Google Analytics
Google analytics Setup
Google analytics are organized into Organization, Accounts, Properties and Views. Properties set up the tracking id for a site or section or group of sites.
Setting up views
A view is a filtered view to some specific aspect of the data - like all data in specific domain. Views do not include past data. If you delete a view, all related data will be deleted. Administrator may recover a deleted view within 35 days.
When setting up a new property, it is best practice to immediately set up unfiltered 'Raw data' view to store all data, a 'Test view' as a sandbox, and a 'Master view' that is used for decision-making. The test view is a quality assurance view for creating and reviewing rules and goals before setting them in the Master view. It lets you test changes without breaking production analytics.
- The test view should be in sync with Master View settings.
- The Master view, should exclude bot traffic and exclude internal traffic, and usually traffic from other domains.
Reports
Traffic source and medium
Source: Every referral to a web site has an origin, or source. Possible sources include: “google” (the name of a search engine), “facebook.com” (the name of a referring site), “spring_newsletter” (the name of one of your newsletters), and “direct” (users that typed your URL directly into their browser, or who had bookmarked your site).
Medium: Every referral to a website also has a medium. Possible medium include: “organic” (unpaid search), “cpc” (cost per click, i.e. paid search), “referral” (referral), “email” (the name of a custom medium you have created), “none” (direct traffic has a medium of “none”).