RWT Webmaster Tools Blog

Google Analytics Review Part 1

In the Spring 2005, Google bought the web analytics giant Urchin. In November 2005, Google revealed its repacked version of Urchin: Google Analytics. The biggest news about Google’s new offering is its price. It’s free. The power of Urchin for free? It sounds ludicrous, but it is true. Many have been speculating how Google will be exploiting this for their own good. What will they do will all this data, etc.? Pundits will ponder whether Google is becoming the next evil empire second only to Microsoft.

However, with such a huge free offering, it is very worthwhile to discuss it on Recommended Web Tools. Especially for the small business that has been hesitant to put out the money for a good statistics program, Google Analytics may be just the solution for them.

I have been using Google Analytics since the middle of November. While a few weeks of stats are not enough to discuss the complete capabilities of the software, it is enough to do a basic review and introduce readers to the basic capabilities.

Signing up is a simple process: name, email, website URL, etc. However, due to popularity, Google has experienced some delays in getting websites fully registered. Signing up requires a piece of JavaScript placed within the head section of web pages. This is similar to all other web based statistics programs. Once that code is placed, Google will have to verify that it can see that code. Though their site says this will take 1-2 hours, it may take up to a day. Once Google recognizes a website, it begins to collect data. Again, while their site states it may take 12 hours to gather the initial data, it took several days (4 or 5) before I started to see any reporting. Google has been in the process of correcting this problem.

There are three reporting views within Google Analytics: Executive, Marketer and Webmaster. Each view has its own sets of reports. Other reports are accessible under the Marketing Optimization and Content Optimization categories. The views are offered as an easy way to access basic reports.

The parameters for ALL reports are the date range. This is set by a calendar widget. The widget allows a user to set a daily date range or a month date range. Users can also set an hourly view, which displays the data by hour within a particular daily date range. The default setting is the daily date range.

There is a lot to be said about Google Analytics. I will discuss the Executive, Marketer, Webmaster views and Marketing Optimization and Content Optimization categories within separate posts. In brief here are several reasons why a new webmaster should consider using Google Analytics:

- the breadth and power of Urchin
- for most webmasters, virtually unlimited hits/pageviews/visitors logged – this translates into more quality reporting
- integration with Adwords – ability to do ROI on investment reporting etc.
- while the power may be overwhelming at first, the basic reports offer an opportunity to learn
- FREE. No other free web statistics program will provide this kind of power.

I will leave the decision whether Google is becoming the second evil empire up to the individual reader. Uncomfortable with Google? Then Google Analytics is not for you. Though remember, many adept people are watching Google. Comfortable with Google? Then there is not a reason to at least TRY Google Analytics. Stay tuned for more.

UPDATE:
Be sure to read three problems with Google Analytics.