Information from Google Analytics helps ecommerce retailers make key choices. However that assumes the information is correct. On this submit, I’ll present directions for conducting a Google Analytics audit to substantiate the accuracy of the information or determine potential errors.

Google Analytics Audit Course of

The next areas could cause reporting errors.

Duplicate Google Analytics tags. Go to Habits > Website Content material > All Pages and examine “Distinctive Pageviews” to “Pageviews.” Pages with a minimum of twice the variety of Pageviews as Distinctive Pageviews may comprise a number of Google Analytics tags.

Evaluate “Distinctive Pageviews” to “Pageviews.” Pages with a minimum of twice the variety of Pageviews as Distinctive Pageviews may comprise a number of Google Analytics tags. Click on picture to enlarge.

Touchdown pages and different pages reported as “(not set).” Navigate to the experiences at Habits > Website Content material > All Pages and Habits > Website Content material > Touchdown Pages. Pages listed as “(not set)” point out an issue with Google Analytics tags on the location. For instance, Occasions tags could possibly be firing earlier than the web page tag, which may trigger Google Analytics to not determine the web page hooked up to the Occasions hit.

Navigate to the experiences at Habits > Website Content material > All Pages and Habits > Website Content material > Touchdown Pages. Pages listed as “(not set)” point out an issue with Google Analytics tags. Click on picture to enlarge.

To dig additional, if there are Occasions reported in Google Analytics, go to Habits > Occasions > Prime Occasions, then Secondary Dimension by “Touchdown Web page” and report all Occasions the place the Touchdown Web page is “(not set).” This could give clues for which Occasions should not tied to pages.

Go to Habits > Occasions > Prime Occasions, then Secondary Dimension by “Touchdown Web page” and report all occasions the place the Touchdown Web page is “(not set).” Click on picture to enlarge.

If there are not any points with Occasions, attempt the identical course of with the Ecommerce experiences, at Conversions > Ecommerce and making use of a Secondary Dimension by “Touchdown Web page.” For instance, the “Product Efficiency” report beneath reveals Enhanced Ecommerce hits that aren’t tied to a Touchdown Web page.

Attempt the identical course of with Ecommerce experiences, setting Secondary Dimension by “Touchdown Web page.” Click on picture to enlarge.

As soon as the Occasions or Enhanced Ecommerce hits are discovered that accompany the “(not set)” Touchdown Web page, the laborious half is fixing it. (An authorized Google Analytics marketing consultant may assist.)

AdWords not correctly built-in with Analytics. Visitors from Google Advertisements (previously AdWords) could be misreported if not arrange correctly. In “Use Google Analytics to Audit PPC Visitors,” I addressed easy methods to audit PPC visitors to substantiate correct reporting in Analytics.

Incorrect sources reporting. Go to Acquisition > All Visitors > Supply/Medium and evaluate the highest sources of Classes and Transactions. If any are unfamiliar or don’t make sense, dig deeper. A typical service provider’s web site may have natural, CPC, direct, and e-mail as the highest visitors sources, adopted by visitors from social and referrals. In case your area or one other supply is chargeable for a big share of Classes or Transactions, there could also be a monitoring or tagging situation.

To verify inside referrals and referral spam, see “Google Analytics: Eradicating Inside Visitors and Referral Spam.” If CPC, e-mail, social, or different visitors isn’t exhibiting up as anticipated, learn “Google Analytics: Easy methods to Observe Advertising Campaigns.”

The “Supply/Medium” report can rapidly level to points with monitoring social, CPC, and e-mail visitors. Click on picture to enlarge.

Improper transactions or income. Be certain the transactions and income reported in Google Analytics are inside 95 % of precise on-line gross sales. Use the Conversions > Ecommerce > Overview report to match reported gross sales to precise for a given interval.

Income and transactions information ought to be inside 95 % of precise on-line gross sales. Click on picture to enlarge.

If the transactions are near the precise however income isn’t, have a look at particular person transactions within the “Gross sales Efficiency” report at Ecommerce > Gross sales Efficiency to determine points with the information despatched to Google Analytics through the Ecommerce tags.

If the transactions are near the precise however income isn’t, have a look at particular person transactions within the “Gross sales Efficiency” report at Ecommerce > Gross sales Efficiency. Click on picture to enlarge.

Do the portions align with precise? Does Product Income look right with correct totals when together with tax and transport?

If income and transactions are each too small, there could possibly be lacking gross sales as a result of Ecommerce tags firing too low on the web page or the web page itself having loading points that influence the tags. Different areas to research are fee strategies in addition to bank card (comparable to PayPal) that redirect the consumer again to the order affirmation web page after making fee.

Duplicate transactions. If the above course of recognized increased numbers of transactions than precise, the issue could possibly be duplications. To audit for duplicate transactions, go to Conversions > Ecommerce > Overview and observe the whole transactions reported.

To audit for duplicate transactions, go to Conversions > Ecommerce > Overview and observe the whole transactions reported. Click on picture to enlarge.

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Then go to “Gross sales Efficiency” at Conversions > Ecommerce > Gross sales Efficiency and search for the whole rows of transaction IDs.

Go to “Gross sales Efficiency” at Conversions > Ecommerce > Gross sales Efficiency and search for the whole rows of transaction IDs. Click on picture to enlarge.

On this instance, there have been 308 transactions reported in whole, however 303 particular person transaction IDs. Which means there have been 5 duplicate transactions, or roughly 1 % of the whole, which isn’t too unhealthy. When you see 10 % or extra duplicate transactions, examine. Work along with your ecommerce buying cart to implement an answer that doesn’t permit clients to revisit the order affirmation web page to set off one other ecommerce transaction despatched to Google Analytics after the preliminary order. If the buying cart can not repair, customized JavaScript will be the reply. That will possible require a developer, nonetheless.

Information Drives Progress

Correct information in Google Analytics is crucial to drive ecommerce efficiency. Correctly establishing Google Analytics is vital. For extra, see “Google Analytics Setup Guidelines for Ecommerce.”