Building Blocks of Digital Attribution: How to get started with Google’s attribution tools

What are the key steps to getting started with marketing attribution? Are you ready to move beyond the “last click” attribution model? How can you use Google’s tools to better understand your customer’s journey and calculate the impact of your digital marketing channels?



To help answer these questions, we’ve put together a series of webinars on attribution:

• Attribution Insights from Google and Econsultancy (4/26/2012) – watch recording here
• Building Blocks of Digital Attribution (5/24/2012) – watch recording here
• Search Attribution: AdWords Search Funnels (6/20/2012) – watch recording here
• Multi-Channel Funnels: Attribution Across Channels (8/9/2012) – watch recording here
• Attribution Modeling for Digital Success (11/2/2012) – watch recording here

If you didn’t have a chance to catch last week’s webinar on Building Blocks of Digital Attribution, it’s a great place to start your attribution journey -- you can watch the recording above. During the webinar, Bill Kee, Product Manager for Attribution and Multi-Channel Measurement, discussed how to lay the foundation for digital attribution. First and foremost, it’s important to get your organization ready. In our work with customers and our recent attribution research, we’ve discovered that many companies try to pursue attribution before their culture or their data is ready. In the webinar, Bill describes the steps and the potential pitfalls to make sure your company is heading in the right direction.

Second, even if the organization has taken the necessary steps culturally, it’s challenging to find the right technology, and to ensure that technology is properly implemented.








We know that finding the right technology is a challenge, which is why Google offers several great attribution tools – including AdWords Search Funnels, Multi-Channel Funnels in Google Analytics, and Attribution Modeling in Google Analytics Premium. In order to get the most out of these tools, it’s important to ensure that the basics are set up correctly.  So, during the webinar, Bill also did a live demo of how to get started with AdWords Conversion Tracking and Google Analytics Goals. The setup is quick and easy – and once it’s in place, users can start accessing rich attribution data.

Naturally, we also received a lot of great questions from the webinar participants. We weren’t able to get to all of them during the webinar, so here are some responses and more pointers on getting started with attribution.







How do you define “digital attribution”?
Digital attribution is the process of assigning credit to the various online interactions your customer has before a “conversion” (conversion = making a purchase or performing some other valuable action on your site). These interactions could include display ads, paid or organic search results, email campaigns, affiliate coupon programs, social network posts, and other digital interactions. Today, many marketers by default use “last click” attribution, assigning all of the credit to the last interaction before a conversion. By understanding the full path to conversion – including early “upper funnel” touch points – and giving credit to all of those interactions, you’ll be able to budget more effectively and design better marketing campaigns.

What about attribution beyond digital channels?
Attribution is about improving the measurement of how ad spend drives conversions. To address this challenging topic, it’s important to consider all the factors that might affect conversions. These factors include the digital channels mentioned above, as well as how users interact with your brand across multiple devices, and the influence of online advertising on offline sales. This webinar series is focused on how to get the most out of digital attribution.

How do I know which interaction is the trigger for the actual conversion, out of the entire funnel?
The goal of attribution is to more accurately measure the impact of all your digital channels on sales, including how these channels interact in the path to conversion. This means acknowledging that, in most cases, there is no single “trigger” for the conversion, but rather a group of campaigns or touch points working together to help drive a conversion. So, a user might see a display ad which makes her start thinking about your product, then a few days later view an organic search result, then receive a targeted email, and finally buy your product. In this example the email was the last pre-conversion interaction, but all three interactions probably had an impact on your customer’s decision. Attribution is the process of deciding how much credit you want to give to each of those interactions.

How do I set up those tools you discussed during the webinar? Can you provide more detail for advanced setup needs?
Our help center provides very detailed information about how to get your AdWords and Analytics set up correctly, and responses to frequently asked questions. Check out our pages on:

• AdWords Conversion Tracking
• Google Analytics Goals
• Ecommerce Tracking
• Linking AdWords and Google Analytics

In addition, if you'd like more help, we recommend contacting one of our certified partners – they can assist you with all aspects of implementation, as well as with interpreting your results. You can also check out our AdWords user forum and our Google Analytics user forum to get answers to your questions.

Does adding all this code to my website affect the site speed at all?
If the code is installed correctly by following the directions outlined on our help center pages (see above for links), it should not impact your site speed, or have only a very tiny impact. Setting up goals and conversion tracking will provide much richer data on how users arrive at your site and whether they’re doing what you want them to do once they get there. With that knowledge, you’ll be able to improve your marketing programs and your website.

What are some sample use cases for “event” goals?
A goal or a conversion can be more than just a purchase. Indeed, you can define multiple “micro-conversions” that represent various actions that are important to your business. So, you might use event goals to keep track of when a PDF was downloaded, or when a user watched a video or played an audio clip. Each of these “events” could be tied to goals that are of value to you. You can find more detail about event tracking in this article on the Google Developers site.

Why do I need to set up conversion tracking and goals? Can’t Google Analytics track without conversions?
It is possible to see some useful information without conversions, but defining conversions helps you measure what's important, rather than just general behavior. Plus, after you have these conversion tools set up in Analytics and AdWords, you’ll be able to access Multi-Channel Funnels, Flow Visualization, and Conversion Reporting in Google Analytics, as well as Search Funnels and Conversion Optimizer in AdWords. It’s quick and easy to get started, and it’s much more useful to look at a user’s path if you know that they’ve reached your desired end point and performed an action that’s valuable to your business.

Marketing attribution is a complex but very rewarding process – we hope that these tools and webinars will help you to get started.

Happy analyzing, and hope you'll join us for the next webinar in the series!

Posted by Sara Jablon Moked, Product Marketing Manager for Conversion and Attribution

Two new Analytics webinars -- for advanced and beginning users

Interested in learning how to use Analytics to make better decisions for your business? Here’s your chance; join us next week for two webinars.  We’re partnering with the Learn with Google team to present an introductory session on Getting started with Analytics, and a more advanced session covering one of the most requested topics - Digital Attribution & Conversion. Here’s a little more detail on what we’ll cover:

Getting Started with Google Analytics
Level of content: Beginner
Covers the basics you need to get started with Analytics. Highlights the most helpful reports for ecommerce, bloggers/publishers, and lead generation businesses. Learn how to tag your campaigns and set up goals to measure if your marketing is a success.

Presenter: Justin Cutroni, Analytics Advocate
Date: Wednesday May 23rd, 2012
Time: 12 pm PT / 3pm ET / 8pm GMT

Building Blocks of Digital Attribution
Level of content: Intermediate/Advanced
Learn what marketing attribution is and what it can do for your business. This webinar will cover the basics of how attribution works, and we’ll show you how to set up your Google AdWords and Google Analytics accounts to enable important attribution tools--Search Funnels and Multi-Channel Funnels.

Presenter: Bill Kee, Product Manager, Google Analytics
Date: Thursday May 24th, 2012
Time: 9am PT / 12pm ET / 5pm GMT

These are free webinars, so be sure to register now and take a look here for more great webinars from other Google teams.

Posted by Ian Myszenski, Google Analytics team

Marketing Attribution: Questions and Answers

Last week, we hosted a webinar on marketing attribution. We had a lively discussion about our recent attribution whitepaper, and we looked at Google’s solutions for attribution -- including Search Funnels in AdWords and Multi-Channel Funnels in Google Analytics, and the Attribution Modeling Tool in Google Analytics Premium. During the webinar, many of you wrote in with great questions, and we’ve provided answers below to some of the top questions.

If you weren’t able to join us last week, you can view a recording of the webinar here.

Questions & Answers:
Q: How can I learn more about getting started with attribution using Google’s tools?
A:This webinar was the first in a series on attribution -- please watch the blog for updates and registration information for our next webinar, “Building Blocks of Digital Attribution.” In the meantime, read on for some more tips.

Q: Where can I learn more about setting up conversions?
A: Setting up conversion tracking in Google Analytics is one of the most valuable things you can do to make your reports actionable and meaningful, and getting these set up properly will allow you to use Google’s attribution solutions. There are resources available in the help center to help you set up goals and ecommerce tracking. You can also view the recording of our recent “Reaching your goals with Google Analytics” webinar.

Q: When should I use AdWords Search Funnels compared to Google Analytics Multi-Channel Funnels? 
A: Both tools can give you insight into how your customers ultimately end up converting on your site. If you are using AdWords Conversion Tracking today, Search Funnels is available without any additional configuration. You can see the interactions your customers have with your search ads leading up to conversion, including both clicks and impressions. However, you can only see these interactions for paid search on Google AdWords.

Multi-Channel Funnels in Google Analytics allows you to analyze traffic sources beyond search, including display, social, email, referrals, affiliates and more - putting your conversion path data in a broader context. Using these reports requires installing Google Analytics tracking code on your site, and setting up goals and/or ecommerce tracking (see links above) -- once these are set up, Multi-Channel Funnels reports work automatically. Note that you  are not able to analyze search ad impressions in Multi-Channel Funnels.

Watch this blog for updates on future webinars in our attribution series that will provide more details on Search Funnels and Multi-Channel Funnels.

Q: How much of an impact does the use of multiple devices have in skewing the numbers we see in these reports? 
A: Mobile and other devices are becoming increasingly important. Multi-Channel Funnels will report on conversion paths that take place on a single device, but not across devices. For example, if a user visited your site on a mobile phone, and then completed a purchase in a desktop browser, those interactions would not be included in the same conversion path.

Q: Can I report on both AdWords Keyword and Matched Search Queries in Google Analytics?
A: You have the option to view either the AdWords Keyword or the Matched Search Query by choosing these dimensions in the data table. Multi-Channel Funnels and Attribution Modeling support a wide range of AdWords and non-AdWords dimensions for reporting and creating attribution modeling rules.

Q: Can you add your own models to the Attribution Modeling Tool or they are all built in? 
A: You can create and save custom models in the Attribution Modeling Tool in Google Analytics Premium. Custom models allow you to create rules that adjust credit based on attributes like the traffic source (e.g. search vs. direct), position (first, middle, last) the level of engagement driven (time on site and page depth), and timing (how much time prior to conversion).

Q: How do advertisers take action on attribution data?
A: Attribution data can help advertisers identify marketing efforts that may be undervalued or overvalued under models such as the last click, so they can adjust their marketing programs. For example, a general keyword like “shoes” may show fewer conversions compared to a more specific, branded term for a type of shoe on a last click basis. However, applying a model that gives some credit for searches prior to the last click may show that “shoes” is credited with more conversion value. When making optimization decisions around which keywords to invest in or cut, advertisers can look at multiple models, and then experiment with investing in keywords that show higher value under alternative models. Similar methods apply to channels like display, social, email, and affiliates. This can help identify areas of opportunity that are missed when using only the last click.

Happy Analyzing!


Posted by Bill Kee, Product Manager for Attribution, Google Analytics team

Better results, (still) early adoption: Marketing attribution in a complex digital landscape

Today, we’re sharing some research on marketing attribution that we conducted in partnership with Econsultancy, a leading digital market research firm. The insights -- Marketing Attribution: Valuing the Customer Journey -- provide a snapshot of how marketers and agencies are conducting attribution, the impact it has, and the barriers holding them back.

If you’re not familiar with digital attribution, it’s about distributing credit to all of the elements of your digital marketing program, so you can gauge the impact of customer marketing interactions on your sales results and make more accurate investment decisions. Here are a few snippets from the report that we found interesting:

It’s still a new craft, but early results show positive impact
Although digital attribution is still relatively new -- 83% of practitioners we surveyed have been using it for less than 2 years -- it clearly has a positive impact on businesses that employ it. 72% agree that it leads to better budget allocations, 63% gained a better understanding of how digital channels work together, and 58% had clearer insights into their audience: 

Attribution leads to improved ROI, better budgeting

Last click attribution dominates; agencies are leading the way in experimentation
Most digital marketers run multiple campaigns, each with different strategies and objectives. For instance, display campaigns that are designed to generate awareness will have a different impact on sales than paid search campaigns designed to bring in buyers. Yet most marketers today still use attribution models that do not account for these differences in strategy. Although only 14% of respondents consider “last click” attribution to be “very effective,” it remains common; most likely because marketers haven't yet found or mastered the right attribution tools. Digital marketing agencies have done more with sophisticated attribution methods and technologies:



Robust attribution leads to confident digital decisions
For organizations that use attribution, it often leads to greater confidence in marketing choices: if you know the impact of your programs, it’s easier to budget for them. As one online retailer commented, “Attribution was the missing piece to our campaign analysis. Now we don’t run a campaign without learning something about how our marketing affects the buying cycle, and then testing to see whether it applies in the long run.”

Performing marketing attribution with Google
Here at Google we spend our time building intuitive tools to make measurement easier, so that you can really use your data to make smarter decisions. That’s why we provide several important tools for marketing attribution, including Search Funnels in AdWords and Multi-Channel Funnels in Google Analytics. And check out our Attribution Modeling tool in Google Analytics Premium, which includes five standard attribution models plus a custom model builder, so you can create and customize attribution models in minutes, and see data instantly. Learn more in our Attribution Playbook.

Join us for an Attribution Hangout
If you’re available this Friday, April 6, at 9:00am PDT, please join Bill Kee, Product Manager for Attribution, and Justin Cutroni, Analytics Advocate, for a Google+ Hangout. Bill will talk about the research and give a demo of the Attribution tool in Google Analytics Premium, as well as discussing Multi-Channel Funnels and AdWords Search Funnels, two complementary features.

To watch the Hangout on Air, tune into Justin’s Google+ Page on Friday. If you have a question that you would like us to discuss, please enter it in this this form -- and we’ll invite five of you to join the Hangout live to ask your questions.

We look forward to seeing you at the Hangout on Friday!

Posted by Sara Jablon Moked, Product Marketing Manager, Conversion and Attribution

Reaching Your Goals with Analytics: Webinar follow-up

At last Thursday’s webinar on Goals, we we explored one of the most fundamental analytics topics: how to translate your business objectives into measurable actions on your website. You sent in your questions, and we heard from many users that you want more guidance on turning all that data into insights.

Please read on for answers to your top questions, and watch the recording of the webinar here:

How do I do data analysis?

Performing data analysis requires understanding what your company defines as success before you can even start to figure out which reports and metrics to use. The best place to begin is to think about why you have a website, what you’re trying to achieve (lead generation, site engagement, sales, et cetera), and how those objectives map to specific metrics in Google Analytics. For example, if you  have an ecommerce website, you might want to track which types of users purchased and which types of users didn’t purchase. If you have a site with lots of content, you might want to understand where users came from before watching a video (e.g., were they referred by a blog post, or did they click on a paid search ad?), or you might be interested in how users moved through your site before getting to a certain page.

Once you’ve figured out your business objectives and defined your questions it’s all about finding those metrics in the reports. We have a lot of great 60-second YouTube videos that walk through different reporting and analysis techniques.

Why should I use Goals if I don’t have a product to sell?
You created your website with the hope that users would come and visit. Even if you aren’t selling anything, you can use Goals to help you dive deeper into your site performance and learn where your users might be having trouble. For example, you might want to ensure that visitors to your site are able to find directions to your physical location, or you might want to be sure that they view a particular piece of content on your site. You could set up a Goal for that page, and then use Goal Flow in the Flow Visualization tool to see how users get there. You might then determine that it's too hard for users to find the information that they need. The specific metrics that you should use will depend on the purpose and goals for your site.

Which types of Goals should I use?
There are four different Goal types to choose from in Google Analytics: URL destination, Time on Site, Pages per Visit, and Event. URL destination goals are best for goals based on a visit to a key page of your site, such as a “thank you” page after a purchase. Time-on-Site or Pages-per-Visit goals are best if you’re more interested in determining site engagement. Event goals should be used if you want to track specific actions such as watching a video, listening to an audio clip, or downloading a PDF. Note that the first three types of goals can be set up with no changes to your tracking code, but if you want to use Event goals, you’ll need to set up Event tracking. And don’t forget that if you’re an online retailer, or if your conversion process pulls in dynamic monetary values, Ecommerce in Google Analytics allows you to track transactions and the order value of every purchase made on your site.

What are good trends to measure for websites without a shopping cart?
A "conversion" isn't just a sale -- it's about all of the reasons why your site exists; it’s any action you want your visitors to take based on your business objectives. Analytics users often want to compare themselves to industry trends or best practices -- but the truth is that in many cases the best benchmark is your own website performance. You should define your own business goals, then develop some key performance indicators, or KPIs, and track them from month to month or quarter to quarter. It may also be helpful to set up simple surveys that ask your visitors if they’ve succeeded in finding the information that they were looking for on your site.

How do I set up Google Analytics for my site?
For some websites, all you need to do is copy and paste the standard JavaScript code to every page of your site -- Google Analytics will automatically generate this standard code for you, so it’s very easy to implement. Read more about this in our Help Center. Other sites, such as those that span multiple domains or subdomains, require additional lines of code. If you have this type of site, you should check out our documentation on all the different implementation scenarios. Use these guidelines with your webmaster to get the code implemented properly. If you need additional help, you should consider contacting one of our certified partners for advice and assistance with all aspects of Google Analytics.

What are Goal match types/settings?
There are three match types for URL destination goals: head match, exact match, and regular expression match. Exact match is used when you have a static URL (a page that does not change based on user actions) -- you can just enter the URL as it appears on your site and Google Analytics will track the goal. Head match is used if you have a URL that has dynamic values at the end, such as session IDs. Head match will record goals for whatever URL you enter into the interface -- plus anything that comes after that. Finally, regular expression match is used for completely dynamic URLs or to capture multiple URLs in one goal. Check out our Help Center article on setting up Goals to get more information about which match type is right for you.

How do we determine what goal value to set?
Goal value is what each action is worth to you. Ask yourself how much it’s worth to have someone sign up for your email newsletters, knowing they'll now get consistent messaging from your business. You may want to start with a larger objective that has a monetary value, like landing a big client, then map out the smaller steps leading up to that sale. For example, it may take an average of 25 lead forms filled out on your site to drive one sale. The value of a filled-out lead form would then be equal to an average sale divided by 25.  It may take some time to determine these attribution amounts, and you shouldn’t be afraid to adjust your Goals and Goal values periodically!

How do we test alternate landing pages?
Once you’ve set up Goals, you may discover that certain pieces of your funnel are losing lots of visitors. Small improvements to those pages could have a dramatic impact on your conversion rates. Fortunately, we have a great tool called Google Website Optimizer that allows you to test different variations of the same page so you can improve the effectiveness of your website and your return on investment.

What are the top 5 metrics to share with the CEO?
There aren’t really 5 golden metrics that will work for every single company and every single CEO. You’ll need to do some brainstorming and discovery to understand which metrics in Google Analytics map to your business objectives. Think about your business strategy -- for example, are you looking to reach customers who are on-the-go? Then it’s probably helpful to track the percentage of visits and conversions coming from mobile, so you can tell the CEO about the success of your mobile strategy. Do you want to make sure that you’re getting a good return on your marketing investments? Then you should consider tracking the percentage of conversions coming from advertising vs. other sources (this is a good place to use Multi-Channel Funnels!).

Although it may take some work to determine the relevant metrics, it’s worth the effort to ensure that you are presenting information that tells the right story about your business. Once you’ve defined your metrics, you can use Google Analytics dashboards to pull everything together in an easy-to-read format. So dive into the Google Analytics reports and find your story!

Please also check our help center for further details on all of your questions.


Posted by Sara Jablon Moked, Google Analytics team

How Google Analytics can help improve your online checkout

[The following is a follow-up post for a video (see above) that we made about websites that are difficult to use. Please watch, share and comment!]

Poor "nick4ever". All he wants to do is buy a loaf of bread from the supermarket, but the store's policies and procedures get in the way of him accomplishing this seemingly simple task! What appears to be a completely absurd situation is actually something that many online shoppers have to deal with on a regular basis. Some online stores have less-than-user-friendly steps that need to be completed for the customer to make a purchase. When visitors get frustrated, they leave the site and go find another place to make their purchase. Making it easy for your customers to complete a task on your site (like buying a product) is extremely important because, unlike in the real world, going to a competitor's shop is only a click away!

Imagine you are the manager of this brick-and-mortar supermarket and, as you are walking around the store, you see the scenario unfold that is depicted in this video. Hopefully, you would do something to fix this and make the shopping experience better for your customers. When managing an online shop, it isn't possible to walk around and observe your visitors to find out where they are running into trouble. Instead, you can use a free tool like Google Analytics to learn about where your customers are having problems using your site. Here are a few tips on how to set-up Google Analytics to get better visibility into where your site could be improved:

Improve customer retention in your checkout by using Goal Funnels

In Google Analytics, you can set up to 20 goals which are pages or events that represent a desired outcome from a customer's visit to your site. Goals can include actions like signing up to a newsletter, requesting a quote or making a purchase. If you have an online checkout, make sure to include the final confirmation (or "Thank You!") page as a goal page (as this is when an purchase has been completed.) When setting up a goal you can also include the steps or pages that the user has to progress through before arriving at the goal page. In the case of an online store, make sure that every page in the process is listed (e.g. "View Shopping Cart", "Select Delivery Option", "Enter Shipping Details", "Enter Payment Details".)

Once you have these goal funnels set up correctly, you can view the Funnel Visualization report which gives you an idea of how many visitors leave your checkout process at each step. Steps in the funnel that have a large dropout rate can indicate that visitors may be confused or frustrated with that particular page. Maybe there is new information (like a shipping charge) that scares them off? Or you are asking for information that they are unable or unwilling to provide? Is it possible that the page is just broken? You may want to investigate those pages with large drop-off rates to see if there is some way to make them easier for your customers to complete.

Reduce customer frustration by tracking errors with Event Tracking

In a process like a checkout, there are many ways that a visitor can experience a error message from a website. Incorrectly filling out a form field, forgetting to tick a box or taking too long are a few of the reasons why your checkout might raise an error to the visitor. Hopefully your error messages are clear and help your visitors correct their mistake, but is there something that you, as the site manager, can learn from them?

If possible, consider putting Google Analytics event tracking in the Javascript error handling code on your site. If correctly set-up, Google Analytics will count the number and types of errors that are shown to visitors. By looking at the Top Events report you can see which errors are experienced most often by visitors. Are these caused by confusion in what the form is asking for? Or is it from something like customers taking too long to complete a part of the checkout? Most importantly, is there anything you can do to reduce the chances of a customer running into these errors?

Ensure consistent customer experience across different browsers

There are a lot of different web browsers out there! When developing a web site, it can be difficult for your developers to test every bit of functionality on every single browser on every type of platform. This gets even more difficult when trying to take into account all of the different mobile browsers as well!

If you have a look at the Browser & OS report you can see which browsers your visitors use to access your site. This should give you a better idea of which browsers you should test on your site. To go even deeper, choose the option in the Browser & OS report to view how each browser contributes to total goal completions. If you switch between these two views, you should hopefully see similar pie charts where the percentage of visits from a particular browser is roughly the same as the percentage of orders for that browser. If 20% of your visitors use the Chrome browser, you would expect that about 20% of the orders placed would be from Chrome users. However, if you see, for instance, that 10% of your visitors use Safari, but 0% of orders come from a Safari browser, there may be a bug on your site that prevents users of that browser to finish placing an order. It might be useful to further investigate any browser incompatibilities that you discover.

As a website owner, you should strive to make your site as easy-to-use as possible for your customers. The data in Google Analytics and some of the tricks mentioned above can help you with this important job. Beyond this, there are several more tools like Site Speed Reports, Intelligence, Site Search and Google Website Optimizer which can help you further improve your site. If you need more help in setting up Google Analytics, consider working with one of our Google Analytics Certified Partners or purchasing Google Analytics Premium.

Posted by Clancy Childs, EMEA Manager for Google Analytics Premium

Join the GA team and Partners at GAUGE NYC

This is a guest post from Caleb Whitmore from Analytics Pros, a Google Analytics Certified Partner. Caleb is also the Chair of the Google Analytics Users' Great Event (GAUGE) conference. We hope you'll join the members of the GA team and GA Partners in New York for GAUGE.

The GAUGE Google Analytics User Conference in New York City is just around the corner on October 17th and 18th. It's not to late to grab a spot and and catch up on the latest and greatest with Google Analytics, learn from top experts on GA, and meet other users of the product and members of the Google Analytics team! More information and registration is at www.gaugecon.com. Use code GBLOG10 for a 10% registration discount.

Whether you're new to using Google Analytics or a veteran user with years of experience, there's always something new to learn about the product thanks to the rapid change of the Internet and the hard work of the Analytics team at Google to continually improve GA. So, how can you keep your knowledge of how Google Analytics works and what you can do with it? There's a great answer: Google Analytics User Conferences!

Attendees at GAUGE in San Francisco

I have the privilege of leading one such conference: GAUGE, or as we call it, the Google Analytics Users' Great Event. GAUGE is one of many flavors of Google Analytics User Conferences popping up all over the world, led by cohorts of Google Analytics Certified Partners. The New York GAUGE event is presented by: Analytics Pros, Blue State Digital, Cardinal Path, and E-Nor. This event is also co-located with Data Driven Business Week, which includes eMetrics, Conversion Conference, Predictive Analytics World, IMC, and Text Analytics World.

Our goal with GAUGE is to create an event that is by users, for users and insanely practical. I started GAUGE after going to one-too-many conferences where great ideas were presented but little practical "how-to do this with Google Analytics" guidance was given. The GAUGE in New York is a two-day event that includes:

• 24 hands-on sessions and workshops led by top Google Analytics experts
• Two keynote addresses: Mythbusting Google Analytics by Stephane Hamel and How to use GA data by Piyanka Jaine
• "What's New with Google Analytics" presented by Phil Mui of Google
• Q&A session with Google Analytics engineers
• Analytics Helpdesk where you can get direct consultation from a Google Analytics pro
• Exhibits from Google Analytics application developers
• Networking with Googlers and other GA users, and more!

Google Analytics blog readers can use code GBLOG10 for a 10% registration discount.  We also have a 15% discount for WAA members, a 25% discount for teams of 3 or more from the same company as well as a 50% discount for government and non-profit employees. You can contact gauge@analyticspros.com with registration questions.

If you're not able to attend GAUGE in New York, consider attending our San Francisco event in early 2012, or watch for other Google Analytics conferences and training events happening around the world (here's a page listing some recent/forthcoming events).

I hope to see you in New York or at another GAUGE event in the future!

Posted by Trevor Claiborne, Google Analytics team

Google Analytics Webinar: Getting started with Multi-Channel Funnels

A few weeks ago we launched Multi-Channel Funnels, a powerful tool to help you understand all the online interactions that lead your users to conversion. With five insightful reports, you can now measure the full conversion path, from first interaction to last click. More important, Multi-Channel Funnels provides actionable analysis about how your marketing channels work together, and answers key questions such as:

• How much time does the average user take between first interaction and conversion?
• How many interactions does it take to convert?
• Which of my marketing channels are “assisting” conversions and which are “closers”?

To help you get the most out of this tool, we’ve scheduled a webinar to walk through the new reports and go over common uses with Bill Kee, the Product Manager for Multi-Channel Funnels.

Title: Getting started with Multi-Channel Funnels

Date: October 11, 2011

Time: 10am PST

Register for the webinar

Have questions about Multi-Channel Funnels? Send them to us ahead of the webinar so we can make sure to answer them. You can also vote for the questions you want to see answered most. You can submit your questions on our Google Moderator page.

If you can't attend the webinar, please check the Google Analytics YouTube Channel for a recording about a week after the live event. You can also read more from the initial announcement of Multi-Channel Funnels and watch a video about the tool.

We hope that you will be able to participate!

Posted by Sara Jablon Moked, Product Marketing Manager, Google Analytics team

Summer time and the learning's easy!

Our Google Analytics Certified Partners (GACPs) are busy over the summer making sure Google Analytics and Website Optimizer users have plenty of opportunities to learn the basics, deep-dive the data, master the technical stuff and tune for conversions!

So if you're in need of some fast-track training, why not join them? Here's the June schedule for US and Europe:

Tue-Fri, June 14-17, 2011	Dallas, TX
Wed-Fri, Jun 22-24, 2011	San Diego, CA
Tue-Fri, June 28-July 1 2011	London, UK
Wed-Thur, July 6-7, 2011	Glassgow, Scotland
Tue-Thur July 12-14, 2011	Philadelphia, PA
Wed-Fri July 13-15, 2011	Boston MA

If these dates don’t work for you, see the complete Seminars for Success schedule.

This is what you’ll learn by attending a seminar with one of our GACPs:

Google Analytics 101 – Introduction & User Training

Whether you’re just getting started or have been involved with Google Analytics for a while, if you’re looking for a thorough training in all of the reports Google Analytics provides, this is the course for you. First, you’ll get a detailed background in the web analytics industry. Then you’ll go through a detailed examination of all of the reports Google Analytics has to offer, with real-world examples of how they can help you. You’ll also learn how to segment your site’s users, spot key trends, and of course, how to take your web analytics data and use it to your advantage.

Google Analytics 201 – Advanced Analysis Techniques

If you’re already familiar with the basics of Google Analytics and are looking to become more sophisticated in your analysis, this course will show you how to do just that. Whether your business goals are user engagement, lead generation, or e-commerce, you’ll benefit from learning how to use the most advanced analysis features of Google Analytics, like Intelligence and Advanced Segmentation.

Google Analytics 301 – Implementation & Advanced Topics

For those who are comfortable with Google Analytics but want to dive deeper into the technical side of GA, this advanced technical implementation course is for you. This training is tailored a bit more toward the tech-savvy, but is extremely valuable to anyone who wants to learn what Google Analytics can do when taken beyond the “plain vanilla” implementation. You’ll go “under the hood” of Google Analytics and learn about filter configuration and setup, opportunities for advanced, custom implementations, as well as the newest beta features that are rolling out.

Website Optimizer

Once you’ve nailed down your Google Analytics implementation, you’re ready to start taking action on your data by testing your website. This interactive training in Google Website Optimizer teaches you how to test your site to improve your users’ experience and your business’s bottom line. Attendees will receive a strong background in landing page testing and testing best practices, many real-world case studies, and an optional, hands-on lab experience in starting both A/B and Multivariate tests.

If you've been wanting to increase your knowledge on Google Analytics, Seminars are one of the best ways. Seminars are going on across the United States and Europe. If these days don't work for you check out the full seminar schedule.

Posted by Trevor Claiborne, Google Analytics Team

The True Value of Search advertising

We know that understanding search advertising and trying to measure its return on investment is not always easy. Marketers and business owners often find it difficult to quantify the indirect effect that online search is having on offline sales.

The AdWords Online Classroom has recently launched a free, on-demand market insights presentation, The True Value of Search, to help you understand the value of search marketing beyond direct response.

During this short video tutorial, we’ll introduce you to the ROPO effect (Research Online, Purchase Offline), latent conversion and how search is involved in the buyer's research and purchase journey. We’ll discuss search as part of the broader media and marketing mix as well as search for branding and how to integrate it with offline marketing. You’ll even see some real life examples of how search campaigns have driven offline sales.

So, if you’re interested in learning about how valuable search is for you, check out this course now!


Posted by Nathania Lozada, Inside AdWords crew