Overview

Universal Analytics from Google introduces many useful features into analytics, to help us get a better understanding of user behavior on our website & beyond.Features that were?only available to developer community are now released to General Public for more flexibility & better customization.

Universal analytics gives is new features with better customization options, simplified feature configuration, custom metrics & multi-platform tracking. With?Multi-platform Tracking?using measurement protocol Universal Anlytics gives you the great fliexibilty of sending data from any digital device to analytics, so you can collect data from more than just your website.

Setting Up Universal Analytics

If you already have Google Analytics configured for your website, you have to run?both Google & Universal Analytics concurrently to maintain continuity.

If you are currently not tracking Google Analytics for your site, create a new account & configure to start tracking Universal Analytics. If you tracking Google Analytics for your site, create a new web property for the same domain & install Universal Analytics tracking code on your site.

Refer to detail setup instructions on Universal Analytics Page.

Features that you can Customize

Some of the main features to look for in Universal Analytcis, within a web property are:

1. Session & campaign timeout handling; to customize for your site and business. You can configure these from “Session Settings” tab in the admin panel
2. Customize organic search sources; to customize the list of recognized search engines, & how the search traffic data appears in reports. Server Side->Organic Search Sources Tab
3. Referral Exclusions; ?to exclude traffic from certain domains as referral traffic. You can access this feature from Server Side–>Referral List Exclusion Tab
4. Search Term Exclusions; to exclude traffic coming to your website with certain search terma. This featue is available from Server Side->Search Term Exclusion Tab

Before you implement Universal Analytics for your site, ?be sure to review, Security & Privacy in Universal Analytics.

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About the Author

Kalpana Murthy, President/CEO at WSI Plano, DBA Kriti Web Solutions, LLC. is a Digital Strategist, Consultant, Speaker/Trainer, & Software Engineer who is passionate about bringing affordable technology solutions to businesses to build online presence. Kalpana Murthy is a certified partner with Google, HubSpot, Sharp Spring, SEMRush and other digital solution providers.