How to Set up a Campaign in Google Analytics

Since 2006, Google has offered a free service, called Google Analytics, aimed at tracking website activity. Analytics uses cookies to gather information on search engines, ads and search terms that drew people to your website. Like many of Google's services, Google Analytics is free. 57 percent of the top 10,000 websites used Google Analytic campaigns in 2010. It is aimed at marketers because they can use the statistical data available from Google Analytics to judge whether a marketing initiative was successful. You must sign up to use the service and integrate it into your own email, advertising and web campaigns. Read more to find out how to set up a campaign in Google Analytics.
Steps

1.Get to know your website. You will need to use Google Analytics by placing a tracking link correctly on your site, so you will need to have at least a small understanding of website and ad code. If you do not, ask your webmaster to help you set up your Google Analytics campaign.

2.Sign up for the Google Analytics service at google.com/analytics. Click the "Sign up Now" link under the "Access Analytics" button. Sign in using your Google account.

• If you do not already have a Google account to access Google Alerts, Documents or Gmail, then you can create a new account. Click the link in the upper right hand corner that says "Sign up for a new Google Account." Enter a username, password and personal information. Sign in anew to access Google Analytics.

3.Click "Sign up" to get started. Create an account name, enter your website and decide if you want to share data with Google. Complete the user agreement and click on the "Create Account" button.

4.Find the code on your main account page. Choose "Advanced" from the Standard, Advanced and Custom tabs.

5.Choose the type of campaign you would like to track on the top right corner of the Advanced Options box. You can choose "AdWords campaigns," "track online ad campaigns from other providers," or "My online campaigns from other providers use different tags than those used by Google Analytics."

• You should place the standard link on your website to begin tracking all clicks, if you have just created a Google account. You can see a general view of how people are accessing your website.

6.Create your URL tracking link for your marketing campaign according to Google Analytics template. You will need to change the following 5 variables to suit your campaign. For this example, a company called Soup My Way wants to set up a Google Analytics campaign for their next e-newsletter.

7.Go to the Analytics Help Center. Search for the "Tool: URL Builder" to help you build your first tracking codes.

• Enter your website URL in the first box.
• Enter the Campaign Source in the next box. This is the place where your clicks will be generated to your website. For example, this could be an e-newsletter, website or a search engine.
• Enter the Campaign Medium next. This is the type of ad or marketing campaign. Common types of media include emails, banners, cost-per-click. You can place "organic" in this box if you are not paying for this particular ad, such as search results on a search engine.
• Enter the Campaign Terms. This is the term that a person would type in to be directed to your site, such as search terms. This is an optional campaign term.
• Enter the Campaign Content. This box is used to distinguish between more than 1 version of an ad that is being tested. This is also optional.
• Enter the Campaign Name. This would be the marketing initiative you are starting, such as "October e-newsletter."

8.Click the "Generate URL" button. You should see a code to place in your new campaign.

9.Place the link inside your campaign. In the place where you would normally link your ad, text link or article to your web page, you will use this Google Analytics campaign instead. The user will still arrive at your site, but Analytics will gather the data along the way.

10.Start your marketing campaign. Sign into Google Analytics and select the Standard and Custom Reporting tabs to find out how successful your campaign is.

• Use the options on the left to search within your statistical information provided by Google Analytics.