Google Analytics Dimensions and Metrics: What You Need to Know

You’ve just set up your Google Analytics account and now what? 

Which dimensions should you pay attention to? And which metrics should you track?

Metrics and dimensions are the building blocks of Google Analytics, and once you understand them, you’ll be able to better segment, organize, and analyze your traffic data. 

Here’s what you need to know about Google Analytics dimensions and metrics,

What Are Google Analytics Dimensions?

Dimensions in Google Analytics are different attributes of your data that allow you to manage it more easily. When you use different dimensions to segment and categorize your data, you can measure more specific metrics and get more precise results.

For example, if you want to track the number of new website visitors in a month, you can look at this data through different categories - dimensions. Some examples are:

• City

• Gender

• Age range

• Source

• Device

• Browser

In Google Analytics, you have access to two types of dimensions: default ones, which are already available in the tool, and custom ones, that you can set up for your needs.

What Are Google Analytics Metrics?

Metrics refer to specific actions happening on your website. Some examples are:

• Number of new visitors

• Bounce rate

• Average session duration

Metrics can also be divided into different categories.

For example, if you want to know how successful your marketing strategy is at acquiring new leads and bringing traffic to your website, measure acquisition metrics, such as the number of unique visitors. 

Which Google Analytics Metrics Should You Track?

There’s no single correct answer to this question. Everyone has different marketing and sales goals and the metrics you’re going to measure depend on those goals.

Still, there are some metrics that most websites need to measure to determine how successful they are.

Here are some of them:

1. Number of visitors. This metric can show you if you need to change something in your marketing strategy to obtain more visits.

2. Conversion rate. How many website visitors have subscribed to your newsletter, signed up for a trial, or bought a product through your website? If the number is low, you may need to revisit your marketing strategy.

3. Average session duration. How long are people staying on your website? This metric can, for example, tell you more about the quality of your content.

4. Number of unique visitors from emails. If you’re using email marketing, you’ll want to know how successful your campaigns are.

5. Organic click-through rate. This metric may depend on where you’re ranked in the SERP, but it can give you valuable insight into your SEO efforts too. Do you need to optimize your meta descriptions or URLs?

6. Organic traffic. How many people find your website without you having to pay for ads?

7. Bounce rate. If too many visitors leave your website without taking any actions, like making a purchase or subscribing to your newsletter, you may need to make some changes in the content.

8. Sessions. This engagement metric shows you the volume of your website visits.

Know Your Numbers

You can’t really know if you’re a successful coach if you don’t know how many games your team has won or how many times they’ve scored.

The same goes for your website!

To learn what works and what doesn’t, you should determine your goals and track the right metrics.

Then you can make the necessary changes to boost your performance or simply keep up the great work if you’re happy with the results.