FEATURES TO KNOW IN GA

Features to know...

In CXL INSTITUTE we talked about the features to know.This is going to be where I'm going to have some fun.Because I'm going to go into Behavior, we're going to go to Site Content and All Pages.This is the report, by the way, that lights up every single page that all of your visitors are seeing.So, if you're looking for a page, and it's not in here.It's because it's not tracking.So that's kind of one important thing to think about.But, as we go through here, this is a Table Report, right?Remember the different types of reports, this is a Table Report.So this Table Report, some of the things that you're going to be mostly using, in Google Analytics.Almost every report you look at.Some, of course, will be these Flow Reports.But, these Table Reports are really where you're going to spend a ton of time.So I wanted to show you the different features.One is the date range.The way that the date range works, Google Analytics by default will typically doa 7-day date range.You can change this, and we'll show you where to do that in a future lesson here.But, you can change this, but it's typically the last 7 days.Technically this is being recorded on May 22nd, and you'll notice by default it does not light up the day of.It does that because Google Analytics, these reports they call the historic reports, take a little bit of time for the data to get in there.There's processing that happens.So all of the information is basically sent to Google Analytics servers at Google.Google servers crunch all the numbers and stitch everything together.Then they put it into these reports and that takes time.Sometimes it can take 30 minutes.Maybe 5 or 10 minutes, if it's a good day.Sometimes it can take hours.And the trick is, different reports can actually get access to their data at different times.You might see something light up in the All Pages Report.But, it doesn't light up in the Landing Page Reporttil 3 hours later, on that same day.So day of analysis is generally discouraged.You typically would not want to see days of numbers.And that's why it defaults to the day before the day you're currently on.So that's that.Now you can also set up comparison dates.So if I click here, you can see it's the last 7 days compared to the previous 7 days before that.You can switch that around.There are lots of different ways to customize that and set up your date ranges.Whenever you're testing and looking at Goals and trying to figure stuff out, make sure you are always looking at apples to apple comparison.Make sure your date ranges are right.Typically when I work with the students and they have problems where they're trying to figure outwhy their Goals not reporting or why information is not looking right in Google Analytics.Often, it's because they're looking at a different date range and they didn't realize it.So always check your date ranges.You can see if I apply this it'll actually show you two different little line charts here.So we've got the two different graphs and we've got two different tables that are broken by the different date ranges now.So you can get some comparison to, sort of, see trending.This is a super important thing, obviously, when it comes to Google Analytics.So, I'm going to take this off for now.Keep it nice, a little simple.So that's our date widget.Got to make sure that you are very aware of that.I want you to be aware of the next feature, not an expert in, but be aware of.And you will see me use this.So, that's why I don't want to get too far into it.But, you can do segmentation.So segmentation is where you can, instead of looking at all of your data.Like in this case, this is every single page that all of your users are lighting up.So this is every single page that all of your users are lighting up.So now that you've got that, you can actually get some information from that, sort of, general trending.But, you can't really get specific information.For example, what pages are Facebook lighting up?Versus, maybe, your email traffic.Well, that's where you would create a segment.And you can say, "Oh, I want to see buyers that are male," I want to see traffic direct, "I want to see just my female buyers or female users.", in this case, that are coming through.So you can see all the different information that comes through.There's a lot of built-in systems.In this case, these are all the built-in ones.And then you can customize what you see here.So we can do some custom ones.And we'll show you all of these, as well, in future courses.So, you can take a look at that.But, I wanted you to be aware that segmentation exists and that you have the option of being able to segment certain bits of traffic and that's where it is.Up here, you will see, there is always a segment applied.Typically by default, it's going to be the All Users, which is everybody.And you'll see it's 100% of page views.So, if you're looking at your analytics somebody else's analytics and it doesn't quite look right and you're seeing a weirdness in the reports where that just doesn't seem right.Check and see if there is a segment applied.And if there is you'll see it, it'll say this only relates to...it's only showing me 30% of the page views.And you'll see things like that.Now the next thing I wanted to show you, I don't believe I'll be able to get this account to do it.Let's try, just for kicks.Let me go back and pull a ton of data here.So I'm going to go back a few years, pull up a ton.So now I'm going through a couple of years' worth of data and what we're looking at is this Pages where it shows this little green box.That's not going to do it, because it's Google and it's fine.But up here, you will see a sampling mark.What will happen is if you are being sampled, you will see it go yellow.It'll go a little orange/yellow.And that's basically saying, hey you've been sampled here.Now, in this case, this tells me everything that is recorded in Google servers is being reported to me.But that is not always the case.If you come up here and you see that this goes yellow or range you'll see that if you hover over it like I am now, instead of saying that it's based on 100% of sessions, it'll say something like, oh this is based on 13% of sessions or 47% of sessions.And you can adjust your sampling accordingly to get either a faster response, which means it might be sampled a little bit.Because it's going to pull out some of the data.In this case, it's not going to Google's demo account.Or greater precision, which means, I don't want to be sampled as much or try to avoid sampling if you possibly can.And so, it'll adjust that.But, just be aware that you can be sampled.Especially in the free Google Analytics accounts.Again, only if you got a ton of traffic going on, if you're looking at massive amounts of data, does that typically happen.But, it does happen.I want to make you aware of that.So if you're up here and you ever see a little orange shield or yellow shield, just hover over that and you'll see the details of how far you are being sampled.So we talked about dates, we talked about segments, and sampling.As we come down here, you'll see that we've got the explorer, this is always the typical sort of line graph.You can adjust that by dates, you can change the formats.Again, probably won't do that a ton.Most of the time, you're not looking at information that's in the graph itself.Sometimes it's just for trending, really quick answers if that's what you're looking for.Mostly you're coming into reports and you almost immediately scroll down and you dive into the tables.Because, you're trying to find information, very specific answers.