Understanding Website analytics using Google Analytics

What are website analytics?

Web analytics is the examination of how people behave when they visit your website. By using Google Analytics, you can track, analyze, and report important data about your website’s performance. This data is divided into these main categories:

• Audience: Information about the people visiting your website.
• Acquisition: Details about how visitors find and arrive at your website.
• Behaviour: Insights into how visitors interact with your website.
• Conversions: Data related to the actions visitors take on your website, such as making a purchase or submitting a form.
• Attribution: Understanding which marketing channels or campaigns contribute to your website’s success.
• Realtime: Up-to-the-minute information about the current activity happening on your website.

See also: How to add business location in Google map

1. Audience

The Audience part of Google Analytics gives detailed information about website users. It covers different categories like demographics, interests, location, and behaviour. This information is helpful for understanding customer profiles and conducting market research.

Additional categories include technology and device, which show the hardware and software used to access the website. This data helps optimize the website for responsive designs by prioritizing the devices and browsers commonly used by visitors.

2. Acquisition

The Acquisition section in Google Analytics focuses on where website visitors come from. It includes subcategories like Google Ads, Search Console, Social, and Campaigns.

Google Ads and Search Console are tools provided by Google that analyze website performance. High authority backlinks from other websites are a significant source of acquisition traffic.

3. Behaviour

The Behavior tab in Google Analytics displays how users interacted with website content. It helps identify popular content and areas for improvement. It compares page views with metrics like average time on page and exit rates. The subcategories in this section are:

• Behaviour Flow
• Site Content
• Site Speed
• Site Search
• Events
• Publisher
• Experiments

4. Conversions

Tracking conversions is a primary benefit of using analytics. It helps understand which pages and content lead to important actions like sales or sign-ups. Conversions are events where users complete desired actions. Google Analytics offers subcategories for goals, e-commerce, and multi-channel functions to set up conversion tracking.

5. Attribution

The Attribution section in Google Analytics is in beta mode. It provides a cross-channel attribution model to report and analyze digital results across all channels. It helps attribute conversions to specific touchpoints in the marketing funnel.

There are two types of attribution models available: rules-based and data-driven. Rules-based models use fixed rules to assign conversions, while data-driven models are personalized to each advertiser based on machine learning algorithms.

6. Realtime

The Realtime section in Google Analytics shows information about current website users. It is useful for tracking results in real-time, such as the impact of a new advertising campaign. It includes categories like

• Overview
• Locations
• Traffic Sources
• Content
• Events
• Conversions

See How Businesses Can Benefit From Using Analytics On Their Website