Some follow up remarks from the Google Analytics workshop held at the Netskills offices

Firstly, in answering questions raised during the workshop, it's useful to distinguish between the following.

1. Visitors flow report (AUDIENCE)
• Shows the accumulative visits through the web site.
• Nodes in the flow are paths (pageviews).
• Events not included.
• Deeper analysis possible by selecting any node and exploring different dimensions.
• Whole report can be generated for any segment of traffic.
2. Social visitors flow report (ACQUISITION > SOCIAL)
• Shows visitors flow report (as with 1) for all visitors from social media source.
3. Behavior flow report (BEHAVIOR)
• Shows visitors flow report (as with 1) but with different initial dimension breakdown (landing page).
4. Events flow report (BEHAVIOR > EVENTS)
• Shows accumulated flow of events over all visits.
• Nodes in the flow are events (custom tracked).
• Paths not included.
• Deeper analysis possible by selecting any node and exploring different dimensions.
• Whole report can be generated for any segment of traffic.
5. Funnel visualization (CONVERSIONS > GOALS)
• A particular path (pageview steps) defined for a goal.
• An event *cannot* be one of the steps (must be path).
• Option to include other paths that lead to conversion in funnel view or just specified path.
• Funnel report shows entrances and exits for each step.
• Report on numbers proceeding at each step until conversion reached at end of funnel.
6. Goal flow report (CONVERSIONS > GOALS)
• Shows the paths (pageviews) visited on the way to a conversion.
• Essentially a visit flow report with conversion as end point.
• The goal itself may be an event but events along the way cannot be viewed in goal path flow.
7. Top conversion paths (CONVERSIONS > MULTI-CHANNEL FUNNELS > TOP CONVERSION PATHS)
• Generally used with campaign data.
• Shows the different sequences of traffic sources used by visitors to reach conversion.
• Essentially shows repeat visits for same visitor via different campaign channel, direct, referral, and search sources.
• Funnel data not retained indefinitely—only up to 90 days prior to conversion.
8. Model comparison report (CONVERSIONS > ATTRIBUTION > MODEL COMPARISON TOOL)
• Range of comparative reports relating to conversion paths.
• Comparing relative importances of sources for first and last interactions etc.

Questions posed during workshop with promise of an answer

1. Can an event appear in a goal flow report or be used in a goal funnel?

It seems that there may only be two options for this and both require some tweaking of the tracking on relevant pages—either construct a series of events that lead to the goal and use the "events flow report" (4 above) to monitor, or track the event as a virtual page (i.e. track a page view when event occurs instead of, or as well as, an event) then that virtual page will be viewable in the "funnel visualization" (5 above) and "goal flow report" (6 above).

2. Can you monitor a single visitor's path through a web site?

In many ways this would be a nonsensical thing to do—visitors cannot be identified and the challenge is to observe what is happening with all visitors and make deductions and decisions accordingly. This is done using the "visitors flow report" (1 above) and variations of it (2 and 3 above).

3. Can you monitor visits to the site that have occurred from multiple source media in a campaign?

This is exactly what multichannel funnel conversion paths do (7 above). The conversions attribution comparison tool allows exploration of the relative importances of each source using a variety of comparative reports (8 above).

Comments welcome!