Google Analytics Guide for Bizniks

Google Analytics is a website statistics tool. When installed properly, it tracks the activity on your website and can help you learn if and when you get visits to your site, where they came from (geographically and virtually), how long they stayed, how they found you, and where they went next. 

I will try and break it down so this article uses as little technical jargon as possible! I encourage you to ask questions. Post one here -- or tia@allamericanadmin.com" title="Send an email to Tia">email me directly -- and I'll answer it for you. 

TERMS

There are MANY terms used in a Google Analytics report, and sometimes people get mystified simply because they don't understand the terms and have no one around to explain them. 

Here are the important ones: 

Visit: when someone gets to your website by clicking on a link or by typing in the URL in a browser, that's called a visit. 

Pageview: a page view is slightly different. A page view counts as a single view of a single page in your website. If your website visitor looks at your home page, then your about page, then back to your home page, that counts as two views of your home page and one view of your about page. 

Bounce Rate: the bounce rate is the percentage of visitors who come and exit immediately. Example: I get to your home page and then instead of viewing your other pages, I immediately leave your website and go to someone else's website. It's a quality metric.

The higher your bounce rate, the more this "leave instantly" thing is happening. You want a low bounce rate. Something lower than 40% is good, particularly if you have a lot of new people visiting your website. 

Traffic Sources: Traffic sources are the places your visitors are coming from. See below for further explanation, but your visitors are either coming from search engines, referral sites or by directly entering your website address (your www) into the browser. 

Referring Site: A referring site is another website that links to yours. So, if a visitor clicks on your website link in your Biznik profile, Biznik will be listed as a referral source on your Google Analytics report. 

Direct traffic: Direct traffic is any visit to your website that is a result of someone entering your website address directly into the browser bar. Example - you go to your browser and type in www.biznik.com - that counts as direct traffic to Biznik. 

Search (organic): Google Analytics differentiates between paid search listings - such as AdWords pay-per-click - and natural or "organic" search listings. When you see a visit in "search (organic)" that means your visitor found you by using a search engine. 

Search (paid): If you use Google AdWords, Google Analytics will track the visits to your site that result from paid clicks. 

Keywords: If you've had any visits to your website that are a result of search, Google Analytics tracks the keywords or phrases that were used to find you.

Avg. Time: Google Analytics also tracks the amount of time a visitor spent on a page, as well as per visit. The more time spent, in theory, the better for you. In general, the longer you can keep someone's attention on your site, the better. 

Absolute Unique Visitors: Google Analytics tracks visits to your website by geographic location and IP address. But, it counts every visit and click, even if it's the same person constantly hitting the back and forth buttons, for example. So, you can use the Absolute Unique Visitors tool to discover precisely how many new visitors you've gotten within a given time period. 

Some other really interesting but somewhat advanced metrics are: 

Entrance and Exit paths / Navigation Summary - Analytics can show you exactly how a visitor got to any page in your site, and then can tell you where they went (if they left by clicking a link to another site). 

Pages/Visit - Analytics will show you the average number of pages viewed per visit. 

SETTING UP GOOGLE ANALYTICS

This guide assumes you already have or know how to set up a Google Account. If you don't, just go to www.google.com and click on "Sign In" and create an account or type "create a Google Account" into the search box to read about how to get one. 

1. Go to www.google.com/analytics. Sign in with your Google account. If you have Gmail, just use your Gmail address and password. 

2. Look for a link that says "Add Website Profile" 

3. Under "Choose Website Profile Type" select "Add a Profile for a new domain" 

4. Type in the address of the website you're going to track. Enter the address without the http.

Note: you can only use Google Analytics for websites that you control. At the moment you can't track a MySpace or Facebook profile using Analytics, for example, or a Wordpress.com blog or anything similar. If you have a question about what can be tracked, ask me. 

5. Select the "Finish" button. You're not actually done yet, don't be fooled! Keep going. This is where people like Joe Hage  -- who asked me to write this article (I'm helping him with his blog) -- get stuck. 

The "Finish" is misleading. You must actually insert specific code into your website if you want it to be tracked by this tool. Also, when you add a new page to your website, you have to copy the code from other pages to the new one if you want it to be tracked as well. 

6. On the next page, you'll be given the tracking code to be placed in your website. If you manage your own website, copy the code and paste it just before the </body> tag on EVERY page that you want to be tracked. If you don't manage your own website, copy the code and paste it into an email and send it to whoever manages your website. 

You'll notice that Google Analytics gives you two sets of codes to choose from - a "legacy" tracking code and a new one. You should always use the new code unless you know why you're using the legacy tracking code. 

Note: if you manage your own website but have no idea what </body> tag means, STOP, because you should probably get someone to help you.

CHECKING THE STATUS

Once you've inserted the code and re-uploaded your website/web pages, go back to Google Analytics. Select the link that says "Check Status." It will tell you whether or not the code was installed properly and whether or not it is receiving any data yet.

Give it at least 4 hours and at most 1 day. If after a day, it's still not "receiving," stop and outsource to someone who can help.

VIEWING YOUR REPORTS

Now that you're armed with an understanding of the important terms, you should be able to grasp the information that Google will show you about your website. When you're logged into Google Analytics, at the top of the page where it says "View Reports:" select the website profile you added. 

You'll see the "Dashboard" and the default report time period which is the last 30 days. For most people, this is really what you want to see and all that matters to you.

You'll see the number of visits to your site, the number of pageviews, the number of pages per visit, the bounce rate, the avg. time spent on your website and the percentage of new visits.

You'll also see keywords – if any were used to find your site in a search engine – as well as the most frequently viewed pages on your site. 

Play around with it because there's a lot more information under the surface that I won't get into in a quick Guide. But if you need more help or have questions, just ask!