This document provides an introduction to using Google Analytics to analyze website traffic. It discusses how Google Analytics is free, easy to implement, and sufficient for most libraries. Basic considerations are that not all data will be captured and the focus should be on trends rather than absolute accuracy. Metrics like visitors, visits, page views, and bounce rate are explained. The document provides screenshots of the Google Analytics dashboard and different reports it can generate related to visitors, traffic, and content. It suggests questions to examine like where visitors are coming from and popular content. More advanced uses and funnels are also overviewed.

1. GOOGLE ANALYTICS:
AN INTRODUCTION
Michelle Belden
Access Archivist, Penn State Special Collections
PALA 2012

2. WHY GOOGLE ANALY TICS?
 Free
 Sufficient for most libraries
 Easy to implement
 Fairly easy to understand

3. CONSIDERATIONS
 Data that won’t go through:
Users who disable Javascript, block cookies
 No reporting is 100% accurate. Focus on trends.
 Privacy:
 Data is anonymous
 No Personally Identifiable Data
 Not shared with 3 rd parties

4. GETTING STARTED
 Sign up for a Google account
 http://www.google.com/analytics / to get tracking code
 Insert code into web pages
 Bottom of head section of HTML
 For large sites, put in template

5. DASHBOARD

6. WHAT DOES IT MEASURE?
Visitor characteristics
 Traffic
 Content effectiveness

7. A FEW TERMS TO KNOW
 Visitors – randomly assigned ID and timestamp
 New and returning
 Visits/sessions
 Page Views
 Unique page views
 Bounce Rate

8. VISITORS 1: OVERVIEW

9. VISITORS 2: MOBILE DEVICES

10. TRAFFIC 1: OVERVIEW

11. TRAFFIC 2: KEYWORDS

12. CONTENT 1: OVERVIEW

13. CONTENT 2: IN PAGE ANALY TICS

14. SO WHAT DO YOU WANT TO KNOW?
 Especially when you’re just getting started, you might be
interested in general questions:
 Where your visitors are coming from
 What browser/resolution they are using
 Most popular content
 Pages with highest bounce rate
 As you go along, more specific questions might arise, like:
 Is this digital project getting enough use to justify further work?

15. VISITORS 3: SERVICE PROVIDERS

16. VISITORS 4: MAP OVERLAY

17. MORE ADVANCED USE
 What are the goals of your site?
 How will you measure those goals?
 Example: we want our users to find our “finding aids”
 “Conversion”: hit on page whose URL begins with:
http://www.libraries.psu.edu/dam/psul/up/digital/findingaids /
 You can even assign monetary values to these “conversions”
 Can also look at time on site, pages per visit
(Is the content sticky? Or is it just hard to find things?
Maybe it’s time for some user studies -)

18. FUNNELS
• Series of URLs you think users will/should follow
• Find out where you’re losing them
• You can also find paths you didn’t foresee

19. LEARN MORE!
 http://www.google.com/support/conversionuniversity/