Google Analytics Powerups and Smartcuts

Google Analytics:
Powerups and Smartcuts
@OptimiseOrDie @CharlesMeaden

Fix or Do These Things
and Get Much Smarter

© Optimal Visit 2d018© Optimise Or Die & Digital Nation Ltd.
INTRODUCTION
GET IN TOUCH!1.
Charles Meaden
@CharlesMeaden
bit.ly/2HeHAt6
Craig Sullivan
@OptimiseOrDie
linkd.in/pvrg14

WHY US THEN?
• 40 years working with Analytics
• Nearly 500 Analytics setups
• Most of them totally broken
• Mistakes are good!
• Failure is a part of analytics work
• Our pain is your gain

ABOUT THIS TALK:
• Solid, hard won advice
• Actionable insights
• Google Analytics tips
• Models, Templates, Reports
• Articles & further reading

Google Analytics Powerups and Smartcuts

CASES ARE REAL:
• We care about handling client data
• We can’t always show real data
• We will show you models or concepts

Powerups & Smartcuts
1. Inheritance Tax
2. Site Audits
3. Walkthroughs
4. Early Warning Hacks
5. Data Skew
6. Data Pollution
7. Data Enrichment
8. Data Models
9. Data Automation
10. Data Ownership
11. Training & Investment

10
When Taking Over An Account
Get the History!

@OptimiseOrDie
Analytics History
 You might be lucky – the analytics configuration might have notes!
 Always check the notes, talk to the team and discover the history
 Have tags been changed in the last 2 years?
 Has anyone updated the analytics?
 Who made the changes?
 What were the changes?
 Are there any plans to make more changes?
 Do any of these changes impact time periods used for analysis?
 Have you talked to the analytics owner and developers?
 Who owns the delivery and prioritisation of these changes?

“Out of the entire lifecycle of
analytics measurement, there is
only one place guaranteed to
pollute everywhere else and that’s
the data collection layer.”
Simo Ahava

“Bullshit data flows like raw
sewage up and through every layer
of an organisation, poisoning
everyone with bad decision
making.”
@OptimiseOrDie

@OptimiseOrDie
Bulls**t flows upwards!
Pastel Coloured Total Bullshit Google
Studio Dashboard
BS metrics
BS Collection
BS metrics
BS Collection
BS metrics
BS Collection
BS metrics
BS Collection
BS reports BS Reports

16
What’s the problem?
Data Collection is Broken for Most Companies
Thanks to
@Simoahava

480 client configurations
95% had high priority issues
100% had medium priority
3/480 had no tracking issues
<1% had solid analytics
Analysis of Site Audits
@OptimiseOrDie

@OptimiseOrDie
Even FREE tools are not FREE of effort:
• FREE simply means that you get a basic system
• It does not mean that it RUNS for free
• A car needs correct setup, oil, fuel and maintenance
• It doesn’t run on air and neither does analytics
• Investment in analytics is #1 weakness in my clients
• How can you race with others, if your dash is broken?
• How can measure self performance if it’s flawed?
• How can your team do their jobs, if they can’t measure too?

@OptimiseOrDie
Why is Google Analytics free?Wiring Analytics to Idiosyncratic Business Signals:

@OptimiseOrDie
Analytics Audit Resources
@OptimiseOrDie
THE GOOGLE ANALYTICS AUDIT CHECKLIST FROM DISTILLED:
Genuinely good and comprehensive list, resources, source articles, checklist:
https://www.distilled.net/resources/google-analytics-audit-checklist/
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1GnwB-jYnNJu18NwuZJzgarZAotXQ0kxXbZAIhI4H0IE/edit#gid=0
ANNIELYTICS CHECKLIST ($295)
https://www.annielytics.com/resources/annielytics-site-audit-checklist/
GOOGLE ANALYTICS HEALTH CHECK FROM CONVERSIONXL:
Some excellent stuff not included in any other articles - a good roundup, sources, expert checklists:
https://conversionxl.com/google-analytics-health-check
HOW TO SELF AUDIT YOUR GOOGLE ANALYTICS
A roundup of some useful things to audit but not a comprehensive checklist:
https://boazsasson.com/tracking-reporting/how-to-self-audit-your-google-analytics/
10 POINT CHECKLIST FOR A PERFECT GA SETUP:
Some good information mixed with some less helpful stuff:
http://supermetrics.com/blog/10-things-to-check-in-google-analytics-account/
GA CHECKLIST ON GOOGLE SHEETS:
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1pU9MpjjzxI-LLu45gPyGiHEpr_v-2rVpYuyNlPTXZ-I/edit#gid=0
GOOGLE ANALYTICS HEALTH CHECK:
Solid checklist and additional articles - although probably needs expanding to include the best of the rest here:
http://online-metrics.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/10/Google-Analytics-Health-Check.pdf
TWO BASIC CHECKLISTS:
https://www.dropbox.com/s/1f4w1vhpmzu938x/GoogleAnalyticsChecklist.pdf?dl=0
http://media.perpettersson.me/2017/02/GoogleAnalyticsImplementationChecklist.pdf

@OptimiseOrDie
Automating Audits at scale:
• Event Taxonomies
• Page Fragmentation (parameters)
• PII compliance
• Campaign Tracking
• Channel Configuration
• Custom Dimensions
• Page Crawling (tag checks)
• Abnormal bounce rates
• Goal & Filter checks (Management API)
• Bulk configuration updates

@OptimiseOrDie
Audit Summary
• Everyone has problems now AND you’ll surely add more later
• Audit regularly to avoid the flow of BS
• Screw up Collection – there’s no Free Time Machine
• Auditing requires more than just tech knowledge
• + Lenses of User Experience, Business Goals, Platform & Tech Capability
• Auditing is the easy bit – it’s what you do after that counts

@OptimiseOrDie
TIP – Push through the PAIN of Post Audit:
• We have 161 standard slides for our audits that we customise
• Scored by Impact, Ease of fix, Business outcomes
• We show clients how each thing shafts their data
• CRITICAL, HIGH, MEDIUM & LOW classifications
• Then the REAL work starts
• Takes MONTHS or YEARS to fix everything

@OptimiseOrDie
TIP – Push through the PAIN of Post Audit:
• So what stuff do we get done first, that helps the company most?
• Prioritisation for analytics stories!
• Get resource & planning mobilised, signed in blood
• Build a relationship with tech/dev
• Agree a release (testing) process with dev
• Parcel out prioritised work in ‘bite sized pieces’
• Celebrate every small achievement
• Psychology of managing the post audit period is critical!

“Walkthroughs are where we tear down the
frontend experience and GA configuration, to
understand the flow of data.
The Holy Trinity for us is Customer, Collection &
Configuration
- what does the customer see in the browser,
what tags fire when and why, how does that
data flow into GA. This is all.”
@OptimiseOrDie

@OptimiseOrDie
Data Collection & Tagging Tools
WASP Inspector:
• Use for general purpose GA tag inspection & debugging
• Find out what scripts are running in which order
• Great for core GA stuff
http://bit.ly/2qrYbRE
bit.ly/2qrYbRE

@OptimiseOrDie
Audit Walkthrough Tools
GTM/GA Debug
• Debugging datalayer and GA
• Simo’s fave extension
bit.ly/2KtuYzm
Data Slayer:
• Handy for debugging GA and event issues
• Find out what stuff is firing on the page
bit.ly/2pbNmPN
Data Layer Inspector:
• Inspect GA and GTM activity
• Hack and test data layer
bit.ly/2p0r5IN
Event Tracking Tracker:
• Dump of event data in table
• Handy for debugging GA and event issues
bit.ly/2pHAlRg

@OptimiseOrDie
What do we walk on the site? Everything!
Key interaction patterns:
 Searching, Category and List Pages
 Filters, Sort Controls
 Product Page elements
 Guest checkout
 Key landing pages & Journeys
 Registered checkout
 Logged in checkout
 Logged out and then logged in checkout
 Basket handling
 Content pages
 Quick view
 Basket page
 Checkout steps
 Failure and error states
 Email handling, more, more, more....

@OptimiseOrDie
Walkthrough: Inspection Parameters
1. What URL shows in the address bar when we do stuff?
2. What tags & data (pageviews, events, data layer) fire when we use the product?
3. Are there any timing delayed tags? Interaction tags? Scroll tags?
4. What parameters or options are firing with the tags?
5. Which GA properties are the tags sending data to?
6. Are there page templates which are similar or identical in the tagging setup?
7. Are pages consistent within one style of template?
8. Are event tags set to interactive or non-interactive?
9. What data is sent in any event tags? What’s the taxonomy?
10. What page and interaction data is actally being pushed to Google Analytics?

@OptimiseOrDie
Here’s one I made earlier…
AMAZING! I KNOW HOW THE SITE & DATA WORKS!
 Category Page /category/xxxx or /cat/xxxx
 Search /search?q=xxxx
 Product /product/xxxx
 Basket add /addtobasket
 Login /loginregister
 Guest flow /guestcheckout/address (then steps are the same)
 Registered flow /address (first time only)
 Delivery /deliveryoption
 Payment /paymentmethod
 Confirm /confirmorder
 Payment /payment
 Success /ordersuccess/xxxx

@OptimiseOrDie
The Holy Trinity of Walkthroughs
CUSTOMER Intersection of Product and Data
CONFIG Filters and Configuration inside GA setup
COLLECTION Tagging, Data Layer, Data Flow to GA

@OptimiseOrDie
Tip! User Explorer
• Run a walkthrough session
• Add a fake parameter (?piggle=diggle) or record the GA user ID
• Filter using a segment to catch it
• Check it’s your session, review
• Check the GA data lines up with your journey steps!

Setup Your Own ‘Menwith Hills’

Spotting The Algorithmic Bot
• Someone in IT deployed a bot that created random user journeys to ‘really
test the system’
• Accounted for 30% of all sessions
• What can you put into place to stop this?

4 Ways to Set Up your Early Warnings
• Use Google Analytics Custom Alerts
• Automate using the API
• Off the shelf tools such as Analytics Edge
or Super Metrics
• Dashboards in Google Data Studio

Early Warning Ideas
• Capture Page Load time for every page
using Simo Ahava’s Google Tag Manager
trick
• Adapt Craig’s 15 Minute Model to extract
data and compare against a running
average

55+ Google Analytics Custom Alerts
6 Essential Google Analytics Alerts for SEO Specialists & Web Agencies
Google Analytics Spreadsheet Add-on
Building visual reporting in Google Sheets
Tips and Resources

• Where your data in Google
Analytics correct, but needs to
cleaned and untangled, before
you perform any analysis
• Time taken to clean the data
means less time for analysis!
• People start to lose trust in the
data if you don’t fix this…
What is Skewed data then?

• When a user hops between subdomains in their user journey such as
blog.test.com and checkout.test.com
• You’ve got 2 or 3 separate sessions to try and stitch together
• Google Tag Manager makes it way easier than configuring GA!
Subdomain / Cross domain tracking not setup

• Will appear as the top referring site for
your all conversions and destroys your
campaign tracking
• Often appears when finance / IT add in a
new payment gateway or tool without
informing you
• The Referral Exclusion list allows you to
also add items such as dev servers and
other ‘breakers’
Payment Gateways and 3rd Party Redirects

• Misspelling and upper and lower cases cause
havoc
• Same issues can cause duplicates with page
names
• Google Analytics filters will save hours of
needless pain
• Fining your agency also really focuses minds
Misconfigured Campaign Tracking

• Most clients don’t have this working right
• Changes to the website and campaigns are not
reflected, stuff goes in the wrong bucket
• Channels and Content Groups can be customised to
your organisational way of working
• People looking at reports simply don’t realise that their
channel or content groupings are skewed
• Sit down and bucket your Source/Medium distribution
with the client –put everything in the right channel
(ask us how)
Misconfigured Channels and Content Groups

• Some are incredibly useful, others fragment
page data but aren’t actually used for anything!
• This regex ?|& will show you all the URL’s in
the All Pages that contain a query string
• Don’t remove all the query strings in one go –
check stuff that is needed!
• Do use the Exclude URL Query Parameters and
individual filters for specific query string
Query Strings

‘With ITP 2.1, all persistent client-side cookies, i.e. persistent
cookies created through document.cookie, are capped to
a seven day expiry’ – Webkit
• Affects EVERYONE using iPhones, iPads (also laptop Safari)
• EVERY tool you use that tries to look longer than 7 days?
• All the ‘Existing Visitors’ will look like ‘New Visitors’!
• It’s going to skew tools, AB testing, attribution – lots of stuff
• Ask your vendors for their response!
ITP 2 and Safari

Simo Ahava
ITP 2.1 and Web Analytics
Use Localstorage for Client ID Persistence
Maciej Zawadziński
Complete guide to ITP versions 1.0-2.2
Built Visible
What Intelligent Tracking Prevention (ITP) 2.1 means for digital analytics
Metric Theory
How to Use Google Analytics to Estimate the Impact of ITP 2.1
Digiday
WTF is Apple’s ITP 2.2 update?
Only the Best ITP Resources for you!
Cory Underwood
A Safari Intelligent Tracking Prevention Risk Analysis
Google’s Plan for Privacy
Mike King
Your Analytics Data Isn’t Real and it’s getting worse

• Basic Google Analytics Filters For Every Site
• Regexr Regular Expression Builder
• Ultimate Guide to Using Google Analytics Filters
• The Definitive Guide To Campaign Tagging in Google Analytics
• Google Analytics channels: Let's make them great again
• The Definitive Guide to Channels in Google Analytics
• Why you want to customise Google Analytics Channels
Data Skew – Tips & Resources

• Data contains extra shizzle that shouldn’t be there
• Either a 3rd party is doing this (bot/spam)
• Or you are doing it, (by not filtering stuff)
What is data pollution (vs. skew)?
• Invisible unless
you check
• Corrupts key site
metrics (e.g. CR,
Bounce Rate)
• “Help – our
conversion rate
is dropping!”

Our Conversion Rate is Dropping:
Prospects
Customer
Logins
Internal
Logins
Dev & Staging
Philippines
Data Pollution Example
Automated

Prospects
Customers
(trial &
paid)
Internal
& Partner
Dev &
Staging
This is how it REALLY should look:
Data Pollution Example
Bot, Spam,
Automated
Philippines

• Not filtering internal traffic (dev, staging, testing, agencies,
partners, employees, contractors)
• Bots, Spam (automated)
• External Site Performance Monitoring
• Internal Site Monitoring
• Scraping or Auditing
• Misconfigured tags
• Double firing tags
Common Data Pollution Sources:

@OptimiseOrDie
Tip! - Top Bot Detective Resources
Best Strategies for Dealing with Bot Traffic in GA
How to Block Spam & Bots from GA
Detecting Headerless Bot Traffic in GA
30+ Custom View Filters for GA
Is bot traffic costing you affiliate fees?
Some additional techniques for spam

@OptimiseOrDie
Tip! User Explorer
• Check the Session Distribution Report
• Set up an advanced segment
• Do you have users with lots of sessions?
• Filter to sessions > 200 (tweak accordingly)
• Examine the high repeat session users
• Is there anything odd about this traffic?
• Get useful clues from network, hostname,
bounce, browser, geo-IP, screen resolution
• Identify, Filter, Fix

59
Plug and Play Analytics?
Data quality isn’t acquired – it’s earned!
Thanks to
@Simoahava

• You will always need to tune Google Analytics to fit how your business,
product or service actually works
• Customising, tweaking and enhancing the vanilla Google Analytics
configuration = enriched data
• What can you do to capture more of the important interactions and
events as part of the user journey
Google Analytics – One Size Fits All

1. Visit Query Explorer and authenticate your
Google Analytics view
2. Get the total for your busiest month
• Subtract that from 10,000,000
• Divide the figure by the number of
sessions for that month
3. That’s how many additional events you can
fire into Google Analytics per session
Ten Million Hits A Month To Use

Analytics Data Enrichment

• Capture the important information shown to a user on a page
• The Datalayer and Google Tag Manager make it far easier to capture
information about a page and push it into Google Analytics
• You’ll still need developers to generate the Datalayer
• The data can then be stored in a custom dimension or in an event
Capturing Content About A Page

• Capturing how the user interacts with individual elements on the page is
incredibly useful for understanding user behaviour
• Organisations such as M&M Direct are capturing every click to build
‘Propensity to Purchase’ models
• Really important to build an event taxonomy that describes how people
interact with your site
Capturing Interactions on A Page

ACTION (VERB)
Clicks, Applies, Adds, Removes, Selects, Collapses, Expands, Views
CATEGORY (CONTEXT)
Navigation, Footer, Filters, Button, Promotion, Product, Basket, Search
LABEL (OBJECT)
Contact Us, Product ID, Sizefilter, List ID, www.crud.com, GBP
The Grammar of Event Tracking

Clicks Navigation About Us
Clicks Button Read More
Views Product 11234
Adds Basket 11234
Views Product 82641
Scrolls Content 50%
Clicks Promotion May001
Clicks Currency GBP
The Grammar of Event Tracking
Views List 11345
Applies Filter Size|12|black
Clicks Footer Terms and Conditions
Views Basket [contents]
Clicks IncreaseQty 11234
Clicks Button Checkout Now
Reaches Checkoutstep 1
Clicks Button Find Address
Action/Verb Category/Context Label/Object

Tip! – 500 characters lets you stuff values with separators
@CarmenMardiros
Stuff Attribute Data into Label

Building an Event Grammar – Alex Dean
The Lego Data Layer – Carmen Mardiros
Event Tracking and 10 Questions to Answer First – Paul Koks
Event Tracking in Google Analytics – Himanshu Sharma
13 Useful Custom Dimensions For Google Analytics – Simo Ahava
50+ Custom Dimensions in Google Analytics – Martijn Scheijbeler
Tracking Multiple Categories for Content Pages – Allaedin Ezzedin
Tips and Resources

@OptimiseOrDie
s zn+1 = zn
2 + c
Every Client has Gearing:

@OptimiseOrDie
Favourite Models of the Masters
A. 15 minute Device Model
B. Bounce Layer Analysis
C. Horizontal Funnel
D. Segmented Funnel
E. Page Group Yield
F. Intent Model
G. Landing & Next Page Paths
H. Top of Funnel Drivers
I. Flow Report Hacking
J. Multi Goal Groups
K. Temporal or Lifecycle
L. Ecommerce Grid
M. Dimensional Funnel

@OptimiseOrDie
30 minutes to save £80M+ in conversion:
bit.ly/DeviceModel15

Page Yield Group % traffic User CR # Sales % revenue
List / Grid 44.33% 0.24% 7547 27.6%
Product Page 15.19% 0.12% 1293 4.7%
Homepage 13.49% 0.82% 7848 28.7%
Brand 9.75% 1.28% 8851 32.3%
Category 4.51% 0.31% 991 3.6%
Blog 4.00% 0.21% 596 2.2%
• Why does product page conversion suck so much?
• Touch devices (Mobile & Tablet) impacted
• Now 7x Conversion – added 30% to revenue
• 40% of traffic to these pages was PPC, D’oh!
Landing Page Group Model:

@OptimiseOrDie
All traffic
HearingSight
StoreOther
Step 1
Step 2
Step 3
Goal
Page PageHearing
Intent – Landing Page Groups

@OptimiseOrDie
All traffic
HearingSight
StoreOther
Contact form
Interact
Submit
Goal
Store
Intent Modelling – Stores:
Phone
Answers
Goal
Visit
Promo
viewed /
printed
Store
visit

• Funnel head gets 94% from
ONLY 3 pages
• There are 3 types of PPC
template being used
• So 6 pages account for 94%
• Simples! - to increase funnel
flow, link more funnel head
drivers or increase CR of other
pages to the funnel head!
• Increase head drivers
• Experiment with templates
Funnel Head Drivers:

Funnel success
Funnel Step 2
Funnel Step 1
Sales
Ecommerce
Behaviour
@OptimiseOrDie
Traffic
Automated funnels for:
• New & Returning
• Analytics Channels
• Country
• Customer Type
• Mobile, Tablet, Desktop
• iPhone Model
• Windows OS
• Mac OS
• Browser & Version
• In app or Native Browser
• Screen Resolution
• Landing page(s)
• Content page(s) viewed
• Demographics
• Days to conversion
• Path Length
Dimension Grid Pull

@OptimiseOrDie
Why are Segmented Grids useful?
• Segments on speed!
• Quick to scan
• Shows up oddities in:
• Landing & Bounce
• Site Depth Engagement
• Funnel Losses
• UX Issues
• Bugs & Broken stuff
• This one grid cube on the left
started 1 hour of work that
fixed an 800K loss per month!
Try app.profitgrid.io

@OptimiseOrDie
Tip! Sketch with paper first:

• If you need to run a report more than once
• If it involves multiple steps and clicks
• If it takes longer than 2 minutes
• AUTOMATE IT
• You’ll get to the data quicker
• More time left over to actually do thinking and analysis!
• Write once, use multiple times
When and Why Should You Automate

• 15 3 minute Device Model
• Bounce Layer Analysis
• Site Speed DOM Timings
• Most navigated to pages
• Locating personally identifiable information (PII)
• Exporting and finding query strings
• Grouping device screen heights
• Classifying search terms from internal search
• Building user based funnels
• Building categories from URLs using regex patterns
Charles and Craig Most Frequently Used

@OptimiseOrDie
Automated Ecommerce Models
A. Customer Segmentation
B. New vs. Existing customer
C. Basket analysis (various)
D. Returns analysis
E. Site Search analysis
F. Boston Grid Quadrant
G. Profit Analysis
H. Yield Analysis
I. Product Interaction Layer analysis
J. Out of stock analysis
K. First purchase / anchors
L. Discount impact model
M. Cart abandonment analysis
N. Live chat or textual analysis
O. Merchandising reporting (various)

• Excel plugins such as Analytics Edge or Supermetrics for Excel allow you
to access the Google Analytics API directly with no need to program the
queries
• The Google Analytics Spreadsheet Add-on takea data directly into Google
Sheets
• Analytics 360 users can export directly to Big Query
• Data Studio reports will automatically update from Google Analytics
• Email reports from Google Analytics
How do I automate stuff?

@OptimiseOrDie
Automating Models and Data Integration:
Dimensions, Metrics, Query Explorer:
Very useful for forming queries and getting to know the API:
https://developers.google.com/analytics/devguides/reporting/core/dimsmets
https://ga-dev-tools.appspot.com/query-explorer/
Guide to getting started with the API:
https://www.optimizesmart.com/how-to-use-google-analytics-api-without-any-coding/
Free Google Sheets Addon:
Google Sheets Addon:
https://developers.google.com/analytics/solutions/google-analytics-spreadsheet-add-on

@OptimiseOrDie
Automating Google Sheets:
https://medium.com/@jev/how-to-import-data-from-google-analytics-into-google-sheets-with-
google-apps-script-5174a10b24d8
ProfitGrid:
Simple tool to pull a multi-dimensional grid from any GA setup:
http://app.profitgrid.io
Analytics Edge:
Very flexible excel tool for pulling API data. Free version available. Bristling with options:
http://www.analyticsedge.com/simply-free/
Supermetrics:
Free GA plugin for Excel and Google Sheets. Multiple data sources available:
https://supermetrics.com/product/supermetrics-data-grabber/
https://supermetrics.com/product/supermetrics-for-google-drive/

@OptimiseOrDie
PowerBI:
Allows you to pull GA data directly - was PowerPivot. If you want a multi-dimensional API pulled
horizontal funnel you can segment on-the-fly, this is what you need. A very powerful way of
viewing and pivoting cubes of GA data:
https://powerpivotpro.com/get-the-software/
Next Analytics:
Free and paid options available:
https://www.nextanalytics.com/excel-google-analytics/
Analytics Canvas
Integration, extracts, multiple accounts, automation and scripting. Paid only.
http://analyticscanvas.com/google-analytics/
Scitylana:
Integration, Hit level datastream, Extracts. Free option available.
https://www.scitylana.com/

@OptimiseOrDie
Integrating GA with R:
http://code.markedmondson.me/googleAnalyticsR/
http://cran.r-project.org/web/packages/RGoogleAnalytics/
https://github.com/skardhamar/rga
http://cran.r-project.org/web/packages/RGA/index.html
R for Analysts:
http://www.eanalytica.com/r-for-web-analysts/
Simo Ahava Recommends:
"I wrote these two a while ago. First is for validating a GA account setup, with focus on
Custom Dims too, and the second is for mass updating Custom Dimensions"
https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/google-analytics-
validato/nmjiiaaejkhpegmcpfaehmbijgoilimo?utm_source=permalink
https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/google-analytics-custom-
d/ogcaloflfbimfnpkkfpfddocaegdmgkk?utm_source=permalink

Monthly reports which lack relevance, are rife with generic suggestions unsupported by research
within the context of your business and simply regurgitate last month’s points, failing to show
any new actionable data.
Thanks to
@Simoahava

Ugly and ineffective hacks to get tracking working at the last minute.
A lack of coordination or standards for how business critical tracking should be delivered. No
data layer or cross silo approach.
Thanks to
@Simoahava

Analytics changes are given low priority and deployed infrequently
Fix Funnel
Tracking
Thanks to
@Simoahava
Deploy
new
funnel

Analytics tracking is often ‘added later’ or seen as a ‘Bolt On’ to existing project work because
ownership is unevenly distributed!

How to Integrate Analytics & Agile
Agile Analytics:
www.youtube.com/watch?v=yIJp9s46CF8
Meaningful Data:
www.youtube.com/watch?v=rMrB0bKdOtc

 Data Ownership
 Weak ownership kills data outcomes
 If your data is not there, late or crap, this is why
 Watch the Simo talks on Agile Integration
 It isn’t ‘Done’ unless Data’s there

“This is a huge weakness for many of my
clients. Few companies validate if the
analytics tools and skills people are given,
actually allow them to do their jobs quickly
and proficiently.”
Craig Sullivan

@OptimiseOrDie
Train Your Team so they….
• Can be better at their job, through data
• Know how everything works in analytics
• Get data out with less work
• Achieve self servicing for data needs
• Automate repetitive tasks
• Get more proficient at finding value
• Become happier and less bored!
A Ferrari mechanic without engine training?

@OptimiseOrDie
Invest in Analytics
Even if tools are free, you should:
• Get an Independent Audit
• Invest in a proper release architecture (QA/DEV/STAGING)
• Make tracking part of every project
• Don’t just tread water – improve tracking
• Put >5% of dev & analytics budget on ENHANCING
• Things like -> Data Collection, Team Training, Fixing Stuff,
Automation, Enrichment, Tracking Tools
• It’s like writing a love note to yourself…

@OptimiseOrDie
Write a Love Note to your Future Self:
Hey Craig,
All we are is dust in the wind dude. You’re like my future self, so I had
to tell you. I thought it would be most excellent to give you clean
data, so I fixed it, like all the things.
You’ve got like at least 3 months of clean data man and like all the
reports and stuff totally makes sense now! Whoa!
Love you, Dude!
Craig from the Past, Dude

@OptimiseOrDie
Invest in Tech & Dev
Don’t forget investing in the relationship with tech:
• Build a direct relationship with dev & tech teams
• Educate them on the outcomes and positives you seek
• Educate yourself on how dev, platform & release cycle works
• HELP THEM to deliver analytics reliably without extra work
• Help to SOLVE PROBLEMS, s**t will get done
Examples:
• Give code changes directly to dev (not via marketing)
• 5 minute video explanation of the data layer
• Integrate the dev staging environment with the GA staging view

480 client configurations
95% had high priority issues
100% had medium priority
3/480 had no tracking issues
<1% had solid analytics
The Dark Side
@OptimiseOrDie

The Sunny Uplands:

@OptimiseOrDie
Collection Skew Pollution Enrichment
Modelling
&
Noodling
Automation Ownership
Invest
&
Train
OUR PATH TO ANALYTICS SUCCESS:

THANK YOU!
• WRITE THAT LOVE NOTE!
• WANT AN AUDIT?
• SKILLS TRANSFER?
CHARLES bit.ly/2HeHAt6
CRAIG linkd.in/pvrg14Optimising the
Optimisation
@OptimiseOrDie
@CharlesMeaden
SLIDES bit.ly/PowSmc

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