Google Analytics Annotations
Google Analytics introduced a small but very dynamic feature called “Annotations” that is tremendously useful both to analysts as well as executives, who are usually not up to date on granular details about website activity.
This newly launched “annotations” feature enables you to annotate and bookmark major campaigns, ebbs & flows in the graphs regarding events that happened on specific days within your statistics for future reference. This will help to explain a spike or drop in traffic to other members within your organization, without having to dig through the past, thereby saving tons of time.
This is a great feature which will end up saving many people a lot of time. The concept here is that there can be real collaboration between those who put together campaigns and those who see the analytics without that important data. Rather than going through old emails to analyze the traffic surge, or shopping cart conversion increased, users can bookmark this event when it happens for future reference. This will sure make end of month reporting a lot quicker!
An easy annotation that outlines a “cause and effect” for the data consumer can save a lot of time and trouble. Annotations complement existing anomaly detection by capturing the tribal intelligence of your company, which tends to be the most expensive and easily lost resource of all. A simple note from a colleague can save hours of real work (and frustration) for an analyst who is tasked to explain a usually dry set of numbers. This short video will show you how to use Annotations.
Another advantage is that different members within your company can instantly see the results of other teams’ actions. In other words, annotations can be created by anyone involved with the production and promotion of a website for everyone else to see.
- The PPC team can announce major changes to their campaigns.
- The SEO team can annotate changes to the website so that results can be tracked over time.
- The PR team can update dates of events, enabling the tracking of offline activities into Google Analytics more easily.
- The media buying team can provide updates of major banner campaigns.
This should help encourage teamwork, as everyone involved will be able to grasp the whole picture and coordinate activities with other teams’ activities. Google has started rolling out this feature and has indicated it should be live for all users mid January!
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