Google Analytics is a free tool that tracks and gathers data from the people who visit your website.
The system uses a JavaScript code that collects and processes data that is then presented to you in the Google Analytics platform.
A tracking code will collect anonymous information on how users interact with your website. It will tell you how many users visited a page, how long they were there, which pages they visited and where they went next on your website. The code will collect browser information such as language, browser type, device and traffic source.
Google Analytics breaks the data into five reporting categories:
Real-Time: What’s happening on the website right now?
This category shows how many people are on your website right now, where they came from and what content (which page) they’re looking at.
There are two scenarios where this report can be useful. First, it shows you live website data, which is especially helpful when you set up custom events (like clicks on a marketing email or links shared on social media). Second, the report can track and possibly optimize the performance of short campaigns.
Audience: Who visits your site?
Audience reports provide information on who has visited your website. This includes demographic information about their age, gender, location and language. Depending on your small business, you might want to look into different reports, but a common category every business should monitor is the mobile report.
The mobile report will show you what percentage of your website visitors come from a mobile device, desktop or tablet. Mobile device usage continues to grow and for many websites, it’s the device used the most. This is crucial to monitor because people navigating the internet on a mobile device have different behaviors and objectives. They tend to be on the go and looking for information as easily and quickly as possible. If a big portion of your website traffic is coming from mobile devices, you should optimize your site for those users. – Read more
