What is Google Analytics & How Does It Work [5 Simple Steps for Newbies]

What is Google Analytics

It is impossible to improve your site’s ranking if it is not evaluated correctly. Therefore, it is important that you use the correct analytical tool in an environment in which everything leaves its mark.

Here, Google Analytics comes into play. It’ll help yourself take the right decisions at key times, by implying the leading data analytics tool.

Google Analytics was founded in 2006, when it purchased Urchin, as a free Google Tool. Since then, it has become one of the leading technical metrics platforms.

If you’re new to Google Analytics, this may tend to be a series of bar graphs, line charts and numbers. So, who are you— a Google Analytics newbie?

You need to know what Google Analytics is providing to you, how to tailor it to your needs, and what each section will do for you if you are going to use this powerful tool.

Without all your frustration and tension, our Google Analytics tutorial will help you to launch this tool. Continue reading in five simple steps to see how to apply Google Analytics!

What is Google Analytics?

You can track websites, blogs, and social networks through the tool. It also makes pre-determined and personalized reports available to you.

Google Analytics ‘ offers clustered traffic information that arrives in the websites by public, acquisition, activity and conversion performed on the website’. And Google Analytics is the leading tool. It has more information and measurements than anyone else.

Also Read: A Beginners’ Guide to Google Search Console 

What Does Google Analytics Track?

It is important to learn how Google Analytics functions first before we discuss the configuration and the functionality of Google Analytics.

Google Analytics gathers web information that provides a special monitoring application for JavaScript.

It tracks how and what your visitors do when they come to your site. Google Analytics gathers this information through cookies and translates them in readable formats, such as graphs.

Your Website Interactions Fall into Three Categories:

Page hits: It shows the hits on loading your page with tracking code.

Event hits: For actions on your website, like clicking on a button.

Ecommerce (transactional) hits: When someone purchases products on your sites.

Social interaction hits: When people use social media widgets on your site.

As this data is sent to Google Analytics, you will see critical metrics of users and results. It also offers a real-time data to track numbers fluctuating with current interactions.

Now that you have a little background on system analysis, it can be made even easier to use Google Analytics.

1. Create an Account & Add a Property

If you haven’t yet built one Google Analytics account, then you can go to the login page and enter your data. Then create your GA accounts free of charge. Along with that, you can also try Google’s free demo version.

You may not think of your domain as a property, but building a strong presence on internet is your plan. It is also what Google Analytics calls the website you own, a property that you want to control.

After signing up, you have to add a property from Google Analytics.

You can also enter a smartphone app as a property for Google Analytics. Technically, any online tool attached to your tracking code is an entity.

Select “Create Property” to enter your URL under the administrative section.

2. Enter Your Website’s Tracking Code

The tracking code will next to be put on your website in this Google Analytics tutorial.

The tracking code is a slingshot of knowledge, which returns any significant interaction to your Analytics account.

Google Analytics has built an ID for you when you added a property. This defines the way the site is managed by Google Analytics, which is identified in the global site tag.

In the Admin area under Property > Tracking Info > Tracking code, the global website tag is located in a textbox.

After initial < head >, you must directly highlight and link the global site tag to the HTML.

You will have to repeat that for each page, if you want to track all the pages around your site so that you can see the traffic and the ROI on each page.

Now that you introduce the code, your charts will change and you will turn the data into progress while attracting visitors and promoting content.

3. Select Campaign Goals

GA allows you to identify unique metrics that are customized to your company’s results. You can create different goals to match your site and see your progress in Admin> View > Goals.

The aim is to sell a product if you have an e-commerce site. When anyone buys a pair of shoes on their website, a retailer will have the target done. Based on the size and purpose, the priorities vary widely.

You may divide goals into four categories and mean certain things for each location.

Explore the types of goals:

Destination goals: End at a particular URL

Duration goals: The amount of time spent on a blog or website

Page goals: Number of pages visited by a visitor

Event goals: Click on “Share” or related activities to finish a video

Smart goals: Machine learning focuses on sessions with the highest conversion potential.

So, whatever is your plan? To generate ideas, here are some samples: 

Generating leads by form submissions. Increase the time you spend on the contact page.

Visit the “shopping Cart” page.

Let people watch a video.

4. Browse Google Reports

Standard reports from Google Analytics mark the side of the tool and encourage you to explore other topics in detail. Audience, acquisition, behavior and conversions are included in Google analysis reports. In certain instances, data samples are used in these studies.

a. Audience

The audience report offers important information on visitors to your site.

To help sell your services or goods, you should familiarize yourself with their interests, location, device and other demographic data.

This also reveals the bounce rate—the number of people who exit your website after they arrive without visiting any pages on it. This is nice if you are trying to improve your ranking in search results.

b. Behavior

Behavior reports show user-related data. There is also a fantastic feature known as Site Search.

Site Search helps you to see sessions that look for something on your website and you can even see your query words. This feature enables you to see what people expect and what they cannot find when they visit your website.

However, if you want this data to be collected, you have to allow this feature and perform a site search on your website.

c. Conversions

The Conversions report reveals how many goals you have accomplished and how different channels lead to sales and conversions.

You may also configure custom reports to your desired measurements and dimensions for GA. You can pick and choose the characteristics that apply to you in customization > custom reports.

This report then compiles the data in one location in order for you to quickly access and share it.

5. Setting up the Dashboard

The greatest advantage of knowing how to use Google Analytics is to see the state of your site. You can view essential details from your dashboard, but you do not have advanced, customizable default settings.

The custom Dashboards collect the widgets that you want in designated groups for your GA domain. Instead of trivial info, you can track the areas of highest concern with customized dashboards.

Boost Your Sales Numbers with Google Analytics

Our Analytics Tutorial is just the beginning of your company with this tool. You should compare successful sections of your website with failure points until it is efficient and can complete massive traffic volumes and optimal rankings.

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