Google Analytics API and Advanced Application

Claye Stokes

twitter.com/clayelinkedin.com/in/claye

Director of SEO

Google Analytics API and Advanced Application

Google Plus: http://goo.gl/cEhGC

High Level First, Then Drilling Down

• GA (Google Analytics) is NOT just for websites!– Google Analytics Android SDK

• Can’t track what we’re not measuring!• SDK Tracks:

– Events– Ecommerce– Market Referrals– Pageviews– Unique Users– Custom Variables

Tweet @claye questions

Track Everything

– All actions– Form submissions (lead generation, newsletters, etc.)– Errors– Downloads– Game modes (single vs multiplayer)– Times (time it takes to complete a level, build a doc)– Step completion (in multi-step forms and checkout

processes)– Registration

Tweet @claye questions

How to Track

• Use Pageviews when content changes• Use Event Tracking for actions

– Example: tracker.trackPageView(“/” + this.getLocalClassName());

– Documentation: https://developers.google.com/analytics/devguides/collection/android/

Tweet @claye questions

Listen App

More Events

• Why not track errors with Google Analytics?– Category: Error– Action: [action that triggered the exception]

• Time can be tracked, for example:– Category: Podcast– Action: Play– Label: [Title of Podcast]– Value: 15:23

Using the Reports

• Segment!– How does your app perform on various devices?– How does that affect user behavior?– Screen resolution?– Landscape vs Portrait?

Tweet @claye questions

Google Analytics API

• Get the good stuff! (Reports that are impossible to get by logging in)– Example: goal completions (conversions) by

keyword• Documentation:

https://developers.google.com/analytics/devguides/

Tweet @claye questions

Google Spreadsheets + GA API

• Using Apps Script, we can access the Google Analytics API to pull anything we want (up to 10,000 rows!)

• Credit where it’s due: thanks to Mikael Thuneberg for making his code public: http://www.automateanalytics.com/

Tweet @claye questions

Example Spreadsheet: GA Report Builder

• http://goo.gl/QqlHZ • Go create a copy for yourself and start playing with

it!– Click File -> Make a Copy…– On the Settings tab, enter your Google Analytics

username/password– Find your profile number by logging into your report at

www.google.com/analytics, find the number with a ‘p’ preceding it

Tweet @claye questions, Report: http://goo.gl/QqlHZ

GA Report Builder

• Required fields– Start/End Dates– Dimensions (rows)– Metrics (columns)

• Optional– Segments (default AND custom, advanced

segments)– Filters

Tweet @claye questions, Report: http://goo.gl/QqlHZ

How it Works

• First, we do some validation

Tweet @claye questions, Report: http://goo.gl/QqlHZ

How it Works

• Encode the password

Tweet @claye questions, Report: http://goo.gl/QqlHZ

How it Works

• Authenticate

Tweet @claye questions, Report: http://goo.gl/QqlHZ

How it Works

• Take the response, handle errors

Tweet @claye questions, Report: http://goo.gl/QqlHZ

How it Works

• Request data from the API

• Request URL:

• Then, stack the response in an Array and output

Tweet @claye questions, Report: http://goo.gl/QqlHZ

Resources:• Google Analytics Reporting API: http://

code.google.com/apis/analytics/docs/gdata/home.html– V3: http://code.google.com/apis/analytics/docs/gdata/home.html

• Google Data Feed Query Explorer: http://code.google.com/apis/analytics/docs/gdata/gdataExplorer.html

• Google Apps Script Documentation: http://code.google.com/googleapps/appsscript/

• http://www.peakconversion.com/2012/01/using-the-google-analytics-data-api-with-google-docs-spreadsheet/

• http://www.automateanalytics.com/• Watch for my posts on the SEO.com blog (www.seo.com/blog) for

updates and new Google Analytics toolsTweet @claye questions, Report: http://goo.gl/QqlHZ