Scribd
Upload
76 views

Google Analytics Implementation Checklist: Tracking Code

This document provides a checklist for implementing Google Analytics tracking and configuration. It includes steps for setting up the tracking code, goals and ecommerce tracking, custom dimensions, campaign tracking, and intelligence alerts. The checklist covers tasks for both new and existing Google Analytics implementations and configurations to track key user behaviors and site performance metrics.

Uploaded by

rednetij
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
Available Formats
Download as PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
76 views

Google Analytics Implementation Checklist: Tracking Code

This document provides a checklist for implementing Google Analytics tracking and configuration. It includes steps for setting up the tracking code, goals and ecommerce tracking, custom dimensions, campaign tracking, and intelligence alerts. The checklist covers tasks for both new and existing Google Analytics implementations and configurations to track key user behaviors and site performance metrics.

Uploaded by

rednetij
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
Available Formats
Download as PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
You are on page 1/ 5

Google Analytics Implementation Checklist

TM

Updated for Google Analytics Universal

Note: this checklist relates primarily to Google Analytics tracking for websites (vs. mobile apps).

Tracking Code
New implementation
Use the Google Analytics Universal tracking code or Google Tag Manager with a Google
Analytics Universal tag.

Existing (Google Analytics classic) implementation


Upgrade to Google Analytics Universal or to Google Tag Manager with a Google Analytics
Universal tag.

Page templates and standalone pages


Include the same Google Analytics tracking code or Google Tag Manager container code in
your site templates/master pages and any standalone pages.

Create a Google Analytics account before adding Google Analytics to Google Tag Manager
If you use Google Tag Manager instead of the direct Google Analytics tracking code, you still
need to create a Google Analytics account/property in which Google Analytics can record site
data.

Subdomain and Cross-domain Tracking


Tracking two or more subdomains within a single property
Supported by the default tracking code in Universal; configure if using Google Tag Manager.

Tracking two or more separate domains within a single property


Configure cross-domain tracking in Universal or Google Tag Manager.

Add hostname plus request URI


To distinguish between request URIs on the different domains, apply an advanced filter to your
working view(s) that prepends the hostname (that is, the domain) to the request URI.

Filter by hostname
To easily view activity on a single domain or subdomain that you’re tracking with other
domains or subdomains in a single property, create additional views that are filtered to include
only one hostname.

Google Analytics Implementation Checklist | 1


Goals and Ecommerce
Track form submissions
Set up a goal for each form submission.

Track purchases
If purchases on your site vary widely in price, product, etc., work with your developers to
implement Ecommerce tracking. If you can’t set up Ecommerce tracking in the short term, or if
the variation in purchases is very limited, you can track purchases as a goal.

Specify Goal Value


If you don’t have Ecommerce set up, assign an actual, estimated, or even arbitrary value to
your goals so you can use the Page Value metric to gauge the contribution that each page on
your site is making towards goal completions.

Configure Funnels
Wherever feasible, define a funnel along with your goal so Google Analytics can calculate goal
abandonment rate and populate the Funnel Visualization report.

Events, Virtual Pageviews, and Social Actions


Record on-page user actions in addition to pageviews
Code or configure events or virtual pageviews for each of the following types of user actions:
•• off-site links
•• mailto: and tel: links
•• Opens/downloads of PDFs and other file types
•• Significant Flash / Ajax / jQuery / HTML5 interactions
•• Video plays, pauses, and completions

Record social actions


Code or configure social actions for clickthroughs on your social buttons.

Distinguish between types of social actions


Distinguish between follow and like content types of social actions, either through the social
action parameter or the social target parameter of the social tracking method.

Use callback for tracking like content social actions


You can use Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn callbacks to verify that the like/tweet/share action
was actually completed before you record a social action in Google Analytics.

Consistent naming
Use a consistent naming convention for your events, virtual pageviews, and social tracking.

Google Analytics Implementation Checklist | 2


Content Grouping, Custom Dimensions, and Custom Channel Groupings
Content Groups
Set up Content Groups to aggregate pages within the Site Content reports by specified
characteristics (such as authorship, subject area, or product type). Content Groups are
especially useful if these characteristics are not expressed consistently in the request URIs or
the page titles.

Custom Dimensions
Set up Custom Dimensions to capture visit/visitor characteristics (such as login status, CRM
data pulled from the back end after login, or drop-down selections on a form) so you can use
these characteristics when defining custom reports or advanced segments. (You can also use
Custom Dimensions to capture page characteristics such as those cited above for Content
Groups.)

Custom Channel Grouping for Multi-Channel Funnels Reports


To display a more specific set of traffic channels in the Multi-Channel Funnel Reports, define a
Custom Channel Grouping in the admin screens for your view.

Views, View Settings, and View Filters


Three views for each property
For each property that you’re tracking, create a minimum of three views:
•• Raw/unfiltered
•• Test
•• Working

Exclude internal traffic


In your working view(s), apply an advanced view filter that excludes traffic originating from
your organization’s IP address range.

Exclude traffic to development servers


In your working view(s), apply an advanced filter that includes only your production server as
the hostname (so activity on your development and staging servers does not appear).

Default page
In the view settings, specify a default page (such as index.php) to prevent both / and
/index.php from appearing as separate request URIs for the home page in your Site Content
reports.

Consolidate query parameters


If your URLs contain query parameters (such as a session ID) that do not determine
significantly different page content, specify them (separated with commas) in the Exclude
URL Query Parameters field. (Note that this setting does not exclude any request URIs; it just

Google Analytics Implementation Checklist | 3


consolidates them.) For an assessment of the query parameters used in your URLs, see the
Crawl > URL Parameters report for your site in Google Webmaster Tools.

Configure Site Search tracking


If your site’s internal search generates a URL in the format below, specify q as the Site Search
Query Parameter in the view settings:
www.mysite.com/searchresults.aspx?q=my+search+term

Campaign Tracking
Use campaign tags for clearer attribution
For more accurate traffic attribution, add manual campaign parameters (or “tags”) to inbound
links from:
•• Emails (including signatures)
•• Banner ads
•• Retargeting banners
•• Pay-per-click (except AdWords)
•• Affiliates
•• Press releases
•• Standalone documents (such as PDF)
•• Mobile apps

Campaign Tag Format


To minimize errors in your campaign-tagged inbound links, use the E-Nor URL builder.

Consistent naming
Use a consistent naming convention for your campaign parameters.

Autotagging
For AdWords, avoid manual campaign tags; instead, enable Autotagging.

Intelligence Alerts and Dashboards


Basic Intelligence Alerts
Set up the following custom Intelligence Alerts:
•• 10% weekly increase/decrease in visits
•• 10% weekly increase/decrease in conversion rate and/or value for each goal
•• 10% weekly increase/decrease in (Ecommerce) revenue (or product revenue, which does
not include tax and shipping)

Google Analytics Implementation Checklist | 4


Monthly dashboard delivery
Set up monthly (or more frequent) delivery of a default or custom dashboard to stakeholders
in your website’s performance.

Additional
Country-specific versions of search engines
To track organic clickthroughs from country-specific search engines such as google.co.uk or
mx.search.yahoo.com (and prevent Google Analytics from simplifying them to just google and
yahoo as sources), add the country-specific search engines to the Organic Search Sources list
in the admin pages for your property.

Adjusted bounce rate


If you’re tracking a blog or another type of site that doesn’t necessarily warrant a clickthrough
to another page, you can more meaningfully measure bounce rate by using the setTimeout or
scroll approaches. If you’re using Google Tag Manager, you can adjust bounce rate by setting a
Timer Listener to generate a Google Analytics event.

Single view for annotations


Annotations are not shared among views, so decide on a single view in which you and your
team will keep your annotations consolidated for each property that you’re tracking.

Google Webmaster Tools


To partially address the (not provided) issue*, and for a great deal of other very relevant
information such as broken links, set up Google Webmaster Tools for each website you’re
tracking with Google Analytics.

For further discussion on many of the implementation tasks included in this checklist, see

Google Analytics Universal Guide: Best Practices for Implementation and Reporting

Tracking Product Journey from Carting to Purchasing - 15 Secrets for Perfecting your Online Store

For ongoing tutorials and technical updates, visit the E-Nor blog.

*The Google search engine no longer provides the keywords that generate organic clickthroughs to your site; in their place, Google
Analytics displays (not provided).

www.e-nor.com Google Analytics Implementation Checklist | 5

You might also like