I was checking the traffic of one of my website’s and I came across one new feature that Google Analytics has included. You can now compare the no of visits and the sales made on a particular day. There are various other attributes such as Page Visits, Avg Time on Site, Bounce Rate, %New Visit that could be compared with other attributes such as Revenue, Transactions, Average Value so on.

Google Analytics

This metric comparison should help us compare one-to-one attributes that will help us monitor the search engine traffic more carefully. By tracking the no of visits and sales we get for a particular keyword, we can implement the SEO element as and when required.

I’ve been working in the SEO industry for quite a while now and feel that using analytics really helps you to better understand your site, the users coming in to your site and their behavior when they are actually navigating through the pages. In some ways you can say that analytics is a mirror for a site and goes a long way to help you understand site usability.

Not long ago there was Urchin that provided all the statistics, although I must confess that it was all numbers in there and sometimes you wouldn’t blame a person if he/she were to zone out after looking at all those numbers.

Then in mid 2007 Google came up with the new and improved version of Google Analytics and the world of web analytics completely changed. You had user friendly graphs, pie-charts, maps, statistics and the works, all free of cost. All you had to do was to upload a simple code on the pages of your site and you were ready to go.
For Search Engine Optimization (SEO), I feel that Google Analytics is both advantageous and disadvantageous. Let’s talk about a few advantages first.
1. Distribution of Traffic
I love the way Google uses a pie chart to show a breakup of the major traffic sources. You get to know exactly how many visitors enter your site directly (typing the domain name in the browser) vis-à-vis organic search results, paid search results (if you run a PPC campaign), referrals and other sources.
2. Keyword Analytics
This, I feel is by far the most SEO friendly data as it gives you all the information as to which keywords people are using to enter your site on search engines. In short it lets you peek into the mind of your visitors and potential customers. You can get detailed reports on which keywords are driving the organic search traffic to your site and which are not. You can also get an idea as to which PPC keywords work for you and can be targeted for SEO. It also helps in a major way to chalk out a list of negative keywords for your site and get ideas for fresh content and products.
3. Map Overlay
This is the feature I like the most interactive as it shows a geographical distribution of the traffic coming in to the site on a world map. It helps you to know about the countries and cities that generate the most traffic.

Now a few disadvantages for the SEO campaign of the site.
1. JavaScript Code
Everyone who’s anyone in the SEO business is familiar that Google Analytics uses a JavaScript code. Moreover it is a common known fact that JavaScript is not search engine friendly and may act as spider stopper for Search Engine Spiders and Bots.
2. Dependency on Google
By using Google Analytics you solely rely on Google for all your data. Moreover there is no such facility as yet for archiving this data in a proper format. You are stuck if Google decides to change the reporting system one fine day and you have absolutely no control over it.

In short, every one of us is solely on Google’s mercy and has to abide by its rules, which I think is not fair at times.

Finally… and I say finally with my hand on my heart. Google Analytics has introduced a graph that shows us traffic trends not just by day, but also by week and month. Have a look at the screen shot below -

This was a graph that I sorely missed. This graph will save a lot of people some trouble. People, who like me want to see the increase/decrease in monthly traffic to judge the success of an internet marketing initiative like SEO that takes time to show results.

Google analytics has informed that there is a temporary reporting delay since Saturday night. Their blog states that “no data will be lost - data will continue to be collected and processed during this time.”

Further, they expect updates for all accounts to continue through Monday night into tomorrow and will update their blog when reporting is fully restored.

So Google’s decided to take the plunge and buy DoubleClick. And what’s more, along with the big bird, they also get Performics as part of the deal. Performics was a bit player in the affiliate marketing space until yesterday, but under the Google umbrella it transforms into a potential 800-pound gorilla. Understandably, the affiliate marketing corner of the blogosphere’s gone ballistic over it. Every affiliate consultant worth his/her salt has a take on it. There are two things which everyone seems to have missed. The less significant one first:

1.) The Goog doesn’t seem too enthusiastic about Performics. From the takeover FAQ:

Q. What will Google do with Performics?
A. Performics is part of DoubleClick, and we are acquiring it as part of the transaction. We have no plans to dispose of it at this time.

What is pay-per-action advertising?
Pay-per-action advertising is a new pricing model that allows advertisers to pay only when specific actions that they define are completed by a user on their site. Rather than paying for clicks or impressions, advertisers can choose to pay when a user makes a purchase, signs up for a newsletter, or completes any other clearly defined action that they choose. Pay-per-action ads are eligible to appear on publisher sites in the Google content network, and publishers can choose specific pay-per-action ads
that are relevant to their site to run in new ad units that they create.

- Rahul.