Week 5— My Journey into Data Analytics — DA Minidegree Review — CXL Institute

8 min readJun 20, 2021

Welcome to Week 5 of our Journey Into Data Analytics, this week I finished the Intermediate Module of Learning Google Analytics. This module focusses on building on our Fundamentals and providing us with tools that enhance our skills. This week, I learned various Tips and Tricks. My Favourite topics were Attribution, Multi-Channel Funnel Reports, and GA Via Google Sheets. Let’s find your interesting topics, shall we?

Note: I would recommend checking out the Week 1, Week 2, Week 3, Week 4 Journey before you jump into this for better clarity and learning.

Finding Answers: Custom Reports

As we know that QIA (ask a Question, with the required information, to find the Answer) is the first step before we enter google Analytics, sometimes our particular questions cannot be easily answered by a Built-in report, eg: Daily eCommerce traffic report or revenue by day and traffic source. Custom Reports come in the picture here.

We can find them in Reports > Customization > Custom Reports > +New Custom Report.

Custom reports can be either created or imported from the gallery. We can create 4 types

Explorer: The standard Analytics report. Includes a line graph and a data table that includes dynamic elements like a search/sort option and secondary dimensions.
Flat Table: A static and sortable table that displays data in rows and columns
Map Overlay: A map of the world. Different regions and countries display in darker colors to indicate traffic and engagement volume.
Funnel: A conversion funnel you define.

Once the report is generated for a view, we can share the report too.

Note: When you share a Custom Report, only the configuration information is shared. Your data remains private.

Eg : Metrics by day of week name and hour Report

While researching more about this topic, I came across a very helpful article from CXL which highlights the efficient custom report template from the gallery that can be utilized — Check it out Here

if you want to explore more such templates, you can check out Google Analytics Solutions Gallery

Tips & Tricks: Dashboards

Google Analytics Dashboards allow you to quickly visualize your data. You can have up to 20 dashboards with 12 widgets in each for each view/property in your Google Analytics account. Each view/property includes a default dashboard to get you started.

To access Dashboards — click on Dashboards in the left side menu. We can either start with Blank Canvas or Starter Dashboard. Each of the Metric or Dimension is represented with a widget that can be customized.

The widgets are two types i.e Standard and real-time. Real-time widgets update the metrics automatically and standard widgets update when you load or refresh the Dashboard.

Standard Widgets include Metric, Timeline, Geomap, Table, Pie
Realtime Widgets include Counter, Timeline, Geomap, Table

As in Analytics reports, we can add segments to your Dashboard, allowing us to compare and contrast metrics generated by different session or user groupings.

Check out the Popular Dashboards with can be imported from the gallery —

Tips & Tricks: Saved Reports & Alerts

The reports can be saved and accessed later eg: If I want a goal completion with source/medium report which highlights only the organic data which is more than 1000 sessions, I can create the report and save it to access later.

Simultaneously, we can create custom alerts that help in notifying us eg: 404 alert — This helps to notify if any broken links are receiving the sessions. The alerts can be sent via email or SMS or both.

create an alert by going to Admin > View-Level Settings > Custom Alerts.

If I want to create an alert to notify the increase in bounce rate, these are the settings

Alert Name: Bounce Rate Increase
Period: Day
This Applies To: All Traffic
Alert Me When: Bounce rate is greater than 90.00

Tips & Tricks: Channels

GA classifies the traffic through channels. Eg: Facebook, Instagram are socials, Google Ads, Facebook ads are Paid, Traffic through Search engines is Organic and Untagged traffic is Direct.

These channels have a default predefined setting. Even though it is well defined, it might not suit our business. Eg: I noticed that my Facebook paid traffic was getting collected in (other) whereas the right channel is Paid. Hence I had to make the changes in Paid Channel to include.

To understand the Definition of Each channel — Check out this article

Note: The change in channel grouping only affects after the change is applied, it does not affect the previous data collected.

You can also use the Custom channel grouping. When you create a Custom Channel Grouping at the user level or create a new Channel Grouping in a view, you:

Can immediately select it in reports.
Can apply it retroactively and see historical data classified by your new channel definitions.
Change how reports display your data, without changing the data itself.
Shows up in the Multi-Channel Funnel Report

Note: After you have created and saved a Custom Channel Grouping, you can copy, delete, or share it directly with others, or share it in the Solutions Gallery.

Note: the order of the channel is very important. suppose we have 2 channels ie Facebook and Social Network.

Position 1 — Facebook

Position 2 — Social Network

Once the traffic comes from Facebook, it will be collected in Facebook Channel and not the social Network due to Positioning and validation of rules of the channel. It follows the waterfall strategy.

Tips & Tricks: Multi-channel Funnels

Standard reports show last know traffic source and do not cover Multiple TouchPoints. Multi-Channel Funnels show how your marketing channels (traffic sources) work together to generate sales or other conversions.

There are 5 MCF Reports

Overview Report — This is a summary report of conversions and channel attributing to it, it also shows the overlap between them
Assisted Conversions Report — This report helps to determine which channels are influencing and assisting on conversions.

Note: Suppose we have a source i.e Affiliates and the assisted ratio is 1 > =, it means that the source is helping us to create awareness and is not a direct source for conversion, Hence we can change the strategy of this source from Action to Awareness.

Top Conversion Paths Report — The Top Conversion Paths relate to the channels that drove the sessions leading up to the conversion (including the last touchpoint/channel).
Time Lag Report — As the name suggests, it uncovers how long it takes for conversions to occur relative to the first session of a visitor. The bar chart report is broken into a different bar for days 0–11 and a single bar for 12–30 days which can be broken down by day as well.
Path Length Report — it provides the breakdown of the average number of touchpoints to channels that have been interacted with before conversion or goal completion

Note: To use the multi-channel funnels reports, you must have e-commerce tracking or goals enabled

Tips & Tricks: Attribution

In simple terms, Identifying the source that is responsible for the sale, whether Facebook, email, or organic search is called Attribution.

Note: We can use the Multi-Channel Funnels Model Comparison Tool to compare how different attribution models impact the valuation of your marketing channels and then apply it as the default attribution model for our Brand.

Let’s take an example of User Journey to understand different attribution models

Session 1 -A user visits the website clicking one of our Facebook Ads (Attention/ Awareness)

Session 2 — He returns one week later by clicking over from a social network (Interest)

Session 3 — He returns the same day via one of our email campaigns (Desire/Evaluation)

Session 4 — a few hours later, He visits directly and makes a purchase. (Action)

Last Interaction — the last touchpoint — in this case, the Direct channel — would receive 100% of the credit for the Purchase

Last Non-Direct Click — all direct traffic is ignored, and 100% of the credit for the sale goes to the Last Known Channel Before Purchase i.e Email channel.

First Interaction — The first touchpoint — in this case, the Facebook Ads i.e Paid channel — would receive 100% of the credit for the Purchase.

Linear — In this, each touchpoint in the conversion path would share equal credit (25% each) for the Purchase/Conversion.

Time Decay — In this, the touchpoints closest in time to the Purchase or conversion get most of the credit. i.e Email and Direct gets the majority of the credit followed by Social Network and Lastly Paid Facebook Ads

Position Based — 40% credit is assigned to each the first and last interaction, and the remaining 20% credit is distributed evenly to the middle interactions. In this case, Facebook Ads and Direct get 40% Credit and 20% goes to Social Network and Email Campaign.

Tips & Tricks: Exporting to Google Sheets

Any marketer would agree that google sheets are our best friend, it helps to calculate metrics very easily and makes data readable. We can create our custom reports through Google Analytics Add-on for Google sheets.

Some of the Benefits of using GA API through google sheets is

Query and report data from multiple views.
Compute and display custom calculations.
Create visualizations and embed those visualizations on third-party websites.
Schedule your reports to run and update automatically.
Control who can see your data and visualizations by using Google Sheets’ sharing and privacy features.

To explore and understand dimensions and metrics that can be accessed through sheets, Checkout the Dimension and Metrics Explorer

How to Create a New Report

Install the Add-on and then select “Add-ons” > “Google Analytics” > “Create a New Report”.
Select “Add-ons” > “Google Analytics” > “Run Reports” from the menu bar.

Note: To create additional reports, just repeat the steps above. Each additional report you create will add a new column of data to the right of the previous report.

Note: For An automated reported such as Sessions by date, We can schedule the reports to run automatically by selecting “Add-ons” > “Google Analytics” > “Schedule Reports”

With this, we are done with Intermediate Module, Next week, We shall start the Google Tag Manager, I am pretty excited about this. As always concluding with a parting thought

Once we know something, we find it hard to imagine what it was like not to know it — Chip & Dan Heath