The Profitability of Google Analytics
As opposed to other Web Analytics Options, like Hitslink, Google Analytics is a free product. The program first started out as Urchin before Google bought it in 2005. Google restructured the product and renamed it Google Analytics Options. The product was initially offered free to all AdWord users and then later spread to the general public.
What does Google Analytics Options offer?
If all you are looking for is a monitoring tool that will tell you how many people are using or visiting your website and how they got there, then Google Analytics Options is ideal. It can be used by anyone with a website – bloggers and webmasters find it invaluable in monitoring traffic levels and gaining information such as:
- Loyalty of visitors
- Length of visit
- How many times visitors return
Google Analytics Options can also show you:
- What visitors are searching for
- What traffic source visitors come from
- What visitors are reading on your website
- What parts or pages of your website they visit
- Average time spent on each page
Another key component tracked by Google Analytics is traffic source – or where your visitors are coming from. A traffic source can be ‘direct’ which is when the visitor comes to your website by typing your URL into their browser or having you bookmarked in their browser. A direct visitor does not use a Search Engine or a link from another website. Another traffic source is called ‘referring’ which means that visitors came to your website by clicking on a link on another website. Search Engines qualify as a traffic source of their own. Google Analytics Options will show how many people come to your site via Search Engines and give a more specific breakdown of traffic from each Search Engine (ie. Google, Bing, Yahoo, MSN etc).
How does Google Analytics Options Work?
You must first install the application and add ‘tags’ to the HTML code of each of your web pages.
After this initial setup, Google Analytics Options is simple. Each time you log in to your Google Analytics Options account you will be presented with your “Dashboard”. It is very simply a graph which shows the evolution of traffic on your site over a certain period of time which can be set for long periods, or a specific day.
There is also an option that shows page views, unique views and bounce rate. A bounce rate shows when a visitor leaves a page or site without visiting any other site within a specified time span, so this will able to tell if the visitor found what they are looking for on your site, or whether they are still searching.
With this type of valuable information, you can optimize your site, or blog to attract more visitors.
Does Google Share your Data?
Google holds itself in very high regard in terms of user trust and user experience. As such, Google offers its customers the option to either ‘opt in’ and share their data or to ‘opt out’ and remain anonymous in the data sharing option.
Your first instinct may be to opt out but choosing to share your data with Google helps to improve their services. You can benefit from more powerful services in the future by giving Google your information today; the features that Google improves are often only available to those who choose to ‘opt in’ to sharing data.
If you do choose the anonymous option Google removes all identifiable information about your website. The data is then combined with data from hundreds of other anonymous websites in similar industries. The reports are generated in aggregate form.
Google Analytics Options feels that this data sharing policy enables them to improve in two ways. First, as their goal is to provide customers with transparency, choice and improved product experience, it generally helps to improve a better customer experience. Second, the data sharing does not affect customers’ individual accounts without having to take an additional step of explicit approval for each affected product or service.