{"id":47910,"date":"2022-08-17T07:00:03","date_gmt":"2022-08-17T14:00:03","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/eigene-homepage-erstellen.net\/?p=47910"},"modified":"2022-09-01T17:32:00","modified_gmt":"2022-09-02T00:32:00","slug":"what-goals-should-i-be-tracking-in-my-analytics-tool","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/eigene-homepage-erstellen.net\/blog\/analytics\/what-goals-should-i-be-tracking-in-my-analytics-tool.htm","title":{"rendered":"What Goals Should I Be Tracking in Google Analytics?"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Updated on 8\/17\/22 to include Google Analytics 4 content.<\/em><\/p>\n

What comes to mind when you think of the word “goal”? <\/span><\/p>\n

Most people, myself included, think of <\/span>personal<\/span><\/i> goals or ambitions for their own life: obtaining a master’s degree, running a marathon, or traveling to every continent. <\/span><\/p>\n

Others think of <\/span>business<\/span><\/i> goals: reaching an annual sales target, launching a new product or service, or expanding from selling in local to global markets. <\/span>Analytics <\/span><\/i>goals are different, although they can help measure and track progress toward your business goals. <\/span><\/p>\n

In this post, we’ll untangle the definition of goals and help you understand what to configure as a goal in your analytics platform. We’ll use Google Analytics (Universal Analytics and Google Analytics 4) as an example today, but you can configure similar goals in most analytics tools. <\/span><\/p>\n

We will use the term “goal” to include GA4’s “conversions” since “conversions” are meant to replace “goals” in the latest Google Analytics product. <\/span><\/p>\n

How Do Analytics Goals Differ From Business Goals?<\/h2>\n

To tease out a proper distinction between an analytics goal and a business goal, we need to understand how it’s defined in the platform you work in. Google Analytics defines a goal<\/a> as:<\/p>\n

\n

…a completed activity, called a conversion, that contributes to the success of your business.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

Since Google Analytics primarily tracks websites and apps, the implication is that the “completed activities” they mention as goals are <\/span>online<\/span><\/i> activities. Whereas business goals can (and do) often include offline measures that are impossible for a user of your website or app to accomplish.<\/span><\/p>\n

Naturally, there’s a lot of overlap in analytics goals and business goals for companies that do a large percentage of their sales online, like e-commerce retailers or gaming app developers.<\/span><\/p>\n

And for companies that do a large percentage of sales offline, it’s also possible to <\/span>connect CRM systems to web analytics platforms<\/span><\/a> and better understand how those offline sales goals are influenced by online marketing.<\/span><\/p>\n

Generally speaking, <\/span>some<\/span><\/i> analytics goals can be business goals, but most analytics goals are online behaviors at least a few degrees of separation from your offline business goals.<\/span><\/p>\n

How Do You Configure an Analytics Goal?<\/h2>\n

Now that we’ve made the distinction between an analytics goal and a business goal let’s look at how to <\/span>configure a goal in Google Analytics<\/span><\/a>. There are several ways to do this, but the three most popular ways are: <\/span><\/p>\n