Top Ten Google Analytics Terms

Have you ever opened up your Google Analytics account, or any other website traffic reporting tool for that matter, and just stared at it, wishing you could see through the overwhelming amount of data to what is really important?  Me too in the beginning.

So to that end, I am providing my list of the Top Ten Google Analytics Terms to help you focus on what are generally the more important stats to understand about your website traffic.  All of the below are based on the time-period you choose when you run your report (i.e. daily, weekly, monthly, etc...):

1. Visits: total number of visits to your website. If I visited your website last week and then again a couple of days ago, I'll have increased your Visits by 2.
2. Unique Visitors: total number of Unique Visitors to your website. In the example above, I would have only increased your Unique Visitors by 1 (assuming I use the same computer).  If my wife, using her own laptop, also visits your site during this time-period, then you would have 2 Unique Visitors, me and my wife.
3. New Visitors vs Returning Visitors: Shows the percentage breakdown of people who are visiting your website for the first time and those who are returning visitors. Good statistic to understand if your website mostly attracts new visitors, but doesn't keep them coming back or if it's doing the opposite.
4. Bounce Rate: percentage of visits in which the person left your site from the entrance (landing) page. So I hit the Home page of your website and then click away to another website; I just increased your Bounce Rate percentage.
5. Pageviews: a Pageview is an instance of a page being loaded by a browser. If I were to visit your website and view both your Home page and your Contact Us page, the Pageviews from my visit would be 2.
6. Average Time on Site: the average amount of time visitors are staying on the website. Depending on the goals of your website, you may want this number to be larger or smaller, but usually larger.
7. Traffic Sources: breaks down the traffic to your website by percentages based on where the users came from before visiting your site
• Search - traffic from search engines (Google, Yahoo, Bing, etc..)
• Referral - traffic from other websites (other websites with links back to your site)
• Direct - users who typed in your URL address or who had a page of your website bookmarked
• Campaigns - traffic from any campaigns that you are tracking, like an email blast that contained links back to pages on your website
8. Search Terms: displays the keywords your site visitors used to find your website. This is helpful to determine if you have optimized your website for the correct search terms or not.
9. Top Pages: lists the most visited pages of your website. Usually your Home page is the most visited, but then seeing which of your interior pages are the more popular ones helps you understand what content on your website is of value to your target audience.
10. Social Engagement: Google now ranks on how socially "engaged" your website is. In other words, whether or not pages on your site are being shared via Twitter, Facebook, etc..

OK, so these are the Top 10 items that I look at when reviewing mine or my clients' website traffic reports. There are many other stats and of course the ability to create custom reports, but the above list will provide you with a really good overview of how your website is performing. I invite discussion from those who agree/disagree or who have questions.

Please contact Ken Sabey by phone (303.506.3406), email (ken@webptoh.com) or feel free visit my website at www.WebptOh.com.