News
Robyn Hardman, Digital Consultant
Google Analytics Gets Helpful New Features
Google Analytics has seen its first big update in a long time with the introduction of intelligent data search.
No matter what business you run, Google Analytics is an invaluable tool for learning more about the people who visit your website. However, it features a considerable amount of data, and it can be difficult to find exactly what you’re after.
In a recent update, Google added Analytics Intelligence – in other words, intelligent data search – to its arsenal. If you have a specific query in mind, simply ask the Intelligence function a question and it’ll collate the most relevant data. For example, if you wanted to know how many visitors you had in the last month, ask something like “How many people visited my site last month?” – it’ll then pull up the relevant information and a full, downloadable report.
Although the feature looks more ‘Ask Jeeves’ than AI on first glance, it’s fairly intuitive, allowing you to pull up more than just basic session data. You can ask more complex questions, like "How did the share of new users compare in January for Firefox vs Chrome?" or drill down really specifically into your user data, with questions such as “What percentage of sessions in the UK are from social?” The search also handily provides you with a few basic questions to get you started.
It’s worth noting that the feature will only improve if more and more people use it, so it’s time to get experimenting! Being able to get specialised reports without loads of extra hassle is fantastic news for any marketeer, but the search feature makes it even easier for website owners to look up simple data – that gets a thumbs-up from us.