One of the biggest skills gaps today is data analytics - the ability to not merely look at reports but to make recommendations and take action based on the data. Google Analytics is a powerful, free, decision support tool that is essential to understanding and improving your online marketing efforts. Anneline Breetzke will cover the basics of the tool, the key metrics and four main reports and will then turn to customization. How to set up a custom dashboard and a custom report.

1. Google Analytics:
Overview & Basic Customization
Thursday, May 19th, 2016
Anneline Breetzke
#mktgacademy @mktgacademy

2. Content
 Introduction : Why Google Analytics?
 Overview : reports layout & key metrics
 4 Main Reports : Understand each category & the data they provide
 Goal Conversions : Activities Important to Your Success
 Customization
 Segments
 Dashboards
 Questions

3. Introduction
Why Google Analytics?

4. Why Google Analytics?
Without data analytics, companies
are blind and deaf, wandering out
onto the Web like deer on a
freeway.
- Geoffrey Moore
“

5. Question
e.g. Did the website changes
increase customer retention?
Look for the report that
provides the answer
e.g. compare avg time on site
Marketing Idea
e.g. Redesigning the landing
page of your website.
Reject Improve Keep
Measure & Analyze
Make recommendations & TAKE ACTION
Why Google Analytics?

6.  How many people visit my website?
 How many visitors are local / national / international?
 Do I need a mobile-friendly website?
 What paid referral partners must I keep?
 What marketing campaigns drive the most traffic to my website?
 What times in the day are people reading my blog?
 How many visitors have I converted into leads or customers?
 Which social network drives the most traffic?
Why Google Analytics?
It can answer questions like…
It does not answer WHY…

7. Overview
A look at the default report layout

8. Four main
reports.
Seven key metrics.
Main navigation menu.
Set regular emails of
the data. Export to
Excel etc. Specify date ranges, including
the ability to compare timelines.
View the data in
different increments.

9. 7 most important website statistics
Key Metrics

10. Sessions
A group of interactions that take place on your website within a
given time frame (30 min). A user can have multiple sessions.
Users The unique individual (unique IP address) that visits your site.
Pageviews
An instance of a page being loaded by a browser. The total
number of pages viewed; repeated views of a single page are
also counted.
Pages/Session
The average number of pages seen per session. Sign of how
curious people are about your community.
Avg. Session
Duration
The amount of time spent on your site per session.
Bounce Rate
The percentage of single page visits (or web sessions). The
number of visits in which a person leaves your website from the
landing page without browsing any further.
% New Sessions Percentage of new visitors (vs returning visitors) to your site.
Key Metrics

11. “Microsoft study finds human attention
span has dropped to just 8 seconds.”
- Indo Asian News Service , 18 May 2015
Key Metrics — Bounce Rate

12.  Bounces will never turn into conversions.
 The lower the bounce rate, the higher the pool of
potential conversions.
Why do you want a lower bounce rate?
Key Metrics — Bounce Rate

13.  100 users visited your site
 60% of those 100 bounced = 60 bounced
sessions
 100 users – 60 = 40 engaged visits
= 40 potential conversions
100
60.06%
Key Metrics — Bounce Rate
Example 1

14. 100
30%
75%
increase
in sales!
Key Metrics — Bounce Rate
Example 2
 100 users visited your site
 30% of those 100 bounced = 30 bounced
sessions
 100 users – 30 = 70 engaged visits
= 70 potential conversions

15. You can increase your conversions for
the same amount of advertising spend.
Tip: Paid bounce rate should be lower than your organic bounce rates.
Analyze your bounce rates with all your advertising referral partners.
Why do you want a lower bounce rate?
Key Metrics — Bounce Rate

16. Example
Key Metrics — Bounce Rate

17. 4 Main Reports
Understand each category
& the data they provide

18. Audience
Who is coming to
your site?
Acquisition
Where are they
coming from?
Behavior
What are they doing
on your site?
Conversions
What is working and
what isn’t?

19. Audience
4 Main Reports — Audience
Location
Country?
Province? City?
Mobile/Device
Desktop? Phone? Tablet?
Demographics
Gender? Age?
Language?
Interests
Movie Lovers? In-
market Segments?
(Adwords)
Browser/OS
Chrome/Safari?
iOS/Android?
Frequency
New vs Returning?
Visits? Pageviews?
Time on site?
Who is coming
to your site?

21. Approach Google Analytics with a question:
What percent of our users access our
site via their mobile device?
4 Main Reports — Audience

23. That leads to another question:
Are mobile visitors less or
more engaged?
4 Main Reports — Audience

26.  View your mobile site landing pages
 Consider areas to improve
 Set up a schedule to test those changes
 Analyze the data
…and start the process again.
What action steps can we take to improve mobile phone engagement?
4 Main Reports —
Audience

27. Traffic Sources/
Channels
Organic/Paid? Social
Media? Referrals?
Engagement
Bounce Rate?
Pages/Session?
Adwords
Campaigns?
Keywords?
SEO
What queries users
typed to reach your
site? Landing pages?
Social
How many people
shared your page on
Facebook? (Goals)
Acquisition
How are they getting
to your site?
4 Main Reports — Acquisition

28. Source
Origin of your website traffic (includes custom utm_source traffic)
google / organic
bing / cpc
comfortlife.ca / referral
Medium
The category of the traffic source (includes custom utm_medium
traffic)
google / organic
bing / cpc
comfortlife.ca / referral
4 Main Reports — Acquisition
Understand your traffic

30. Organic Search SEO traffic from unpaid search engines (e.g. Google or Bing)
Direct Users type your URL directly into their browser (or from a bookmark)
Referral Visitors referred by links on other websites (that are not social networks)
Email Sessions that have a medium of “email” – custom: utm_medium=email
Social
Traffic from approximately 400 social networks (that are not tagged as ads).
Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn etc.
Display
Paid – can be made up of any number of traffic sources as long as the medium is
“display”, “cpm” or ”banner”.
Paid Search
Paid – where the medium is “cpc” or “ppc”.
Google Adwords, Bing Ads, Facebook Ads etc.
7 Default Marketing Channels
4 Main Reports — Acquisition

31. Behavior Flow
Visualize the path
users take from one
page/event to another?
Site Content
How often do users
enter/exit this page?
Site Speed
Which pages are
taking too long to
load?
Site Search
What are users entering
in the search box on your
site?
Events
How many clicks on a
link/button or video
player?
Experiments
Which version of a
page performs
best?
4 Main Reports — Behavior
Behavior
What are they doing
on your site?

34. Goals
How many users signed
up for your newsletter?
Funnel
Visualization
Where did users exit the
funnel before reaching the
Destination goal?
eCommerce
Why are users exiting
before they checkout?
Conversions
How many conversions?
Conversion Rate? Compare
campaigns.
4 Main Reports — Conversions
Conversions
What is working
on your site?

35. Activities important to your
success
Goal Conversions

36. A goal is a completed activity on your site
(a conversion)
a completed sign up form
a completed purchase (eCommerce sites)
a click to play a video
Goal Conversions
Goals provide essential information

37. Without this information it is
almost impossible to evaluate the
effectiveness of your online business
and online marketing campaigns.
Goal Conversions
Goals provide essential information

38.  You can track different types of goals
The Destination goal is the easiest
to implement and track.
Once a specific page is loaded
(e.g. Thank you for registering!
Page), the goal is completed.
 For the Destination goal you need a destination URL that loads
after a user completes the action.
Goal Conversions
Type of goals

39. Goal Conversions
Destination goals

40. 1. Click on Admin > Goals (under View)
Goal Conversions
Setting up goals

41. 2. Click on +NEW GOAL
Goal Conversions
Setting up goals

42. 3. Click on Custom >
Continue
Goal Conversions
Setting up goals

43. 4. Name your goal
something descriptive
> Select Destination
> Select Continue
Goal Conversions
Setting up goals

44. 5. Enter your destination page’s URI (the piece of the URL that
comes after the .com or .ca of your domain) E.g. /thankyou.html
> Choose Begins with
> Click Save
Goal Conversions
Setting up goals

45. 6. Assign a monetary value (filling this in populates reports in analytics that are
otherwise empty, and it helps in calculating ROI)
GA does not update values retrospectively. Choose
your value system upfront, or make a note if you
change it.
Goal Conversions
Setting up goals

46. • Google Analytics Gallery Import
• Setup Custom Segments
• Setup Custom Dashboards
Customization

47. Google Analytics Gallery

48. Google Analytics Gallery

49. Google Analytics Gallery
Occam’s Razor Awesomeness – Segments, Reports & Dashboards

50. Google Analytics Gallery
Occam’s Razor Awesomeness –
Segments, Reports & Dashboards
These customizations can
be deleted/removed from
your view if you no longer
want to use them.

51. Google Analytics Gallery
Occam’s Razor Awesomeness – Segments, Reports & Dashboards

52. Again, you approach with a
question:
What is the number of users
per operating system on
mobile devices?
Google Analytics Gallery
Custom reports - AK: Mobile Performance Analysis v2 vs standard Devices

53. Custom report: AK: Mobile Performance Analysis v2
Google Analytics Gallery
Custom reports - AK: Mobile Performance Analysis v2 vs standard Devices
Standard Devices report: Acquisition > Mobile >
Devices

54. Custom report: AK: Mobile Performance Analysis v2
Google Analytics Gallery
Custom reports - AK: Mobile Performance Analysis v2 vs standard Devices

55. Setup Custom Segments

56. Setup Custom Segments
Think of segments as filters – viewing your data based on specific criteria
Approach with your question:
How many visitors are
highly interested in my
content/site?

57. Setup Custom Segments
Think of segments as filters – viewing your data based on specific criteria

58. Setup Custom Segments
Think of segments as filters – viewing your data based on specific criteria

59. Setup Custom Segments
Think of segments as filters – you can add multiple filters

60. Setup Custom Segments
Segments are easy to remove (they don’t delete or change your data)

61.  https://searchenginewatch.com/sew/how-to/2268458/16-secret-
google-analytics-advanced-segments-worth-their-weight-in-gold
 https://www.koozai.com/blog/analytics/top-15-most-useful-
advanced-segments-in-google-analytics/
Setup Custom Segments
Bonus – Custom Segments to get your started

62. Setup Custom Dashboards

63. Setup Custom Dashboards
Dashboards are a collection of reports that you can view in one glance.
Dashboards are comprised of widgets.

64. Setup Custom Dashboards
Dashboards are a collection of reports that you can view in one glance.

65. Setup Custom Dashboards
Dashboards are a collection of reports that you can view in one glance.

66.  Metric. This widget displays as a single number, with or without decimals depending
on the metric.
 Timeline. This widget uses a line graph to display how a metric changes over time.
It can even be used to compare two metrics against each other.
 Geomap. This widget displays a plain white atlas of the world and uses various
shades of blue to show which country each metric occurs in.
When you create a new dashboard, you’re prompted to add a widget to it right
away. Let’s take a moment to go over what each widget does:
 Table. This widget displays a simple
table; max 2 columns and 10 rows.
 Pie. This widget displays a simple pie
chart that can have as many as 6 slices.
 Bar. This widget displays a typical bar
graph that can have as many as 9 bars.
Setup Custom Dashboards

67. Setup Custom Dashboards
What are common questions you ask:
Who are my top referrals?
How many visitors from a specific city?
How many visitors completed a goal?
How many visitors came from your newsletter?
Visits by social network?
Dashboards are a collection of reports that you can view in one glance.

68. Setup Custom Dashboards
Top referrals widget example

69. Setup Custom Dashboards
Top referrals widget example
Who are my top referrals?
Which ‘entity’ (source) is
referring (medium) the most
traffic (sessions) to my site?
Remember: source/medium
e.g. ourkids.net/referral

70. Setup Custom Dashboards
Top referrals widget example
Who are my top referrals?
Which ‘entity’ (source) is
referring (medium) the most
traffic (sessions) to my site?
Remember: source/medium
e.g. ourkids.net/referral

71. Setup Custom Dashboards
Top referrals widget example

72. Setup Custom Dashboards
Top referrals widget example
Which ‘entity’ (source) is
referring (medium) the most
traffic (sessions) to my site?

73. Setup Custom Dashboards
Top referrals widget example

74. Setup Custom Dashboards
Top referrals widget example
Remove this
source

75. Setup Custom Dashboards
Top referrals widget example

76. Setup Custom Dashboards
Top referrals widget example

77. Setup Custom Dashboards
Top referrals widget example

78. Setup Custom Dashboards
Top referrals widget example

79. Setup Custom Dashboards
Top referrals widget example

80. Setup Custom Dashboards
Keep adding widgets that answer your questions

81.  Monthly Summary –
https://analytics.google.com/analytics/web/template?uid=3kH8xmYaQ2SRnEx_NjxgAA
 SEO Dashboard –
https://analytics.google.com/analytics/web/template?uid=7ZlJXPE7Rh6D4h8nI6QFWw
 Mobile Analytics –
https://analytics.google.com/analytics/web/template?uid=VWZQkJEGRHaZBhNLhO2w-A
 Site Performance –
https://analytics.google.com/analytics/web/template?uid=zghuZw7cQtugzNBSbDAWqw
 Social Media –
https://analytics.google.com/analytics/web/template?uid=2qZVTPjsQ9GJE98fzFL6bQ
 Visitors Technology –
https://analytics.google.com/analytics/web/template?uid=NZZ00lHtSWqyzlO1N9F24w
Setup Custom Dashboards
Bonus – Custom Dashboards to get your started

82. Brand, brand, everywhere!
Questions?
Contact:
Anneline Breetzke
anneline@ourkidsmedia.com
#mktgacademy
@mktgacademy
The replay and slides will be
available in a few days at:
ourkidsmedia.com/marketing
Comfort Life Marketing Academy — for Retirement Communities www.ourkidsmedia.com/marketing