DIGITAL ANALYTICS MINIDEGREE / CXL — BLOG 3
In the last blog post, I talked about the capabilities of Google Analytics Universal and differences of new GA4. In this blog post, we will explore Google Analytics Audit features in detail with the third part of CXL Digital Analytics Minidegree.
You can go to the CXL website from here.
This week, we will cover the features of Google Analytics Audit under different headings in general. First, let’s talk about what Google Analytics Audit is and what it does.
What is Google Analytics Audit?
Audit means an official inspection of an organization’s accounts, typically by an independent body according to the universal dictionary definition.
When we consider this definition in terms of Google Analytics, it consists of the correct setup in order to measure the performance of your website or mobile application and the examinations made to correct any errors. GA Audit becomes an examination, verification, and validation of different things associated with Google Analytics.
“ A Google Analytics audit is one of the best ways to ensure that you can trust your data. You don’t want to use it, if you can’t trust it.”
Why is GA Audit important?
We want the data to be sent to Google Analytics correctly and not to mislead us when interpreting. Therefore, it is very important to understand that the setup is correct before analyzing the data.
The risk of not doing an audit are like below:
- If people in the company don’t trust the data, they won’t be ready to use the data. Trust in data leads to better adoption.
- If you have data quality that is not very good, and you’re trying to make decisions based on that data, then you’re going to be making bad decisions. Inaccurate data leads to inaccurate decisions.
We need some basic tools to help us do the auditing in a much better way. Chrome extensions and the developer console are good starting points to start learning how GA auditing.
Some of the useful extensions to be used are:
1. Google Tag Assistant
Google Tag Assistant is a free Chrome extension that helps you make sure your Google tags such as Google Analytics, Google Tag Manager, Adwords Conversion Tracking, and more are working correctly.
2. Adswerve DataLayer Inspector
The Adswerve dataLayer Inspector+ is a tool kit of utilities for a digital analyst.
3. GA Debugger
Prints useful information to the JavaScript console by enabling the debug version of the Google Analytics Javascript.
4. GTM/GA Debug
This extension will allow you to debug the Google Tag Manager and Google Analytics Implementations.
5. Chrome Developer Tools
Chrome DevTools is a set of web developer tools built directly into the Google Chrome browser. This is an important tool to assist in debugging Analytics.
Checklist for Google Analytics Audit
Auditing Account and Property
We would want to make sure that the ID associated with the account is the same one seen on the live website. Google Tag Assistant can be used to check the property id.
Auditing Property and View
If you want to specify and measure clearly you can use Eisenhover Matrix. With this method you can rank your scale according to the:
- Important and urgent
- Important but not urgent
- Not important but urgent
- Not important and not urgent
Auditing Page Views
The main objective is to make sure that the page views are being tracked while keeping in mind that we are neither tracking too many page views nor very few.
Auditing Host Names
Here we should look at Cross-domain tracking, Landing pages, MA Pages.
Auditing IP Filters
Excluding your IP address (as well as the IP addresses of your remote team members and contractors) to avoid self-generated traffic. Bear in mind that it only works for static IP addresses. If any of the above IP addresses are dynamic, one of best solutions is a Chrome extension or you can try different segments from Google Analytics.
Auditing Default Channel Group
Throughout Analytics reports, you can see your data organized according to the Default Channel Grouping, a grouping of the most common sources of traffic, like Paid Search and Direct. This allows you to quickly check the performance of each of your traffic channels.
Auditing Site Crawl
Here, we need to check analytics.js, gtag.js and GTM on every page and the pages with utm_parameters.
Auditing Grouping Similar Pages
The idea here is to find out similar pages that are not grouped together. Some of the common query parameters that can be used here are:
Fbclid = FaceBookclickID
Gclid = GoogleAdsClickID
Mc_cid = MailChimpCampaignID
Mc_eid = MailChimpe-mailID
Msclkid = Microsoft(BingAds)ClickID
Auditing Events
We should try to create clear and tangible events and can have multiple events. Keeping the same page together is a good way for that. With this method we can understand and measure our customer’s actions better.
Auditing Goals
When making a goal definition and auditing, it will be easier for us to measure in a few specific subjects, not on the basis of all scenarios.
Auditing Personally Identifiable Information
PII can include Names, Social Security numbers, email address and other personal pieces of user information. If this data appears, all the data you have may be deleted, so you should be very careful.
- Where does PII live?
- Page content
- Event category, action, label
- Search terms
- Custom dimensions
Auditing Enhanced Ecommerce
This feature helps us to create goal funnels which would be useful in identifying how satisfied customers are with the e-commerce and the checkout process.
If you want a more deep dive, here is a great article on CXL on a DIY Health Check of Google Analytics.
While providing a specialization in GA, CXL minidegree also teaches things I have never known in different fields. If you want to learn what Eisenhover Matrix I mentioned in a part of the blog is and where it is used, you can find it here. I’m just learning too, but it has already expanded my horizons considerably.
See you next week with a new blog post containing details from the CXL digital analytics mini degree program.
Thanks,
Mert Kolay
