A platform that measures and reports on website traffic. It provides information about how people use your website, which includes the most popular content, the time spent on each page, and what devices are used to browse. Google Analytics can be connected to Google Ads to learn which campaigns are driving the most traffic and converting casual visitors into customers. Additionally, the platform offers rich insights about your audience, such as terms they use to search and location data.
Today, marketing analytics revolves around data. Data tells you how people behave, what they want, and even when they want it. But all the raw data in the world is worthless if you don’t know what it means.
Using the right tools to collect and examine data from your web properties allows you to make sense of patterns and act on what you find before the competition does. And the best tool to use is Google Analytics.
Thousands of companies use Google Analytics, and you can too. But first you need to understand what Google Analytics can tell you and why that information is important. Armed with that knowledge, you can get Google Analytics up and running and working for you.
Whether you run a blog or want to promote a new business website, there are some vital questions to answer that will help you understand what’s working for you and what’s not.
Google Analytics integrates with an entire suite of marketing products such as Google Ads and Google Data Studio. The tool combines data from multiple points to create an incredibly detailed map that will help you navigate your audience. The more you learn about your people, the better you’ll be at giving them what they want.
Start by setting up a dedicated Google Analytics account. If you already have a Google account you use for Gmail, YouTube, or another Google product, you can use that account to get started.
Don’t use someone else’s account to manage your Google Analytics data. If they leave your company and your Google Analytics account is registered under their name, all your data will go with them, and you’ll have to start from scratch. If you need someone else to manage your Google Analytics information, grant them access—not full control—to your account.
Once you have a Google account, visit the Google Analytics website and click Sign into Google Analytics or Start for free. Either button will take you to a page where you can click a blue Set up for free button to create your Google Analytics account.
Then follow these steps.
You may choose to use a hierarchy to organize your account.
You, the user, decide what properties to track.
Each property can be viewed up to 25 different ways. At a minimum, you should set up 2 views per property.
Figure out which properties you want to track with which accounts. You can’t move a property from one Google Analytics account to another. You have to set it up as a new property under a new account, a process that would lose you all the previously collected data.
To make properties easier to organize, it’s a good idea to give your properties and accounts simple, clear names. You can always rename properties later.
Below where you set up your property, there’s a section that allows you to configure your data-sharing settings. Here, you can check or uncheck what kinds of data you want to share with Google to help the organization maintain its service. Options include:
Once you fill out the account and property sections, follow these steps.
The code you receive is a collection of numbers, letters, and symbols that you embed into your web pages so Google Analytics can track them. You will need to copy and paste this code on every page of your website.
If you have a large website with upwards of 50 pages, don’t worry. You only need to install the code in the page templates. Afterward, you can duplicate those templates as often as you need them.
How you install your Google Analytics tracking code will vary based on what website builder or platform you use.
There are many other ways to integrate Google Analytics into your website. If you use a website builder or platform that’s not listed here, you should be able to find instructions for how to add tracking codes to your pages in the site builder’s admin menu. Look for an option labeled “Google Analytics” or “analytics.”
Once you’ve set up your Google Analytics accounts, selected properties to track, and pasted in your tracking code where appropriate, you’ll have everything in place to start collecting valuable data. After gathering enough information, you can try out different reporting features to figure out how to best use your data to your advantage.
When you log in to your Google Analytics account, you’ll automatically be taken to your Audience Overview report, or, if your account tracks more than one website, to a page that lists your websites. Clicking on a website takes you to that particular property’s Audience Overview report page.
The Audience Overview report gives you information about user demographics, languages, operating systems, and devices. The report also provides data on metrics such as page views, view duration, and the percentage of new visitors versus returning visitors.
Information is displayed numerically in tables and visualizations such as graphs. Selecting a statistic will give you a graph and pie chart for that particular stat, so you can examine each number in more detail.
There are more than 50 reports available through Google Analytics. Access these reports via the Reporting link in the top menu.
Many reports in Google Analytics look like the Audience Overview report. To make the most of your data, be sure to try several features and procedures.
Google Analytics provides you with opportunities to delve into more detail about almost every data point. You can sort and filter data to find exactly what you’re looking for or look holistically at each individual data point—discovering everything from a user’s geographic location to the screen resolution of their device at the time of viewing.
Take the time to play around and adjust your data filters. Find out what data is most useful for you to answer questions like what parts of your site are most popular and who finds your content the most attractive.
If you click into the left sidebar of your Admin menu, you’ll find a list of different reports you can access. Each report shows you a different aspect of your audience.
Audience reports Audience reports give you in-depth information on your site visitors or your mobile app users. They provide insightful data on areas such as:
You can also create custom metrics to learn more about your audience’s behavior, interests, and more.
Acquisition reports Acquisition reports tell you how users in your audience report landed on your site. Your website traffic gets broken down by category and sources, such as which of your visitors came from which social media channel or advertisement.
Behavior reports Behavior reports provide information on how your content performs with viewers. Among other things, you’ll learn about:
You can also configure your behavior report to display more nuanced information, such as what queries or terms users search for on your web pages.
Conversion reports Conversion reports are part of Google Analytics’ goals feature. They tell you how well you are achieving the goals you set with metrics such as how many conversions your website generates.
Conversion reports are tied to the standard Google Analytics reports. For example, using information from the audience reports, you can create filters to view the number of conversions from particular locations or from people who speak a particular language. This integration is particularly useful if you divide your target audience and draft separate marketing strategies for each segment. It’s also useful for tactics such as A/B testing, as you get to easily measure the performance of different versions of different pages.
When you start out, it’s smart to explore all the reports Google Analytics has to offer. As time passes, however, you’ll find some reports more useful to you than others.
To make navigation easy, Google lets you create shortcuts to the reports you use most. To create a shortcut, click the Shortcuts link at the top of the report you want to add. You will then see the report show up in the shortcuts menu in the sidebar.
You can also configure reports to be regularly emailed to you and your team members. To do this, click the Email button in the top menu, select the messaging frequency, day of the week to send the report, and the relevant recipients, and then hit Send.
To add a new Google Analytics account:
To add a new property to your Google Analytics account:
Sometimes, Google Analytics’ default tracking mechanisms and metrics won’t tell you everything you need to know. But there are built-in tools and customization options, ranging from custom metrics to goals, that will help you get the data you need for your business to succeed.
Once you’ve set up your profile and installed your tracking code, you’ll want to set some goals. Goals in Google Analytics track specific user interactions with your website to help you better understand user behavior and measure how well your web pages accomplish their intended purpose. To access this feature, click the Admin link in the top menu of your Google Analytics page and then select Goals under your website’s View column.
When setting up a goal, Google Analytics provides templates that fall specific categories such as:
Each category has its own set of options you can choose as a goal. Under the revenue category, for example, you can choose:
After you’ve selected a template, you’ll be prompted to enter a description, type, and details for the goal. The details section lets you create a funnel to track people’s path to the goal. If you want to track purchases, for example, you can enter the URLs of each page related to your business’s buying process. Google Analytics will measure how many people make it to which steps in the process, and how many people abandon their purchases.
You can also set up custom goals.
You can create up to 20 goals for each website, so think about what’s important to you and take the time to configure as many of them as you can. Goals in Google Analytics help you measure how well your web pages perform to gauge whether your marketing or content strategy is hitting the mark.
A search box provides valuable data about your website and how users interact with it down the line. Google Analytics can use your search box to track what people look for when they visit your website, so you can learn what your audience wants the most.
To enable the Site Search feature:
With this feature set up, Google Analytics tracks any search made on your site. This data will provide valuable information about what content you should add to your web page in the future. If you run a blog, for example, track what people search for the most on your site, then create a blog post—or a series of posts—on that topic.
Now you know the basics of Google Analytics for beginners. Have some questions? No worries. Here are answers to some common questions.
To share Google Analytics data with other people:
You do not need to provide access to your Google account to share your Google Analytics data.
Yep! There are various services available to make your Google Analytics data more accessible.
For a native solution, you can configure monthly summaries for each property in Google Analytics by opting in to share your monthly data with Google:
After completing these steps, you will receive an email each month that summarizes the previous month’s data for your selected properties in Google Analytics.
Sometimes you’ll see a message like “90%+ of organic keywords are (not provided)” in a report. Google Analytics uses “(not provided)” as a way to list users who protect their privacy when searching, so the keywords they use aren’t recorded.
There are tools you can use to try to uncover keywords and access blocked information. Some tools are:
These tools are not guaranteed to work, but they can help uncover enough for you to get a better sense of relevant online search trends.
Google Analytics is a powerful tool that gives you the information you need to optimize your business’s marketing or content strategy. As you experiment with the tool, you’ll get a better idea of what data you need and what patterns to look for. In time, you’ll gain crucial insights about your audience and your website and be able to make informed decisions for your business to thrive.