice Tip 1 Advanced segments
2 https://www.google.com/support/googleanalytics/bin/answer.py?answer=175538&hl=en_
US&utm_id=ad

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Best Practice Tip 2 Annotations
Best Practice Tip 3 Custom alerts
þþ
þþ There is also a fourth type of asset, which is a Custom report, but these aren’t viewable
within the Profile setup – you have to select the custom report tab.
þþ
Use of these assets should be reviewed in profile setup.
Once a profile is created, there are additional optional setup stages including:
þþ Setting up on-site search
þþ Turning on Ecommerce tracking
We will look at these as separate steps since we want to highlight the importance of creating
filters to apply to the profile first, so that we are only collecting the data we need.
Step 4 Create and apply filters
r Q. Filters reviewed?
A Google Analytics filter is applied to modify data from one or more profiles so that it shows
a subset of data within the profile. This can be created as an include or exclude filter. See
Google Analytics Help on Filters.
The most common uses of filters are:
þþ to exclude employee site access from statistics
þþ to limit data reported to part of a site, such as a subfolder for a blog or product category
þþ to add information about the domain name to reports when the same tracking code is
used across several sites which will make it difficult to distinguish between pages with
common names on different profiles.
Excluding employees
r Q. We have taken steps to exclude employees?
This configuration is relatively simple if you have a single office IP address. You don’t want
visitors from a company skewing the results, so these should be excluded unless you want to
artificially boost your visitor numbers and have difficultly understanding visitor behaviour.
Single IP address
þþ Select Filter Manager
þþ Select “exclude all traffic from IP address” as follows:

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2. Range of IPs
A filter can also be created to exclude a range of IP addresses for company employees and
contractors working in different offices.
Use the IP address tool and instructions here3
.
3. Exclude by cookie
Alternatively, if staff have a range of IP addressses or dynamic IP addresses when working
out of the office, then setting a custom variable on a page used by staff only (e.g. Intranet
home page or login page) can be used to update a cookie to filter staff out. Both strategies
are explained below:
§ Google Analytics Help – Excluding internal traffic / Employees
Step 5 Setup Goals and funnels
r Q. Goals and funnels setup to track business contribution?
We’ll look at Google Analytics setup separately for transactional Ecommerce sites and other
types of sites which don’t have a checkout or application process. This is a detailed section
since it’s so important to get this right.
Goal-tracking for Ecommerce sites
If you’re running an Ecommerce site selling online, then the tracking in Google Analytics of
sales transaction is almost always setup by the Ecommerce provider, although there are
often teething problems with accuracy or managing international sites.
If you need to know about Ecommerce tracking this is the relevant GA help page�
or feel free
to ask questions online.
For an Ecommerce site, your main goal is simple, it’s a sale registered through the checkout
completion page. But that’s the end of the funnel process, so you also need goals for other
points in the funnel, for example:
þþ Browse products
þþ Search products
þþ Add to basket
3 Google Analytics IP tool

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þþ Start checkout
þþ Individual checkout steps
These are sometimes known as micro-conversion steps.
What is it? Micro-conversion
An intermediate step on the path to purchase. Through improving micro-conversion rates
we increase overall conversion rates.
This graphic shows steps at different levels in the funnel:
This shows how this looks in Google Analytics:
Goal-tracking for non-Ecommerce sites
For non-Ecommerce sites it’s more difficult to think of different goal types. So we often see
that they’re often not setup. But in the examples below you will see that goals can and should
be set for all types of site, including non-Ecommerce sites. Tick off and then set up the ones
which apply to you that you don’t currently have.
Strategy Recommendation 6 Goals should be setup for all site types
Visits to page types which indicate a visitor has engaged with your site (or brand) and
progressed along the path to purchase should be setup for all types of site.
Q. What is a goal in Google Analytics?
A goal is a record of a page you specify being viewed which shows that a visitor has engaged
with your website showing interest in your products and services.
Google Analytics originally included just 5 goals per profile, but currently 20 are available and
they can be grouped. Since you can group goals in Google Analytics, we recommend you
group your goals in a logical way. This example shows one suggestion for a grouping.
Best Practice Tip 5 Group your Google Analytics goals
Logical grouping of goals will help when you review them.

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Q. Why do I need to setup goals in Google Analytics?
I find that often, goals aren’t set in Google Analytics since they do require some
configuration. So it will need some time to set them up. How do you justify this?
For us, setting up goals in Google Analytics is indispensable for any business looking to get
the most from their digital marketing since you can:
þþ Go beyond measuring visits to events happening on the site that show that customers
have engaged with your business
þþ Track the value the site is generating for your business from these events
þþ See which traffic sources you’ve invested marketing in give rise to these goals
þþ Review which content types and customer journeys on the site are helping achieve the
goals
Q. Which types of goals can we use?
Different goal types to consider which are shown in the example above are prompted by
these questions:
Q. Do we have goals for lead-generation and email communications
r Q. Contact Us or phone call-back thank you page goal?
r Q. Lead-generation thank you page goal?
r Q. Goals for content marketing pages which generate leads, e.g. whitepapers, guides?
Q. Do we have site engagement goals
r Q. Time on site engagement goals?
r Q. Pages viewed engagement goals?
These are a special class of Google Analytics goal where you can set ‘hurdle rates’ for
engagement.

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Best Practice Tip 6 Set hurdle rates for engagement
Hurdle rates are the proportion of customers or prospects that fall within a particular level
of activity. For example, the percentage of members of an e-mail list that click on the e-mail
within a 90-day period, or the number of customers that have made a second purchase.
Q. Do we have top of funnel product engagement goals?
If you can encourage site visitors to view product-related pages they’re closer to buying, so
you should assess the success of the site in getting visitors to these types of goals
r Q. Product search page viewed?
r Q. Category page viewed?
r Q. Product page viewed?
How easy it is to set these up will depend upon the URL structure used as part of the site’s
specification. As an example, if product pages include /product_id or products they will be
relatively easy to identify within a goal
Q. Social engagement or participation goals
Encouraging participation helps develop social proof to new visitors that you’re a credible
brand to do business with. Goals in this category to set or track include:
rr Blog comments
rr Product comments, reviews and ratings
rr Favouriting or sharing of pages through social bookmarking
rr Sharing content or linking through to social presence like Facebook, Twitter or Linked In
Q. Do we have checkout process goals?
The need for goals for checkout may be obvious but are often not setup since Ecommerce
sales can be tracked without goals being setup. But goals are essential to create a purchase
funnel.
r Q. Add to basket goal?
r Q. Start checkout goal?
r Q. Intermediate steps as part of checkout process, e.g. credit card payment?
r Q. Checkout complete goal?
For some types of goals where there isn’t a separate web address Google Analytics events4
need to be setup.
Best Practice Tip 7 Use Event tracking to record Add to Basket Goals or
social engagement
Oftentimes, and following best practice, sites are designed such that adding a product to a
basket dynamically updates a basket showing the product added. Since no new page view
is produced these can’t be tracked as a goal unless a Google Analytics Event is generated
which can then be tracked as an Event Goal. You will need to ask your Ecommerce
supplier, agency or IT team to setup event tracking.
4 Smart Insights: Google Analytics Event tracking and Event Goals

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Q. Have we included offline events?
r Offline events included?
Up to this point, we have reviewed online events. But don’t forget value events such as sales
generated by phone numbers. You should aim to track these through using unique phone
numbers, perhaps for different parts of the site.
Best Practice Tip 8 Track offline sales
Remember to take into account telephone sales influenced by the website when assessing
a site’s contribution to a business.
Q. Have we assigned value to our goals?
r Value assigned to goals?
Once you have worked out which are the best goals for you, the next step is to assign a
monetary value to them. As we’ll see in the next section, if you set a value you’ll then be able
to report the value your site is generating to your colleagues, even if it’s a non-commercial
site!
You’ll also be able to compare how good your different traffic sources or pages are at
generating value so you can boost the good value sources and fix the poor ones.
Setting the precise value is difficult, but it’s not that important for comparing relative value.
The best way to set a value is to work back from a business event which you can put a
value on. For example, if you’re looking to set a value for “Add to Basket”, you know that the
average order value is £$100 and that if conversion from Add to Basket to Sale is 10%, then
you would set the “Add to Basket” conversion goal at £$10.
Similarly, if you’re setting a value event for a lead such as a brochure or PDF download and
you know the value of each lead on average is $100, then set this at that level.
If you’re not sure what value to set, as with an enewsletter signup, then we recommend
setting it to a nominal value of $1 if you want to include that in a value calculation, but you
may not in this case since you can’t really attribute it to business value.
Customisation instructions – assigning value to your conversion goals
þþ To assign value to conversion goals you should again go to Analytics Settings and then
assign the value?
þþ Relevant Google Analytics Help page: GA Help page
Worked example of goal setup for a Google Analytics page
Let’s bring all these ideas together with an example. Let’s take the example of a brochure
download, here you simply specify the thank you page address, give the goal a name and
your goal is set up.
Many will do this, but often not set a value against it based on the conversion of brochure
downloaders to sale and average order value.
How to setup goals the right way
We’ve seen many cases when goals aren’t setup the right way, although the form is quite
straightforward. Here are the three steps for goal setup we recommend and our tips of the
common traps to avoid.

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First Step. Enter Goal information.
R Goal name. Straightforward, but be as explicit as possible to make it obvious to
others what it refers to, so don’t make it too short.
R Active Goal. Again straightforward, set to On for goal information to be collected
R Goal Position. Choose from one of 4 sets as shown in the example at the start of this
topic. It helps to plan goals and group them logically as the example above shows. I
have often seen that goals grow organically if this doesn’t occur.
R Goal Type. This will usually be the default of the URL destination like the thank you
page after the page has been downloaded
Second Step. Goal details.
This is where it starts getting tricky and where mistakes are commonly made, so think this
through carefully.

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Here are some of the fields to pay particular attention to on the goal setup form.
þþ Match Type. This tells Google Analytics to record a goal for a condition when the page
viewed by the site visitor matches your goal URL. Several options are available here to
give you flexibility to match a single URL which is most common for a thank you page
after a form submission or a range of pages such as product pages. Generally, you are
best to avoid the “Exact match” option since this could exclude pages, for example with
additional tracking parameters in the URL query string to a landing page. Instead, use
a “head match” which will include the first part of a URL and page name, but if there
are other parameters such as ?campaign_id=email then the page will still be included.
Remember that, confusingly the match type also effects what the URLs for the third step
of the goal funnel, so check what you chose works here also.
þþ Goal URL. For a “thank you page” this will simply be the web address of the landing
page. If you want to include several pages within a head match, it could be the first part of
the URL, for example, http://domain.com/category-pages. Including a trailing slash page/
can exclude URLs without a trailing slash, so it’s best not to include this to capture all
goals.
þþ Case Sensitive. Generally it is best to avoid the case sensitive option since this may
exclude some pages.
þþ Goal Value. This is often not set, but as we have explained, it’s best to apply it for
major goals such as leads from brochure downloads since it will five you an idea of the
differences in value generated through different traffic sources (through the Goal Value
per Visit metric) and different page types (through the $Index value metric). Ideally, you
should base the value on a known calculation of conversion rate from lead to sale with an
average order value. Even if this isn’t possible, setting a lead goal to an arbitrary value
of £10 can be useful to understand value. Setting the precise value is difficult, but it’s not
that important for comparing relative value. The best way to set a value is to work back
from a business event which you can put a value on. For example, if you’re looking to
set a value for “Add to Basket”, you know that the average order value is £$100 and that
if conversion from Add to Basket to Sale is 10%, then you would set the “Add to Basket”

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conversion goal at £$10. Similarly, if you’re setting a value event for a lead such as a
brochure or PDF download and you know the value of each lead on average is $100,
then set this at that level. If you’re not sure what value to set, as with an enewsletter
signup, then we recommend setting it to a nominal value of $1 if you want to include that
in a value calculation, but you may not in this case since you can’t really attribute it to
business value.
Third Step. Goal funnel
Here you enter a series of up to 10 URLs to explain the number of a steps in a conversion
process such as check out. If you have more than 10 steps you may as well give up and go
home, but it does happen...
In a brochure download, contact us or enewsletter signup page, this is relatively straightfor-
ward. You need to specify a single URL which is the signup form page, so simply specify this
URL.
The only complexity is the “Required Step” check box. This is usually left unchecked, but
you can use it if you only want to show visitors that included this point in the funnel. It is most
commonly used to make the first step in the funnel mandatory. But confusingly checking
Required Step doesn’t affect the number of goals recorded, only the funnel visualisation.
Mistakes to watch out for
As a summary of the common errors we have made, here are common mistakes to avoid:
ýý Gotchas 1. The match type also applies to the funnel, so take care if using exact match.
ýý Gotchas 2. Not actually referencing for URL correctly, so start with /<page>
ýý Gotchas 3. Including a trailing slash / can exclude URLs without a trailing slash, so it’s
best not to include this to capture all goals.
ýý Gotchas 4. Missing/wrongly assigning goal value. You know we’re keen on assigning
values to key goals.
Gotchas 5. Required step may exclude some behaviour e.g. entry deeper into funnel and
cause confusion in the funnel visualisation.
Step 6 Setup tracking for interactions and goals that don’t involve a
page view using Event tracking, Event Goals and Virtual Page Views
r Q. Options reviewed for monitoring interactions and goals that don’t involve a page view?
We have shown how goals are used to record outcomes where an action is completed
such as completing a brochure download form or checkout which involves a page being
viewed. While this works fine for these types of interaction, there are many different types of

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interaction a user may have on a site when they engage with a site where there isn’t a page
served to tell us about the interaction.
Strategy Recommendation 7 Review tracking of additional interactions of a
user with a site that don’t involve page views
To truly understand user behaviour and the effectiveness of your communications on the
site you have to record other significant user interactions. Check that you are using event
tracking or virtual page views to do this.
For example, we may have goals involving:
þþ A stage in an application process for which there is no corresponding page since the
content on an existing page is refreshed
þþ An item is added to the shopping basket
þþ Video or rich media interactions
þþ PDF downloads or emails from mailto: links on pages
þþ Outbound or external links.
In fact, there are many more types of interaction it’s useful to measure: here is a checklist:
Checklist – tracking interactions and goals that don’t involve a page view
Here we list 17 different interactions which you should consider measuring, they cover
different types from blog to retail sites.
Interaction with rich media
rr 1. Video plays and duration. The original example in Google. A subtle benefit of
creating events is that when you trigger an event within code the visit is no longer
counted as a bounce, which is appropriate since the user has engaged. For example,
a video on a landing page with traffic on Adwords it’s important to know if someone
engages with the ad.
rr 2. A carousel with different panels as often used on home pages. With event
tracking, you now know which options are popular since you can fire an event when
they’re viewed or the panel is clicked upon.
Interaction with navigation
rr 3. Identifying engagement with different navigation elements linking to the same
page. For example, if you have a link to a page in the top nav and an editorial hyperlink
within copy to the same page, you can’t isolate which is gaining you the most clicks
through a In-page Analytics overlay or navigation summary (although you could append
tracking to the query string this isn’t a great idea since then you can’t review top content
page views so readily.
rr 4. Tabbed navigation options. When a landing page has a tabbed widget event-tracking
has to be used to see who is clicking on which tab.
Response to call-to-action
rr 5. Buttons and links vs banners. For example, in our right sidebar we have a link to
Econsultancy in different formats and through Event tracking I know that the MPU format
get’s 70%+ of the links, so that’s what I should optimise.
Social sharing and user-generated content

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rr 6. Share button for page. The different networks an item is shared through a widget like
AddThis.com can be recorded.
rr 7. Join a social network button. Our example at the start of the article.
rr 8. Product or article star reviews or ratings. Register an event when these are clicked
and add the product name or SKU to the event label.
rr 9. Comments on a blog. Simple!
rr 10. Document downloads. If you are offering Word or Powerpoint documents for
download for example.
rr 11. PDF downloads An important one for professional B2B sites offering many PDF
downloads. Again you can write the item downloaded as a label for the event.
rr 12. Mail To Links Not so important for most, I’ve grouped this here since often included
in scripts to make it easier to track PDFs.
Usually an additional script is required for tracking downloads and outbound links. This was
originally implemented through generating additional or “virtual” page views, but care has to
be taken that these don’t contribute to the overall event title.
Here are two of the best established options for recording these events5
Ecommerce processes
Last, but not least, we have:
rr 13. Add-to-basket Crucial for retail sites of course, this can now be analysed as an
Event goal, so session Add-to-Basket conversion can be recorded more readily in the
new version.
rr 14. Steps in a checkout when page addresses aren’t updated since the same pages
is updated dynamically. As in the example above where there was an application quote
with pages with the same address.
rr 15. Login button This is particularly useful when linking to a domain tracked separately
since this would be recorded as a bounce even though someone has engaged.
rr 16. Form field abandonment You can trigger an event when a user interacts with each
new field showing our far they have progressed through the form.
rr 17. Form-field error messages These can be written to an Event with a label.
Options for tracking non-page outcomes 1 – Event tracking
r Q. Have we reviewed options for event tracking?
Within Google Analytics, Events apply to interactions with content made by visitors, so if they
are setup, they are found within the Content reports section of Google Analytics.
What is it? Event tracking
A method of tracking user interactions when they click on links or buttons within Google
Analytics.
When you use events, it’s worth being aware of these implications:
þþ When an event is recorded a visit will not be recorded as a bounce. Take the example
5 http://gaaddons.com, Advanced Web Metrics - tracking downloads and outbound links

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of a visitor hitting a landing page and then playing a video tracked as an Event. Without
Event tracking this would be tracked as a bounce, but it’s not with Event tracking which
is right since the user has engaged with the site. It’s useful for Adwords if you’re sending
visitors to a landing page where a video is played. Another useful application is when
a visitor clicks a log-in button that takes them to another company site which is tracked
independently.
þþ In the previous version of Google, Events couldn’t be recorded as Goals since no page
specification was possible. In the new version this is possible as described in the next
section on Event Goals.
þþ There is still the limitation that Events can’t be used as funnel stages though. In this case
you’re still best using virtual page views which are described in the following section.
The Google documentation shows that Event Tracking can be specified with different
parameters to the _trackEvent() method values of which then appear in the Analytics
Reports interface under content.
Here is an example, where on Smart Insights we used Events to track the relatively
popularity and growth of shares to social networks through the buttons at the bottom of this
panel.
Best Practice Tip 4 Categories (required) – Here, the top level grouping of events “Social Media”
related to social media interactions with the site
Best Practice Tip 5 Actions (required) – Here “External link”
Best Practice Tip 6 Event labels (optional)– The type of link clicked, in this case “Twitter”
Best Practice Tip 7 Values (optional)– Not used in this case, but could be used to record the
value of an item added to a shopping basket for example
Using this approach enabled us to see which is popular through Google Analytics – here’s
how they’re shown in the new (in 2011) Google Analytics:

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Clicking on the category of social media then shows the breakdown of different events.
To create an Event that will be recorded in Google Analytics, is relatively straightforward. It
involves taking the hyperlink reference and adding a Javascript “onClick” function which has
a specific order of parameters as shown above, i.e.
þþ Categories (required)
þþ Actions (required)
þþ Event labels (optional)
þþ Values (optional)
In our example, we are just using the first 3 parameters:
<a href=”http://www.twitter.com/smartinsights” title=”Follow us
on Twitter” onClick=”_gaq.push([‘_trackEvent’, ‘Social media’,
‘External link’, ‘Twitter’]);” >Follow us on Twitter</a>
Adding the event to the HTML code of a site can sometimes be made within a Content
Management system if it is a simple link within the body copy of an article, but if it’s part of
code on the server it may need an IT request to make it.
This is a further example from Google help:
<a href=”#” onClick=”pageTracker._trackEvent(‘Videos’, ‘Play’,
‘Baby’s First Birthday’);”>Play</a>

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In this case, the reports for Events would display Videos as the Category, Play as the Action,
and Baby’s First Birthday as the Label. You can read more on the technical implementation in
the Google Documentation6
.
Options for tracking non-page outcomes 2 – Event goals
r Q. Have we reviewed event goals?
Event goals are a new feature introduced into Google Analytics in the 2011 interface
revision which enable events to be recorded as Goals; a previous limitation. This is helpful in
situations such as recording PDF downloads or Shopping Cart Adds as a goal you want to
report on – both common situations.
Be aware though, that you still can’t use events as part of a funnel, in that case you will still
have to use our third option of Virtual Page Views.
What is it? Event goals
Event goals are a specific class of goals where an Event which doesn’t generate a page
view on a site, such as a PDF download are assigned to a Goal with a value if required.
To record an event you have already setup as a goal is straightforward. As the screengrab
below shows, Google has added a fourth goal type “Event” to it’s goals creation form. When
you select Event, it gives you the opportunity to enter the group or specific you want to be
recorded as a goal
The method of setting up Event Goals is very flexible in that you can specify an individual
goal with a label or a group of goals indicated by an Action or Category. That’s what we have
done here – by selecting a category of “social media” this includes all visits to different social
media sites from our sites, so grouping them together.
You can also attach a value associated which the goal. For example, you may want to assign
a PDF download a nominal value of 1 so that you can then see which media and pages are
contributing as assists to generate this value.
Options for tracking non-page outcomes 3 – Virtual page views
r Q. Have we reviewed options for virtual page views?
We have seen that Event tracking has some limitations which make it difficult to visualise
funnels. For this reason many still prefer to use “Virtual Page Views (VPVs)”.
What is it? Virtual page views
6 Google Analytics: Event tracking guide

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A page view is simulated within Google Analytics for an interaction with the site that doesn’t
naturally create a page view.
To create Virtual Page Views (VPVs) requires a similar approach to creating an Event. They
can be created by calling the Google Analytics _trackPageview function which is part of the
code snippet on every page when a page is loaded.
Using our example from Event tracking, we can track a click on our link to Twitter using:
<a href=”http://www.twitter.com/smartinsights” title=”Follow us
on Twitter” onClick=”_gaq.push([‘_trackPageView’, ‘/Social_media/
External link/Twitter’]);” >Follow us on Twitter</a>
When a site visitor clicks on these links, this will create a new page view using this folder
structure.
One limitation, or rather feature of virtual page views you need to be aware of is that these
will inflate your page view figures. In this example this is misleading since a page isn’t being
viewed rather a link is being clicked. However, when a visitor downloads a file like a PDF you
may consider that the PDF download is equivalent to a page view.
Best Practice Tip 8 If you use Virtual Page Views be aware of the impact
on increasing page views to the site
You may choose to remove additional page views using a filter in conjunction with different
profiles if you feel they are misleading
If this is a concern then you will have to create a separate profile with a filter to applied to
include these.
Step 7 Setup users and personalised reporting features
Setting up user access
r Q. User access setup?
Once you have the core tracking features of your profile setup you should then setup access
for different types of employees and agencies.
There are two types of users: Users and Administrators. We recommend assigning all users
to User level only unless they have been trained in managing profiles, filters, goals and
funnels as described in earlier steps.
The reason we recommend this is that is possible to delete all data or corrupt data collected
if filters and profiles are not used correctly.
In a smaller business though, where a single business owner, webmaster or marketer is
managing the site then you will want to have full Administrator access, but take care with
accessing the reports.
You invite new users to use the system using the “Users” tab of the Profiles page as shown
below:

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Setting up shared customised reporting “assets”
r Q. Options for shared reporting for Google analytics users setup?
Users can share different ways of customising reports for their organisations. This can help
novice users take advantage of some of the more powerful features of Google Analytics
which can be setup by “power users”.
Strategy Recommendation 8 Give access to shared reporting assets for users
To help get value from Google Analytics provide arrange for shared reporting techniques for
different users.
These shared reporting techniques include:
Best Practice Tip 9 Advanced segments
Best Practice Tip 10 Custom alerts (part of Google Analytics Intelligence)
Best Practice Tip 11 Annotations
These are accessed through the generically named “Assets” feature in Google Analytics:
Another shared reporting feature isn’t listed here, but is shareable in a similar way. This is
Custom reports.
We’ll now look at these four options in turn:
1. Shared reporting option 1: Advanced Segments
r Q. Advanced segments setup?
Advanced Segments give a powerful way of identifying the behaviour and business
contribution of different types of visitors from different sources. They are created for used on
a single profile or can also be shared with other profiles when saved.
We cover how these can be used in depth on Step 4 on Understanding Visitors and Step 5
Improving Reach.
2. Shared reporting option 2: Annotations
r Q. Annotations setup?
Annotations are feature introduced in 20107
overlaid on the graph on each report. For
instance, you can show new campaigns, new content or new publicity and relate it to
changes in traffic or conversion.
7 http://analytics.blogspot.com/2010/01/annotations-now-available-in-all.html

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What is it? Annotations
Annotations are ideal for overlaying a reminder of the start of new marketing activities to jog
your memory or to share with colleagues.
The method of selecting annotations are subtle – you have to be aware that the pull-down
arrow at the base of the trend line can be clicked on to reveal the box for adding a new
annotation:
So the steps to create an annotation are simply:
þþ Pull down the annotation editing box using the arrow at the base of the chart.
þþ Enter the date and comment
þþ Set to shared – for other users in the profile, or Private – just for you.
To review annotations, simply click on them or pulldown the annotation bar.
3. Shared reporting option 3: Custom alerts (Google Analytics Intelligence Events)
r Q. Custom alerts setup?
Google Analytics Intelligence is a useful new feature introduced in the October 2009 Google
Analytics update which looked helpful to combat the “information overload” from web
analytics through alerts intended to “provide automatic alerts of significant changes in the
data patterns of your site metrics and dimensions over daily, weekly and monthly periods”.
What is it? Custom Analytics Intelligence
The Intelligence feature of Google Analytics currently gives you automated or custom alerts
of changes in visitors from different sources like an individual country, search engine or
another site.
While the automated intelligence alerts are useful, a lot of spurious reports can be generated,
for example for a single city or country, unless you reduce the sensitivity which is worth
experimenting with. Instead it’s best to setup some custom alerts and then you can be
emailed when there is a problem.
To setup events select “Home” in Google Analytics, choose “Intelligence Events” from the
menu in the left sidebar and then select the “Custom Alerts” tab at the top.

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Strategy Recommendation 9 Setup Google Custom Alerts to save time and identify
problems
Create custom alerts to email you or colleagues about major problems or opportunities
indicated by week-on-week or day-on-day changes
Examples of useful custom alerts are:
þþ All Traffic, Visits – increase or decease of more than 10% week-on-week
þþ Natural Search – overall or strategic keyword increase or decrease by more than 5%
daily
þþ Paid Search – increase or decrease by more than 5% daily. For example, Goal
conversion rate – decreases by 5% daily
All traffic visits will be subject to daily spikes, for example when a newsletter is sent, so it
makes sense to do a week on week comparison.
You setup Custom alerts for each profile from the Assets tab.
This example shows the most useful type of alert – when you have a problem such as with
traffic or conversion, you need to see when the value decreases by an amount compared to
the same day over the previous week.
4. Shared reporting option 4: Custom reports
r Q. Custom reports setup?
Custom reports enable you to produce different reports from the standard reports to
customise them to your business.
Strategy Recommendation 10 Create relevant custom reports for your business
Custom reports are one of the best ways to make Google Analytics more actionable by
applying reports to the way your business works.
Here is an example of a simple custom report. Its purpose is to show engagement in different
countries and then enables drilldown to see different further information about each:

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This report is created using this Edit form:
Features available in custom reports are:
1. Tabs. Reports have separate tabs in which you can have separate reports with different

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information grouped for different people.
2. Metric Groups. Within each tab you can have additional reports or if you prefer “groups of
measures” (New in the May 2011 version of Google Analytics)
3. Segments. The green-colour coded segments describe how you break down the data. In
this example we’re breaking it down by Country – Google Analytics is relatively limited in
reports with this type of breakdown.
4. Drilldown through Explorer tables. Unlike many other reports in Google Analytics, in
Explorer tables you can click on a row and then finding out more information through
considering a different segment. In this case, we drill down by Keyword to find keywords
used in each country. Alternatively you can use standard “Flat Tables”.
5. Filters. You can apply a filter, for example to just look at data for a visitor segment, for
example first time visitors, individual countries, etc (May 2011 version of Google Analytics).
The choice is similar to that which you have for Advanced Segments.
6. Sharing custom reports. They can be shared amongst other profiles by using the Sharing
button at the bottom of the edit page.
7. Migrating previous reports. You have to migrate existing reports to the new (May 2011
version of Google Analytics)
Types of custom reports
Often, the biggest challenge with custom reporting is thinking through the right type of report.
Here are some reports to consider which aren’t readily available in the main reports of
Google Analytics:
1. Time reporting.
Use a dimension of week/month to compare performance over time more easily
2. Value reporting.
Report the value of different contributors:
– Keywords
– Landing pages
– Product categories
– Countries
3. Role-based reporting.
Setup different tabs for different types of people or marketing activity
This post by Google Analytics Evangelist Avinash Kaushik may also inspire further ideas for
custom reports8
.
Step 8 Setup on site search (if relevant)
r Q. On-site search setup?
On-site search is relevant to most sites. On site search reports on searches performed in the
search box on your site. This is not setup as often as would be expected in my experience,
8 http://www.kaushik.net/avinash/2010/02/leverage-custom-web-analytics-reports-insights.
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But it is usually easy – you simply specify the search parameter which is a text string used to
tell the search engine what the query term is.
For example, my sites use the Google custom search engine which like Google.com uses the
search parameter ‘q’.
Once you have on-site search setup you will be able to access the report from the Content
Menu.
We have more information on how to use this in our Site Design 7 Steps Guide and in Step 7
of this guide.
Step 9 Setup on Ecommerce setup (if relevant)
r Q. Ecommerce tracking setup (if relevant)?
Although this is a crucial step for transactional sites, many sites won’t include this, so it’s an
optional step.
Two main actions are necessary to track an Ecommerce site:
1. Tell Google to enable Ecommerce reports.
This is achieved through profile settings for each profile:

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2. Add special Ecommerce tracking code to the transaction completion page.
This tells Google Analytics when the order was placed and the items that were ordered and
their value so that the transaction information can be included in the Ecommerce reports of
Google Analytics.
If you are coding this or inserting manually (e.g. for event tracking), in addition to the
standard tracking code, the order details _addTrans() and line item _addItem() Javascript

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functions need to be included on the page as in this example from Google9
If you are managing an international Ecommerce site then there is a limitation to be aware
of if using profiles to report transactions for an individual country. You can’t use filters for
transactions as you can for pages. So instead, you have to filter with affiliation or Order ID by
writing a unique identifier for each country to that field. Alternatively you can choose to create
a separate Google Analytics account for each country and then create an aggregate rolled-up
account using a separate web property id.
You also need to consider how currency will be treated in Google Analytics since the
information is only recorded as a number, not in a particular denomination. If you want to
report in a single currency, then you will need to convert to this currency before writing the
value to the page. If this issue is important to you, we recommend review of these 3 options
by Google.
You can see that each method has it’s own limitations10
.
Step 10 Setup custom variables
r Q. Custom variables setup?
Custom variables apply to Visitors, so they are found within the Visitor reports section if they
have been implemented. In our experience they are rarely used since they need careful
consideration to see how to best use them and need to be implemented on the server
requiring input.
That said, custom variables are powerful since they enable us to learn more about visitor
characteristics. For example, how does customer behaviour differ from non-customer. What
are the demographics of different users?
Care must be taken not to store information about individuals, since this is against Google’s
terms of service for privacy purposes.
9 Google Analytics migration guide
10 Google Conversion Room guidance on Ecommerce tracking by country

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Strategy Recommendation 11 Use custom variables to find out more about customers
Custom variables enable you to distinguish between customers with different characteris-
tics rather than treating all visitors as anonymous.
Options for setting these variables include:
þþ Customer vs non-customer
þþ Different customer segments or demographic profile variables like male or female or
membership levels for a membership site.
þþ Segmenting visitors according to landing page.
þþ Recording referral source attribution.
þþ Categorising different content types
Custom variables were originally specified through a call to a function called _setVar, but are
set through _setCustomVar. This post gives the relevant function specification from Google.11
They are most often used for defining specific segments based on the profile detail identified
through a form or consuming particular content. This post from US analytics specialist E-Nor
gives great detail on how a retailer can review different customer types.12
11 Google Analytics guide to custom variables
12 E-nor: Multiple custom variables

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Step 2
Campaign tracking
r Q. Marketing campaign setup reviewed?
Today there is an incredible range of different media that can be bought online and offline.
From traditional TV and print ads to Google Adwords ads and video ads there is no shortage
of choice. Ideally, to check the return on investment in your promotional efforts, these need to
be reviewed for effectiveness. Although digital media have been called “the most measurable
ever” extra effort is still required to setup campaign tracking.
Defining a standard set of online marketing source codes is essential to determining the
value of different referral sources such as ad campaigns or email campaigns.
Strategy Recommendation 12 Set standard marketing source codes for use in reporting
Through using standard marketing source codes you can get a much better idea of where
to focus your marketing campaign spend.
What does Google track by default?
When you select the Traffic Sources overview, you get a good idea of what Google Analytics
can tell you about traffic sources.
out the type of marketing which is sending or referring visits to your site:
The four main traffic sources reported at this level in Google Analytics are:
þþ Search traffic – This groups both natural and paid search (Adwords)
þþ Referral traffic – This is traffic from other sites which have direct links to your site
þþ Direct traffic – Direct traffic results from URL type ins, bookmarks or when email
marketing isn’t tracked.
þþ Campaigns – Campaigns include Adwords when linked to the Google Account and any
other campaigns like affiliates, display ads and email campaigns when these have had
marketing campaign tags attached.
Google Analytics gives you good search campaign tracking by default. Most companies using

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Adwords will track it through its automated integration enabled from Google AdWords. This
reports on paid search and your natural search is tracked also by default and you will see
these when you select “incoming sources”. Both of these forms of search marketing can be
reviewed through advanced segments.
You can get more detailed tracking information on campaign source in Google Analytics by
adding additional marketing source codes. Here’s how.
Using Google Analytics marketing source codes
r Q. Marketing source codes used in Google Analytics?
To track other (non-search) campaigns requires you to use a standard notation which needs
to be defined and then added to all links involving media placements or campaigns.
Google Analytics uses 5 standard dimensions for a campaign which need to be incorporated
into the query string of the URL for each ad placement as this example shows:
http://www.domain.com/landing_page.php?utm_campaign=spring-sale&utm_
medium=banner&utm_source=handbag.com
The campaigns report in Google Analytics will then enable you to compare media.
The table explains each of these 5 dimensions which refers to this example:
Variable Explanation
utm_campaign
Recommended
The name of the marketing campaign, e.g. Spring Campaign.
utm_medium
Required
Media channel (i.e. email, banner, CPC, etc).
What is the ‘distribution method’ that is used to get our message out to
our clients?
utm_source
Required
Who are you partnering with to push your message. A publisher such
as handbag.com, or for paid search, Google, Bing, etc
utm_content
Optional
The version of the ad (used for A/B testing) or in AdWords. You can
identify two versions of the same ad using this variable. This is not
always used and is NOT included in the above example.
utm_term
Optional
The search term purchased (if the link refers to keywords).
This is not always used and is NOT included in the above example.
To understand the way this works, we recommend you use the Google URL Builder13
that
can help with creating these links.
Best Practice Tip 12 Use the Google URL builder and spreadsheets to create campaign
source codes
Use the URL builder to setup campaign tracking on one-off campaigns. For more regular
activity, use a spreadsheet to automatically create the URL strings.
For other types of vendor tools used to create and manage campaigns, the marketing source
codes can be added automatically if you enable this option. This is worth researching when
you get new systems or ask your existing providers of support for:
13 Google URL Builder

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þþ Affiliate marketing
þþ Display advertising
þþ Email marketing
þþ Social media marketing
To summarise this section, this is our summary of how campaign tracking codes can be used
– these are only suggestions – campaign, content and term are flexible with how they can be
used.
Digital media
channel
Medium
(Media
channel)
Source
(Site name)
Campaign
(Campaign
name)
Content Term
Natural search Organic
(label within
segments)
Search
engine name
Not used Not used Search
term used
by user
Paid search cpc Search
engine name
Adwords
campaign
name
Ad version User
search or
Search
term
triggering
ad
Affiliate
Marketing
Affiliate
marketing
Affiliate
network,
aggregator or
voucher site
Referring
site
Offer Product
Display
advertising
Display
advertising
Ad network
or publisher
name
Campaign
name
Ad
placement
or testing
version
Ad
identifier
Email
Marketing
Email
marketing
Email
type, e.g.
Enewsletter,
Triggered,
Campaign
Campaign
name
Location of
link in email
or offer if
testing
Subject
Line
Social media
marketing
Social media Social
network
name
Campaign
name
Offer? Name of
message
Best Practice Tip 13 Use Social Analytics to isolate the impact of social media marketing
The “Social” report in the “Traffic Sources” menu enables you to see all social media visits
and conversions grouped together. It reduces the need for campaign tracking with a social
media-specific code, but this is still good practice so that visits from social applications like
Hootsuite are tracked.
In 2012 Google introduced a feature called “Social Analytics” which has reduced the need
for separate tracking of social media URLs, but we would still recommend this as a good
practice. Read our alert on Social Analytics14
for more details. You can access the “Social
14 SmartInsights: Alert on Social Analytics

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Analytics” feature under the “Traffic Sources” menu. The most important point to note is that
it can be used to show assisted conversions where a visitor was referred by social media at
some point in the journey to purchase, not just the last click. This can be helpful in proving
the value of social media.
Strategy Recommendation 13 Use multi-channel funnels to help prove the value of media
throughout customer journeys
Use “multichannel funnels” to show how social media marketing or display advertising
contributes “assists” to sale earlier in the path to purchase.
This example15
shows how a B2B company is able to show the value in Referrals from
partner sites and social networks in generating leads:
You can access this report from the Conversions menu in the left sidebar - it is labelled
Multi-channel funnels, Assisted conversions.
15 Smart Insights: Example of applying Multichannel funnels

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Offline campaigns
r Q. Offline campaigns tracked?
To track offline campaign effectiveness ideally requires use of a specific campaign URL
within offline communications like Print or TV ads.
Some will argue that this isn’t worthwhile since so few use the URL. But we would argue that
it’s still worthwhile since:
þþ You get a good idea of the relative effectiveness of campaigns
þþ It stops offline media being grouped within the “Direct” category
There are several choices with which URL to use, here are the advantages and
disadvantages:
1. The standard home page address.
Example: http://www.domain.com
This is a common approach by advertisers since it’s the simplest. The main disadvantage
from a measurement point-of-view is that there is no way to directly track this. Although you
can review an increase in direct traffic arriving at this URL through a segmented landing page
report.
From a marketing point-of-view this also has the disadvantage that their is no value indicated
in the URL to encourage the clickthrough.
So for a major campaign it’s best to avoid this, but many marketers argue that it’s their
preferred method since it gets the primary URL in the prospects mind and so few remember
and type the URL anyway. I would argue that it will be less effective since the design of most
home pages will make it difficult for the users to find the offer, so conversion rate will drop.
Campaign landing pages are more effective.
2. Static campaign specific URL.
Example: http://www.domain.com/<campaign-name>
The use of a campaign URL (‘CURL”) is a common approach, where a promotional URLs or
so-called vanity URL is used in offline Print ad, Direct Mail and TV campaigns to make it easy
for the customers to fulfil the offer.
Best Practice Tip 14 Encourage use of vanity URLs through a specific offer
Use a value offer within the campaign URL to encourage type-in and make it memorable.
For example, “freememory” for a computer retailer.
Example: http://www.domain.com/<value-offered>
3. Redirecting campaign specific folder URL with Google Analytics tracking codes
Example: http://www.domain.com/<campaign-name>
In this case, the URL is the same as the previous two examples, but the server setup is
different. A 301 redirect should be created by the server administrator so that the visitor is
automatically redirected to the landing page.
The trick here to tracking is that when the redirect happens, the same campaign tracking
codes format should be used as for other sources as explained in this post on online
campaign tracking.

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As with digital campaign tracking, offline campaign tracking should use standard codes for
medium, source and campaign name.
The table explains each of the 5 dimensions referring to an offline campaign example:
Variable Explanation
utm_campaign
Recommended
The name of the marketing campaign, e.g. Spring
Campaign.
utm_medium
Required
For an offline campaign this should be print, TV
or direct mail
utm_source
Required
Who are you partnering with to push your
message. It will typically generic, such as
“magazine”, unless you have a specific code for
each publisher such as “Forbes”.
utm_content
Optional
Not usually used in offline campaigns, but could
be used for offer code.
utm_term
Optional
Again not usually used in offline campaigns, but
could be used for offer code.
This example of the server code for a print ad is taken from Brian Clifton’s whitepaper and
book listed below which I recommend for delving into the details.
<VirtualHost>
RewriteEngine on
RewriteCond %{HTTP_USER_AGENT} .*
RewriteRule .*
http://www.mysite.com/?utm_source=magazine&utm_medium=print&
utm_campaign=March%20print%20ad [R=301,QSA]
</VirtualHost>
Other sources to find out more about offline campaign tracking.
1. Brian Clifton’s whitepaper on Tracking Offline marketing with Google Analytics is an
adaptation of Chapter 11 from his book - AdvancedWeb Metrics with Google Analytics,
second edition by Brian Clifton (Wiley 2010).
Offline or multichannel tracking was also explained well by Avinash in his 2008
post: Multichannel Analytics: Tracking Online Impact Of Offline Campaigns.
The core technique is to use a 301 redirect which appends a campaign code. He describes
the example of http://www.dell.com/tv which redirects and appends a (non Google Analytics)
tracking code referencing TV:
http://www.dell.com/content/topics/segtopic.aspx/tv?c=us&cs=19&l=en&s=dhs&keycode=6Vc
94&DGVCode=TV&dgc=TV&cid=11510&lid=985367
4. Redirecting campaign-specific domain name
The approach here is similar to the third approach, but this time a completely new campaign
URL is used. For example, some time ago, insurer Aviva used the URL http://www.

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quotemehappy.com for it’s campaign that redirected to a landing page on the main site. We
recommend a redirection since if a new separate domain is used, it can take the search
engines a long-time to include in the index meaning that searchers look for the campaign
name will be forced to use the paid search ad since there isn’t a natural listing. However, if
the campaign page is within an existing site it should naturally be at the top of the natural
listings.
Defining a standard set of online marketing source codes is essential to determining the
value of different referral sources such as ad campaigns or email campaigns.
The campaigns report in Google Analytics will then enable you to compare media.

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Step 3
Working with reports to find
opportunities and problems
r Q. Methods of reviewing reports improved?
This is a short step since Google Analytics is easy to use in comparison to many Analytics
tools. Google also has an excellent animated tutorial on using the interface you can view�
.
In this step we’ll cover:
þþ A. Overview of reporting and working with data tables
þþ B. Selecting and comparing different time periods
þþ C. Using reporting Views including Pivots
þþ D. Using Filters or “Searches” to narrow results
þþ E. Using custom reports
A. Overview of reporting
Reports are where all the analysis action happens in Google Analytics. It’s worth getting to
know them well since there are a lot of short-cuts to save time and find opportunities where
you should focus your efforts.
A fair few changes were made to the reports in new 2011 version of Google Analytics, so we
thought it would be helpful to summarise them in the context of what you scan on screen:

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Many of the features you will know, or they are self-explanatory, but there may be some you
do not know about. We find 2, 8, 10, 12 and 18 aren’t used so much because you have to
seek them out.
Here is our summary of how to use the different report elements highlighting tips to get the
most from each.
Feature Purpose Tips
1 Date selector Select fixed periods of weeks
or months or custom periods.
We have more information below
on how to use this for time period
comparison below.
2 Explorer
report:
Select report
types
Report variation in dimension
by site usage or commercial
performance (goals or
Ecommerce).
This is a good short cut to see which
dimensions are.
NB. New. For some reports: Pages,
Landing pages there is an additional
choice of report type that is useful
for analysis of an individual page
(Navigation Summary and Entrance
Paths).

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Feature Purpose Tips
3 Summary
measures
These are the headline figures
for this report.
Watch the % variations between periods
when you have comparison selected.
Also compare to site averages when an
individual page or referrer is selected.
4 Trendline Performance of the primary
measure for the table.
You can compare the primary measure
to another using the Compare metric
option 6.
5 Graph mode
* New
Apart from the standard Line
chart, this also offers the
“Motion chart” or X-Y format.
Motion charts work best for
interpretation over a longer period of
week or month.
6 Compare
metric
Select from the list to compare
to another measure
Often useful to compare volume against
engagement, in this case to bounce
rate.
7 Graph By Used for selecting Day, Week
or Month
Week and month are best for evaluating
long-term trends.
8 Annotations Add annotations as personal
reminders or to share with
colleagues
Examples might be campaign start date
or changes to AdWords accounts.
9 Viewing The primary dimension can be
changed.
For example can change to medium in
this example.
10 Secondary
dimension
This inserts an additional
column for you to break down
the primary dimension further.
For us, the pivot table arguably gives a
better visualisation for this.
11 Search Filters the results to those
matching criteria.
Think of this as a filter. Can be useful to
find opportunities for example, highest
volume pages with the highest bounce
rate.
12 View Changes from the standard
table view to graphical or pivot
views.
We think the Pivot table is the most
useful alternative view. Comparisons
and pie-charts can be useful though.
13 Page selector Scroll through the pages Best to increase “Show rows” 19 when
reviewing Pages or Keywords.
14 Measures The measures reported in the
table.
Click on the column heading to order by
this measure.
15 Select Plot
Rows.
New.
Tick the boxes for these to be
compared as line graphs using
18.
Useful for isolating problems pages or
referrers.
16 Primary
dimension
Drilldown to get data with
same measures on this
measure only
When reviewing Content clicking used
to give details on this page, now you
have to select “Navigation Summary”
from the Explorer area: 2.
17 Measures in
table
Measures listed in order of the
column selected.
Change column selection by clicking on
the column heading 14.
18 Plot Rows.
New
Plots the rows selected in 15. Useful for isolating problems pages or
referrers.

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