Google Analytics Kickstarter Guide: Get Tips to Boost Your Traffic and Sales Using Google Analytics (English Edition)

By Grigor Yovov

This book will help you learn everything that you need to know about Google Analytics. We will start by setting up the account and updating the settings. Then, we will go through the main reports in Google Analytics will dive deep into the analysis. We will then analyze the users, their behavior, and their sources. This analysis will improve your business and website results. We will also go through the fundamentals of relating Google Analytics data to your marketing strategy. We will explore live examples of analysis with real Ecommerce data and learn approaches to analyze our data. At the end of the book, we will go through the Conversions section in Google Analytics. By the end of the book, you will be able to make informative decisions based on data related to your website visitors.

• Language: English
• Publisher: BPB Online LLP
• Release date: Aug 25, 2020
• ISBN: 9789389845631

Book preview

CHAPTER 1

Google Analytics Step-By-Step Set Up

Introduction

Google Analytics is an important tool for data analysis. It provides a variety of information regarding the behavior of the visitors to your website. In this course, you will learn how to set up your Google Analytics account. We will cover all that’s needed to understand the platform structure and the marketing concepts that will allow you to use Google Analytics data for business decisions. It is important to learn how to professionally analyze all the Google Analytics reports for your business and we will help you master this skill. We will go through how to use other Google products in combination with Google Analytics. For example, you will learn how to use Google Search Console integration to improve SEO results and learn how to use Google Ads integration to improve PPC advertising. You will also understand and implement digital marketing concepts based on data using the Inbound Marketing approach.

In this course, you will learn how to create a Google Analytics account, how to properly set it up, and what the Google Analytics data structure is. At the end of this course, you will have your Google Analytics running smoothly with all the settings needed. You will be able to observe even the real-time behavior of your visitors. This initial phase is important for the good functioning of the platform for the needs of your further analysis. In addition, some of the steps in the chapter will prevent you from losing important data form your account. You will always have a backup of your data.

Structure

In this course we will cover:

Setting up a Google Analytics Account

Admin settings for Google Analytics

Creating views and backing up your account

Objectives

At the end of this chapter you will have:

Functioning Google Analytics account implemented on your website.

All the settings needed for the proper functioning of the account.

Backup view of the account so that you will have your data protected.

Setting up a Google Analytics account

In this section, we’ll set up a Google Analytics account. It is very easy and as a result, you will have a well-functioning website tracking system in no time.

Google Analytics helps you get information about your visitors, where are they from, what traffic source they have used to reach your website, what pages they are most interested in, and many others. Google Analytics is not just a measurement tool. It can show your website visitors’ behavior in data relations and paths that are crucial for the business and the marketing strategy.

To set up a Google Analytics account:

Go to https://marketingplatform.google.com/about/analytics/. Here’s how the page should look like:

Figure 1.1: Google Analytics Platform

Google Analytics is a trademark of Google LLC

Click the Start for free button in the upper right corner of the page.

If you already have a Google account you can sign up for analytics right away. If you don’t, then you need to create one. In that case, just click the Create Account link as shown in the following screen, and follow the instructions:

Figure 1.2: Sign Up

Google Analytics is a trademark of Google LLC

Once you have your Google account you can enter the credentials and click Next.

Then you will be prompted to fill a form, as shown in this screen:

Figure 1.3: Choose your property

Google Analytics is a trademark of Google LLC

First, you need to select an option based on the purpose you will use Google Analytics for - whether you want to track website traffic, mobile app traffic, or cross-track both.

Next, you’ll see several fields to fill in:

Figure 1.4: Website name

Google Analytics is a trademark of Google LLC

Website name: This field is for your internal account use. It will not affect the actual tracking of data and you can name it as you want. It can be, https://mywebsitedomain.com, mywebsitedomain.com, MyWebsiteDomain, or even, MyWebsiteDomain – eCommerce. You can pick whatever you feel comfortable with.

In the next field, however, you need to specify the exact URL of your website. It needs to be: https://mywebsitedomain.com

Note: Do not forget to choose the correct Https or Http option form the dropdown menu.

Next, from the dropdown menu select the category that applies to you the most.

In the end, pick up a time zone. It is very important to select the time zone that your business operates in. This will guarantee that the results in your analytics are displayed according to this time zone. Let’s assume you are located in the United States but your website sells goods in the United Kingdom, in London. In this case, it is more appropriate to set London time instead of your own. In that way, the data in your Google Analytics will be more accurate. For example, let’s say your London customers buy more goods in the morning hours from 9 am to 11 am and you have a 7 hours difference from the London time zone. If Google Analytics uses your time zone in the United States then the data will show that the buyers are active in the time span of 2 am to 4 am which doesn’t make sense. That’s why you need to set up the time zone according to the location your business operates in.

After you have selected the correct time zone, you can click Create.

Congratulations! You have created your first Google Analytics account.

Installing the tracking code

Now we are just a step away from tracking your visitors. In this section, we will go through the installation of the Google Analytics tracking code on your website. This is the way Google collects the data from your website to turn it into graphs and charts.

Once your Google account is created, you’ll see your tracking code and tracking ID as displayed in the following screen. The exact location is the ADMIN tab | Tracking code:

Figure 1.5: Tracking ID

Google Analytics is a trademark of Google LLC

There are two types of information you will get here. The Tracking code and the Tracking ID:

Tracking code: This is a piece of code that contains your unique tracking ID. Placed on the right spot on each of your website pages, this code is activated when a user lands on your website. It starts sending information that refers to your unique ID, this way Google Analytics detects which account to populate with data.

Tracking ID: If you are using a platform like WordPress as an example it often has plugins that already have installed the tracking code to your website but missing the unique tracking ID. In this scenario, you need just your tracking ID. When placing it in the plugin admin area it completes the code and starts tracking your website visitors just like in the first scenario. Here’s how your tracking ID should look like UA-54516992-1.

Every account has a unique tracking ID. You’ll get your unique tracking ID, as shown in the previous screen. UA-54516992-1 is just a sample, thus do not use it on your website/application.

And this is the tracking code itself:

window.dataLayer = window.dataLayer || [];

function gtag(){dataLayer.push(arguments);}

gtag(‘js’, new Date());

gtag(‘config’, ‘UA-54516992-1’);

Copy and paste this code as the first item into the of every webpage you want to track. As mentioned earlier, a lot of platforms such as WordPress have plugins that simplify your work. They just need your tracking ID instead of the full tracking code.

If your website is using WordPress you can go to https://wordpress.org/plugins and type insert headers in the search box and hit Enter. You’ll be presented with a list of plugins. After comparing a couple of them just choose one and install it. Visit this page for best practices to choose and install a WordPress plugin.

Once the tracking code is placed on your website, Google Analytics will start to populate your account with data.

To test if your Google Analytics is working, just open your website in a browser, come back to your Google Analytics account, and then go to Reports | Realtime | Overview as displayed on this screen.

Figure 1.6: Realtime Overview

Google Analytics is a trademark of Google LLC

The number of active visitors will be displayed in the Overview section. In the screenshot, we can see 30 active visitors. If it’s just you, it will show 1 active visitor. At the same time, you can follow the visitors’ session duration on the dynamic chart on the right. It is separated by two measures – per minute and second.

Congratulations! You now have your Google Analytics tracking your data.

Over a few days as sufficient data is received by Google Analytics, it will populate all the sections and you can start analyzing and taking decisions for your business. In the Audience report, you will get information on the visitors of your website - what country or city they come from, what devices they are using, and how often they visited your website. In the Acquisition report, you will start getting information on how they are coming to your website, if they use organic search, paid ads, or referral websites. And on the behavior reports, you