How Does Google Analytics Work?
Google Analytics works by relying on a small bit of Javascript Code that is placed on your website This code is activated when visitors arrive on your site. It allows Google to record important information about your site so that you can better understand your site visitors and build your business.
The code that you place in your website will look at three main sources of data and information. It will use:
- First party cookies
- The HTTP request that the browser sends
- The browser and system information of the user
Through these data sources, the code will track certain information about the person visiting your website. It will help you understand everything from the geographic location of the user, the language in which they view your site, and the pages they visit on the website. The information that the Google tracking code collects will then be sent over to the Google Analytics servers 
to be displayed in the reports that you can view.
Google wants to help businesses thrive online because when the websites provide a solid user experience, it benefits the people who browse the site. This helps them feel satisfied with the results that they received from the search engine. In turn, this makes them more likely to visit the search engine again, which makes Google happy.
To help brands improve their websites and ability to engage customers, Google has created Google Analytics. When you place the Analytics code in your website, you have access to a free platform that provides in depth information regarding the behavior of your site visitors and what interests them.
These Analytics can help you make business decisions. You will get to see what customers engage with best on your website, what pages do not help customers, and where your site can improve. You can also take this information and integrate it into your BrightEdge platform account, helping you create an even more in depth analysis of your site performance. This information will make it easier for you to improve your site and therefore grow your business.
Integrate BrightEdge And Google Analytics
Is Google Analytics important?
Google Analytics offers brands a host of valuable information that can help you manage your digital presence. You can learn about the demographics of your site visitors - including their geographic location and language - how people engage with your site, including the bounce rate - how people arrive on your page, conversion rates, and even Google tracking attribution models to help you better understand the success of different parts of your buyer’s journey.
These data points can help brands make business decisions and keep their customers happy. For example, you can take the engagement rate of your page, including your bounce rate and conversion rates, to better understand how well your material engages visitors and addresses their needs. If you see a high bounce rate and low conversion rates, then you will want to go back and analyze how well this content aligns with the needs of these important buyer personas and what needs to be amended to better engage them.
Similarly, you can look at information regarding how people arrive on your page to see the impact of various marketing strategies, including social media versus organic SEO. When combined with the data from the BrightEdge platform regarding your keyword rankings and your position on the SERP, you can start to gain a more complete picture of how your SEO efforts directly impact the success of your site.
Using Google for attribution
You can also use Google Analytics to begin tracking attribution. Attribution attempts to calculate the impact of various marketing channels and efforts on the final revenue collected from a particular customer. Different attribution models weigh the different stages of the buyer’s journey differently. You will want to select the attribution model that makes the most sense for your business. For more information on the different attribution models, click here.
You can then use your attribution models to gain a better understanding of how customers move through your content as they progress closer to conversion, what material has the biggest impact on conversions, and your ROI. You can also calculate ROI for different marketing methods, which can help you clearly demonstrate the value of these different channels, in turn allowing you to advocate for more budget and investment.
Google Analytics will help you better understand what customers want to see from your site and how you can do a better job of answering those needs so that your site engagement grows and you see more success for your organization.
