How To Set up Goals In Google Analytics To Track Conversions?

Everybody’s talking about goals in Google Analytics. So, what does it means?
If you don’t know, then don’t worry you will know here. In this guide, you will know what is a goal? How to set up goals in Google Analytics? And about all queries related to this topic.

But before deep diving into it, let’s know about Google Analytics.

Google Analytics is one of the most powerful tools on the web for tracking and understanding your website traffic and online success, but it has traditionally been difficult to understand. Recently though, Google introduced goal conversion tracking, which makes data gathering simpler than ever.

The key to understanding Google Analytics is that it’s all about goal conversion; everything you do on your site should be focused on increasing the number of conversions (e-commerce transactions, form submissions, etc.) that your site creates.

Goal conversion items can be found under Conversions> Goals> Overview in Google Analytics. But before heading toward Goal conversions, let us get into detail about what is Goal in Google Analytics?

What is a Goal in Google Analytics?

A goal is a way of tracking what you or your visitors do on your website. Goals are very simple to set up in Google Analytics and will help you find out where and when people interact with your site.

Conversion: The act of purchasing something from a website, performing an action at a website, interacting with content on the site, signing up for a newsletter, etc.

How to set up goals in Google Analytics?

Now the first thing which comes to mind is – how to set up goals in Google Analytics?
Generally, there are four kinds of goals, you’ll find in Google Analytics. They are Duration, Page screen per Session, Event, and lastly Destination. All of the above goals are “Page” based goals.

Duration: This is a type of goal that track visitors for a period, for example, minutes, hours, or days. You may also have a negative duration goal which will track visitors until they leave the site.

Page Screen per session: This type of goal tracks when users first arrive on your site as well as how long they stay there. It can also be used to track where users leave your site and enter other parts of your website.

People using Google Analytics will see these additional items in their reports and charts such as the bounce rate and view time charts.

Events: These goals track events that you have created for your site. Google Analytics has several types of events built-in, such as page views, button clicks, downloads, and video views. Use Event Tracking when you have a special type of goal that isn’t covered in the other types of goals.

Destination: This is a type of goal that tracks visitors to other websites. You can set these up so that they only track visitors who went to one specific address or any website within a list you specify.

How do I track my conversion data?

After setting up the goal in google analytics, it is needed to track conversion data using the Goal Value metric.

In the first stage, you need to set the goal value metric. Goal Value is a default metric that will show you the number of conversions or purchases that have been made per session or visit. You will find this metric in the Overview by clicking on Conversions> Goals> Goal Value.

After setting up goals, you can click on Link Sets and edit them as per your requirement to create custom segments. Then your conversion data can be tracked in the Summary report as well as various reports like Bounce Rate, Conversion Rate, etc.

Set conversion goals, track the conversion information, and analyze the data for better future planning.

Why Goals Are Important for Google Analytics?

Setting goals is a way of fulfilling what Google Analytics does best–tracking behavior and understanding how people interact with websites. All website owners want to know why their website is working so well or not as too well as they want.

Using goals will help you analyze whether your website is sending the right kind of traffic from different channels to convert your visitors into customers and make them buy from you.

Goals in Google Analytics are essential because they allow you to track the four most valuable things on a website: sales, user engagement, traffic acquisition, and customer loyalty.

How to build goal conversion tracking for your website?

Setting up goal conversion in Google Analytics is easy. All you need to do is follow these easy steps after signing in to the Google Analytics page.

Adding Goals in Google Analytics

• Go to the Admin section of your GA. On the property setting page, click on the desired view as shown below.
• Then, you will have a new section VIEW; click on the Goals> Add New Goal button.
• It will allow you to enter a name for your goal and select what type of goal setting you prefer from a drop-down list.
• Once you selected the preferred metric settings, click on the Save button as shown below.

Note: On the dashboard page, you may find 3 basic options to build goals.

• Goal template
• Custom goals
• Smart goals

To create via Goal Template

After you’ve completed the steps to establish a new goal (above), you’ll need to:

• Choose a Template from the drop-down menu.
• To continue setting up your objective, click Next step.

Goal templates are meant to assist you in creating actionable goals that align with your company’s objectives. Before saving a goal, you may make changes to any template field.

The wider corporate objectives that inspire the goal templates are the goal categories (Revenue, Acquisition, Inquiry, and Engagement). Use them to help you think about the purpose of your objectives as an organizational tool.

To gain a better idea of how consumers engage with your material, try to set at least one objective for each category. These categories have no bearing on your data or reports.

To create via custom goals

After completing the steps to establish a new objective (above), go to:

• Choose Custom from the drop-down menu.
• Select a goal Type after clicking Next step.
• To continue setting up your objective, click Next step once again.
• For additional information on creating custom objectives, see the Goal Types section below.

Create Smart Goals

Smart Goals do not require any further configuration. If your account fits the requirements, all you have to do now is choose Smart Goals from the goal Types list and name your goal (This is why they’re called “Smart Goals”).

Share goals

When you add a goal or edit one that’s already been added, you can share it with specific people. They will be able to view your archived reports and new goals from the shared goals page.

There are three ways to share a goal:

Using the “Share with” links in Google Analytics: Go to Admi> View> Goals, click on Settings for the desired goal, and then click on the Share With button.

Via email: Click the “Email settings” link.

Via CSV upload: From Reports> Goals sub-tab> Settings tab> CSV uploads tab, upload a CSV file of your list of users and their access privileges to the goal.

Import goals

If you want to import your goals into Google Analytics. Simply upload the CSV file of your users, selected access privileges and goal values to the Gmail-based library, and then select “Import my data” from the Library tab.

The last step is to enable the “Import my data” option in your account.

Note: If you have a large number of Goal Setups, use the CSV-upload option described above to import them all.

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Conclusion

Now you can easily set up your goals in Google Analytics. Google Analytics is one of the most powerful tools on the web for tracking and understanding your website traffic and online success, but it has traditionally been difficult to understand.

Generally, there are four kinds of goals, you’ll find in Google Analytics. They are Duration, Page screen per session, Event, and lastly Destination. All of the above goals are “Page” based goals.

With the goals, you can easily get insights about visitors to a particular website or business and you can also use this data to create a marketing strategy to target the audience.

I hope you’ve liked our article on how to set up goals in Google Analytics. In case we’ve missed something, feel free to contact us below in the comments section.

Frequently Asked Questions

What is a goal in Google Analytics?

A goal is a way of tracking what you or your visitors do on your website. Goals are very simple to set up in Google Analytics and will help you find out where and when people interact with your site.

Can anyone easily understand the data we get from Google Analytics?

Google Analytics is one of the most powerful tools on the web for tracking and understanding your website traffic and online success, but it has traditionally been difficult to understand. Recently, though, Google introduced goal conversion tracking, which makes data gathering simpler than ever.

What is Destination goal tracking?

With destination goal tracking, you can track how many times a visitor comes to a page of a website. You can only be utilized on ‘Thank you’ pages.