Wow, what a hiatus! 1 year. Let’s take a look at this year in review. New job New city New state New website I’m out of news. Let’s pick things back up but not quite where we left off. I plan on elevating this guy to 15,000 feet. Since I’m no longer in consulting, I … Read more
Note: Since this was posted in mid-2013, the domain measureboards.com has since expired. Womp womp. So there are these new nifty things in Universal Analytics that take the place of your typical Custom Variable. These are Custom Dimensions/Metrics. I’m not talking about the Custom Data Source. I’ll save that for when I’m actually able to … Read more
There’s a reason it has been a while since I’ve posted here. That’s because I have been steadily working on building out the framework for my new website Measure Boards (http://www.measureboards.com). What is Measure Boards? Simply put, it’s intended to be a community for web analysts. Yes, I know we have a Yahoo group; but let’s … Read more
The other day I was writing a function in JavaScript. Alright, before you say it – yes, it was broken in IE7/8. However, sometimes when you use common functions like trim and innerText you don’t really think about compatibility… especially if you’re an analyst. That’s what we call “knowing enough JavaScript to be dangerous.” Now normally … Read more
Bounce rate too high? It may not be as serious as you think! Let’s start off by defining what “too high” means. For most sites, a bounce rate over 50% is a sign of trouble. For blogs, one can be over 65% simply because RSS feeds lure people into viewing only one page and then … Read more
Analysis begins with your implementation. I’m not talking about making sure your data is being collected properly. Let’s assume it is. What I am saying is if you aren’t thinking about how your traffic MIGHT behave during your implementation, you are missing out on an entire new (deeper) level of analysis. Think beyond click tags. … Read more
Really, Google? It was already the #1 keyword in all of my keyword reports. Now you’re saying it’s going to GROW?! Can we at least talk about this? Maybe negotiate a little? No? Okay, well forget you. I’ll figure out my own way to get around this issue. Let’s outline the problem we want to … Read more
Sometimes I’m using Google Analytics and every time I reload the page… the interface changes. Google has now merged what was the “Home” dashboards (Real-Time, Intelligence Events, etc) into what was the “Standard Reports”… or is that vice versa? So everything is consolidated, which makes total sense now. Why should the Dashboards, Real-Time, and Intelligence … Read more
Hey everyone – This post was written by Neil Shapiro. I worked with him on an Analysis Exchange project for Childspring International. He volunteered to write a guest post about social media that offers an interesting perspective on conversion measurement: First came Web Analytics – and the end of the day it is all about … Read more
Alright, I don’t intend on making this a regular column – but sometimes I run into an issue that takes a bit of troubleshooting. This is one of those issues. Seeing an unusual spike in traffic in Google Analytics? Bounce rate skyrocketing? It might not be a traffic quality issue! Check your implementation. Follow this … Read more