Create basic Google Analytics settings for your website

Basic Terminology

Before creating an account in Google Analytics, it is advisable to consider how it will be used and to be aware of several limitations that arise from an improperly structured setup.

In Google Analytics, we distinguish:

• Account: the highest level of structure within Google Analytics. The account is most commonly named after the company.
• Property: the domain of the website you want to measure using Google Analytics.
• View: this is where you look at data about your website's visitors. You can create multiple views and condition them based on the perspective you expect. For example, you can create a view for all visitors and exclude traffic from your company — then conversely create a view that only includes traffic from your company. We will discuss this in more detail later.

How to Create a Google Analytics Account Structure

First, it is important to realize that Services cannot be removed from a Account and transferred to another account. If your company has multiple websites (that is, multiple Services) and you want to transfer one of them to another account (for example, due to the sale of the website), unfortunately, you are out of luck. 

We recommend considering in advance how you will manage the websites in the long term. Alternatively, create a separate account for each website. However, the downside of separate accounts is that you will lose the ability to share filters for the data views you access.

For our basic example, let’s assume the most common structure:

• The account will be the name of the company
• The service corresponds to the domain name. 

We will not create additional Services.

First Steps

After registering for Google Analytics, proceed to create your first Account. Enter its name in the Account Name field.

Scroll down and click on Next. In the Service Settings, enter the service name, select the country and currency. Click on Show advanced options and check the option Create a Universal Analytics property. Enter the website URL and select the option Create a Universal Analytics property only. Click on Next.

Fill in your company details and proceed with the option Create. Confirm your agreement with the terms and conditions. Subsequently, the measurement ID for your website will be displayed. Make a note of this ID. You will need it for implementing Google Analytics via Google Tag Manager.

Now click on the arrow to the left of the title of your Service. Three columns will appear. In the third column, click on Create data view and name it Rescue data view. Again, select the country and click on Create data view. Next, we will set it up so that only traffic outside your company and only from your domain is displayed in Google Analytics. However, we will leave this Rescue data view without filters and settings so that we can compare filtered and raw data.

In the Data Selection column, select All website data. Click on Filters and Add filter. Enter Only traffic from the own domain as the filter name — select in the Predefined option – Include only — Domain traffic — Containing. And enter your domain name. Click on Save. This will prevent data distortion if someone (accidentally) copies your Google Analytics tracking code to another domain. Only traffic to your domain will actually be measured.

Again enter Add filter. Now we will exclude traffic from your company. To do this, it is necessary to know the IP address that you use in the company. You can find it out by connecting to the company network and opening this page. 

In the first line, you will see your IP address. Copy it to your clipboard. Name the new filter Exclusion of company traffic and select Predefined — Exclude — Traffic from IP addresses — Which equal. Enter the IP address that was displayed to you. Then continue by clicking the Save button. You have now excluded visits from your company.

Are you wondering how to set up remarketing audiences? In the middle column Service — Audience Definition — Audience using the guide. 

Where to Watch Events Created in Google Tag Manager

In our article about setting up Google Tag Manager, we showed how to send information to Google Analytics about which page users scroll and how much.

Where to View the Data?

In the left menu of your Google Analytics account, select the overview Behavior — Events — Top Events. Here you will find the event Scroll Depth. Click on it. You will see an overview of your website's pages. If you have a new account or have not yet set up scroll tracking in Google Tag Manager, please return here later. 

At this moment, you will not see any data here. Once you click on a specific page where you are interested in the scroll depth, you will see percentages representing the portion of the page that visitors have scrolled through.

Optimize Content More Easily

This information will help you with evaluating visitor engagement. Based on this, you can determine where to place important information on the page and simultaneously work on optimizing the content so that users view it in its entirety. Placing attractive content at the top, inserting buttons, or submenus can guide users to lower positions on the page.

Are you unsure about the Google Analytics setup? Interested in comprehensive Google Analytics setup? Contact us , we are happy to help you.