Post on 14-Jul-2015
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Top Google Analytics Hacks for SEO
#BrightonSEO 2011
Nikki Rae
@analyticsgirl
Future Insight
Analytics07/04/2011
SEO Fundamental Needs
• I want to know the effect of Keyword Rankings
• I want more organic traffic
• I want more organic conversions for non-branded/ non-navigational traffic
• I don’t want to look like an ASS!!
• I want my life to be easier07/04/2011
Much More than just a Keyword Reporting Tool
Use GA to check results, test, report,inform strategies
What is it you want to know?
Makes you ask more Questions than answer them
07/04/2011
I want to know my rankings
• REALLY useful little hack• Written by Andre Scholten• Re-edited by Nikki Rae• http://www.freshegg.com/blog/track-seo-rankings-yoastscholten-
twist-analyticsgirl_2754• Re-edited by MikeCP• http://www.seomoz.org/blog/tracking-organic-ranking-in-google-
analytics-with-custom-variables• Monitor the behaviour of visitors who click through to your site
– Keyword– Keyword Rankings
• Not absolute, just follow the trends
07/04/2011
I want to know Rankings Cont...
• Visitors/User-Defined• Group ‘behaviour’ by keyword ranking• Group ‘keyword’ by keyword ranking and find which
keywords should be promoted
07/04/2011
Why are positions 9 & 10 bringing in more traffic than positions 4, 8 and 7?(Not set) is any other traffic source that is not recognised as matching the User-Defined filter pattern
Rankings vs. Page Titles (Call to Action)• Does traffic delivered from
position 9 convert better/worse than e.g. Position 1?
• WHY?
• Is there a correlation between landing page, keyword, title and call-to-action, meta description etc.
• WHAT IS IT?
07/04/2011
How to: Content/Content by Title (drop-
down by User-Defined Variable)
Advanced Filter – User-Defined Value
contains 9
I want more Organic Traffic: Add More Search Engines
• Google Analytics only tracks this list of Search Engines ‘out-of-the-box’
• Add more search engines –particularly for international sites
07/04/2011http://code.google.com/apis/analytics/docs/tracking/gaTrackingTraffic.html#searchEngine
http://code.google.com/apis/analytics/docs/gaJS/gaJSApiSearchEngines.html#_gat.GA_Tracker_._addOrganic
I want more organic traffic: Tracking Google Places as Organic
– Maps or Place– Use Google URL Builder
http://www.google.com/support/analytics/bin/answer.py?answer=55578– I want to know it is (Source) Google, Medium (Organic) Traffic
• Track as campaign name = Places• Track as campaign content = Place|Maps
07/04/2011 http://www.seomoz.org/blog/tracking-traffic-from-google-places-in-google-analytics
http://www.futureinsightanalytics.com/?utm_source=google&utm_medium=organic&utm_content=map&utm_campaign=places
I want more Organic Traffic
• Sub-Domain and Cross-domain tracking– E.g. Tracking blog as part of main site stops blog
appearing as referrer
– Instead shows keyword/traffic sources that drove traffic to the blog and then through to the main site.
07/04/2011 http://code.google.com/apis/analytics/docs/tracking/gaTrackingSite.html
I don’t want to look like an Ass!
• When weird stuff happens in keyword reports that you can’t quite explain....
• Even worse when client notices it first• Or another agency notices and make you look like a duffer
07/04/2011
I don’t want to look like an ASS!: Stealing PPC traffic
• Make sure your client is correctly tracking paid search traffic
• Have you asked them if they are running PPC campaigns (then check if these are being tracked)?
• Are there kw’s appearing in GA with high visits that you don’t rank for?
07/04/2011
I don’t want to look like an ASS!Killing PPC traffic (aka wasting client budget)
• Communicate when you make development changes
– Change URLs
• Remember to tell PPC agency of changes so PPC traffic is not sent to 404 pages.
– Use 301/302 redirects
• Make sure that any 301’s carry over important parameters such as gclids and other tracking parameters
07/04/2011
I don’t want to look like an ASS!Hiding SEO Issues
• Applying filters with due care and attention
– Force page URI to upper/lowercase
• This will hide duplicate pages
– Using Default Index page
• Will also hide instances of multiple home pages
07/04/2011
I don’t want to look like an ASS!: Somebody has stolen my site!!
• Has your traffic suddenly increased
• You have referrers from new and far off lands
• Suddenly, a large percentage of your keywords are in Chinese!?
• Hostname report contains www.web.com or some other irrelevant domains (this should be the name of your website)
07/04/2011
I don’t want to look like an ASS!: www.web.com
• Referrer Spoofing
– Our site has been scraped/copied e.g. Your tracking script has been hijacked
– Using a hostname filter (from day 1) will prevent this from happening
(Good Explanation here) - http://techhacking.com/2011/01/23/google-analytics-referrer-spammers/
07/04/2011
Why does Google show as a referrer?
• Tracking exact referring URLs will help
– Was an actual link from Google (Yippee)?
– Igoogle
– Page has been translated
– Google Image search
– Google Docs (e.g. Spreadsheets)
07/04/2011
Exact Referring URLs
• Want to know exactly which page traffic has come from?
• Want to know why Google is showing as a referrer?
07/04/2011
http://www.analyticstraining.co.uk/2010/02/how-to-find-out-the-real-referring-url-google-analytics/
I want less branded Search Conversions!
• To get more conversions from non-branded traffic sources– Use advanced filters to recognise brand/navigational
source and set it as Direct traffic source• Can set medium as (branded) or (navigational) so that you
know what ‘type’ of direct traffic it was.
– GA will not attribute conversion to direct traffic unless was first visit to site (last click wins unless is direct source)
• Put this in a separate profile so you can still see how much traffic comes from branded search (and keep count of organic searches )
07/04/2011
Second Page Viewed
• If a search has come in via branded keywords or direct search, you will not know what visitor is searching for
• Find out what second page viewed was and then you’ll have a better idea of visitor intention
07/04/2011
Content Reports
• Look for Duplicate page titles
• Look for insightful Internal Search keywords
• Look for duplicate page names
07/04/2011
Using Advanced Segments
• Track ‘exact phrase’ you are working e.g. ‘Google Analytics Training’
• Track containing ‘exact phrase’ you are working on ‘Find Google Analytics Training Courses’
• Track contains ‘exact’ and ‘phrase’ you are working on ‘Training in SEO for Google Analytics’– How do these different segments perform?
– Can you see patterns to give more insight to your strategy?
– Is engagement better with long tail?
– Compare with paid/non-paid• Missing opportunities for keywords?
• Missing landing page opportunities?
07/04/2011
I want to stay up to date: Using Google Analytics Intelligence
• Use Google Intelligence to email you for significant keyword/visit changes
07/04/2011
I want to stay up to date: Using Google Analytics Notations
• Use Google Analytics Notations remind you what happened on specific days– 301s put in place– New Site went live– Server down for 2 hours– Anything that will affect your campaign– Etc.
07/04/2011
Troubleshooting Google Analytics
• Tools
– SitescanGA
– Livehttpheaders
– Google Analytics Tracking Code Debugger
07/04/2011
Making my life easier
• Add a tracker for an account specifically for tracking SEO data.
• Imacro
• Excellent analytics
• Tatvic
• TrackPal
07/04/2011
Resources
• http://www.smartinsights.com/blog/search-engine-marketing/google-analytics-seo/ by @danbarker
• http://www.slideshare.net/JoannaButler/think-visibility-advanced-analytics-joanna-butler by @joannabutler
07/04/2011