Measuring website traffic using Google Analytics
Website traffic is more than the number of hits to a website. With Google Analytics you can find out more about who visits your website, where they come from, and what they do when they're there?
Note: Google Analytics uses Javascript code to measure traffic. This code is automatically included within the footer section on corporate UniSA websites. If your site is not on the corporate web server or uses different templates then you will need to add the code in yourself. Please email webenquiry@unisa.edu.au to request the code, outlining which website/s you will be using the code on.
- Accessing Google Analytics
- Getting to know Analytics
- Separating internal and external UniSA traffic
- View information about your own corporate website
Accessing Google Analytics
If you want to view information from Google Analytics about your site you will need to:
- request access to UniSA's Google Analytics account
- create a Google account (use your UniSA email address when registering).
Once you have received access go to http://www.google.com/analytics/ to logon and sign in using the Google account you created in Step 2 above.
You will see a screen like the below. Select View report to see UniSA's web traffic data.
Getting to know Analytics
Because there are so many things in Google Analytics that you can do we'll try and cover the most commonly asked questions and Google Analytic's support website has documentation and support forums for other questions you may have.
This YouTube video provides a useful overview of getting to know Google Analytics.
Separating internal and external UniSA traffic
One of the most commonly asked questions from staff is how to separate external and internal visits and this is easily done via the use of a filter. Written instructions are included below or you can view a video of the process (14Mb, View with Quicktime).
Creating a UniSA internal traffic filter
- Select View report (unisa.edu.au) as outlined above
- Under My Customizations (was Settings) on the left, select Advanced Segments
- Select 'Create new Custom Segment'
- Click on Visitors in the left hand menu to expand it
- In the Visitors drop down options, drag and drop 'User Defined Value' into the dotted dimension or metric box on the right
- Under 'Condition' select 'Matches Exactly'
- Under 'Value' select 'Internal UniSA'
- In the 'Name Segment' box name the segment 'Internal UniSA'
- Select Create Segment
- Go back to the Dashboard to view analytics
Creating a UniSA external traffic filter
- Select View report (unisa.edu.au) as outlined above
- Under My Customizations (was Settings) on the left, select Advanced Segments
- Select 'Create new Custom Segment'
- Click on Visitors in the left hand menu to expand it
- In the Visitors drop down options, drag and drop 'User Defined Value' into the dotted dimension or metric box on the right
- Under 'Condition' select 'Does Not Match Exactly'
- Under 'Value' select 'Internal UniSA'
- In the 'Name Segment' box name the segment 'External UniSA'
- Select Create Segment
- Go back to the Dashboard to view analytics
Applying UniSA Filters
Both Internal and External filters can be applied to any analytics by
selecting the 'Advanced Segments' box at the top right
corner of the page
Internal and external filters can be applied by ticking the appropriate box.
For more information on filters visit the
Google Analytics filters
website section
View information about your own corporate website
- In the UniSA Dashboard, select Content, Top Content
- By default the report will show the top ten pages and their analytics but you can filter this information
- For example if you want to view the information about the Open Day
website, type /openday into the filter box and select Go
- Once you've done this you'll see a list of webpages that have /openday in the web address and you can select individual pages to view statistics about them.
Whatever information you view you can add to your Dashboard for quick reference next time you logon to Google Analytics. To do this, select 'Add to Dashboard' near the top of the screen.
To view this, select Dashboard from the left hand menu and it will appear on that page (you may have to scroll).
More information about report data in the Content section.
You may also want to setup a Custom report (video) if you're interested in certain metrics and data.