Friday, March 1, 2013

How to Track Outbound Links using Google Analytics

Outbound links or external links are such links, which is generally a hyperlink that  points to another website on internet,  and  Google  analytics  refers  to a service provided  by  Google  thatcreate  detailed analyses andstatistics  about a  websites’  traffic, traffic sources and keeps tabs on  conversions and sales. The useful way to categorize  outbound  links  is   to  categorize  tracking
reports.  With  this  structure in place, it could then see that Outbound Links as one of the event categories and drill down  to  see  which  particular outbound links are the most popular. It  must be made sure to make use of the onClick handler’s return false. Without this statement, the browser will continue to follow the link previous to the record OutboundLink method even gets a chance to execute. Google analytics allows tracking the external links on websites. Links to internal pages are automatically tracked however JavaScript code can be added to links that points to pages outside. There various types of methods in Google Analytics to track any kind of outbound links. The methods are as follows.

Outbound+Links+using+Google+Analytics

* _trackPageview method: This is a JavaScript application results in creation a fake
   view of a website and helps to track the outbound links or generally download links.
   This _trackPageview attribute is generally typed inside <> tags and will look like
   onClick="JavaScript: pageTracker._trackPageview(’/example/some-blue-link’). This /
   example/some-blue-link which will become a new page view. It will be tracked in GA as
   a completely new page view which will increase the page view count.

* UTM method: The method of UTM tells the GA what the campaign’s name is (you name
   the campaign), the source of the campaign (normally something alike Google), and the
   intermediate (in general something alike PPC) – along with a several other alternativess.
   This method is most commonly used for tracking PPC campaign, and external campaigns
   like email campaigns, that link back to site. If you want to tag the links you create with
   utm, it will erase all of the information from references and if someone is arrived at
   the site via Google’s organic search then internal link is clicked having utm tag and thus
   looses the insight from where the visitor originally came. Instead the new source will
   be displayed which was entered manually. If the organizer wants to known about the
   visitor a tracking of link on webpage is done using _trackPageview method.

   1. Pages are opened with the links in webpage editing software.
   2. In the A HREF tag, add this JavaScript onClick="JavaScript:
           pageTracker._trackPageview('/example/some-link.com');" just edit the part in the
           parentheses to the location listed in report of tracking. Hence, after you add the
           onclick event, the link will possibly look like this: internet" onClick="JavaScript:
           pageTracker._trackPageview('/some/where/on/internet');">Check this</a>
   3. The file is saved and uploaded to webpage

   4. Then the whole process is checked by logging into Google after a day or few days
          later. The links will b appearing as “Top content” report. The links added tracking
           code should now appear in report.

It is very easy to track an out bounded link by Google analytics and will be done in
above mentioned way. Everybody could try it out for his or her security purposes.

Author:
More info about seo and web design. Please check it BlueHost reviews.
If you would like to write for bloggertrix, check our guest posting guidelines

1 comment:

  1. Nice Article Keep it Up Dude Share Articles Like This Its Really Awesome And Helpfull

    ReplyDelete