Spent the morning yesterday giving a 1:1 workshop on Google Analytics to a client. Having looked at the new version a couple of times, locating various functions via the new interface took some time, however we got there in the end. Whilst browsing through I came across the Page Speed section in the Page Content dropdown. On more investigation the tools now gives you the ability to look at the speed it takes to load a page.
With the announcements some time ago with the inclusion of Site Load Speed in the Google Algorithm is it no big surprise that they’ve started to include this as a metric, encouraging the user to review and identify where the usability of the site may be having an effect upon the end user experience.
To get page speed working in analytics you have to make a small modification to the Google Analytics tracking code. The tracking works with both the asynchronous version and the previous version of the tracking code.
To identify which tracking code your working with review the source code of the page and locate the tracking code section from Google.
To add site speed in you add the following line to the Google code:
_gaq.push(['_trackPageLoadTime']); |
It will then look something like this….
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or with the old version of the Google Tracking Code……
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Analytics provides a good overview page for you to find out more information on this part of the Analytics Toolset.
If your interested in learning more about Google Analytics. I deliver courses for the National B2B Centre on Google Analytics and other topics. Review their workshop training schedule for more information or contact me direct at the p-tech ltd website to see about a dedicated 1:1 training session.
