8+ Vital Google Analytics Tips (Small Business E-commerce Link Digest – July 6, 2012)

Measuring how your customers interact with your digital marketing represents a core component of digital marketing itself. The (largely oversold) ability to measure “everything” in online marketing has played a crucial role in the growth of the medium. And, it’s no secret around here that Google Analytics is one of my favorite tools for conducting that measurement. But there have been lots of changes in the world of Google Analytics the last few months. Which ones are most important? How can you get the most of your installation?

Read on, Big Thinkers…

1. Leading off, Phil Anderson on the LunaMetrics blog runs down the recent changes in Google Analytics. My favorite: Page Value — or, as Phil calls it, “the triumphant return of $ index!” (though the comments on LunaMetrics’ blog seem to indicate that it’s vanishing for some users… the joys of Google beta tests).
2. Google also announced an Android app for Google Analytics (yay!) Now all that’s missing is the iOS app (grr…)
3. Speaking of apps, Google also announced new analytics features for mobile apps. If your business or brand offers an app, it’s definitely something worth checking out.
4. Event tracking remains one of the coolest — if most misunderstood — features of Google Analytics. Christopher Penn offers great examples of using event tracking to understand your visitor’s behavior. Additionally, Search Engine Land has a great “Event Tracking 101” guide and Michael Fienen of dot Edu Guru has an amazing “Idiot’s Guide to Event Tracking.”. Of course, if all else fails, you could just read the manual.
5. SEO Takeaways looks at Google Analytics Pivot Tables in detail.
6. Meanwhile, Mahesh Narayanan walks you through how to error-proof your Google Analytics data.
7. I don’t just like Advanced Segments. I love them. Happily Anna Lewis over at Koozai’s blog offers up the 15 most useful advanced segments in Google Analytics.
8. Finally, no discussion of Google Analytics would be complete without a few words from our old friend Avinash Kaushik. And his look at the recent EU cookie privacy laws and their impact on Google Analytics is well worth a read if you do any business in Europe. Great overview with practical insights (not that we expect any less from the Divine Mr. K).

What? You still want more? OK. Then I guess I ought to recommend you check out our Web Analytics Fundamentals Series and my look at the best tool to measure your website. And if you still want more, contact me for a copy of my whitepaper on website analytics best practices.

Now go and have a good weekend, OK?

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