Google has recently made improvements to its Analytics program. There is now a new Analytics interface in place. The two biggest improvements that Google made was the ability to create multiple dashboards and the additional widgets.

With these improvements, Google Analytics allows you to now create up to twenty different custom dashboards for each of your profiles. One great use of this is to organize each of your website's traffic sources and separate them into their individual dashboards. This will allow you to be able to have a convenient overview of each traffic source's metrics such as total visits, bounce rates, and revenue. However, along with each separate dashboard for the different traffic sources, it is also still a good idea to have a dashboard designated for the metrics of all of the traffic sources combined so you can get an overview of how the entire campaign is performing.

The different widget options that Google has added to its' Analytics dashboard are a great way to give the user flexibility while creating each of your own dashboards. The first widget, Metric, allows users to see the value for a single metric. This widget also shows a sparkline and the percentage of the selected metric compared to the total over a selected period of time. Another metric, the Pie Chart, shows the user the breakdown for a single metric grouped by a maximum of six dimensions.

The metric of the Timeline only shows a graph for one or two metrics over the selected time period. The Table widget allows you to have a table with one or more dimensions compared to two metrics over the selected time period with a maximum of ten rows. You can take advantage of these widgets by using the different filter options available, and end up with a really clear, customized dashboard.

If you do no have any experience in Google Analytics tools please be aware that Blue Archer offers Google Analytics Training. This is a free service to all of our clients and to anyone who is potentially interested in Blue Archer's services.


Kerianne Lawlor
Internet Marketing Consultant
Blue Archer