New: How to Track Page Load Speed in Google Analytics |
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I’m excited about the new Google Analytics interface, and not just because it is faster and looks shiny. The latest significant feature to be announced is the Site Speed Report (officially announced Wednesday), which gives us the ability to track page load time for every page on a website, and then analyze ... Read more
I’m excited about the new Google Analytics interface, and not just because it is faster and looks shiny. The latest significant feature to be announced is the Site Speed Report (officially announced Wednesday), which gives us the ability to track page load time for every page on a website, and then analyze load speed in great detail. Why Track Page Load Speed?
First of all, having a fast website can improve rankings, so improving slow pages can have an impact on your organic success. Site speed is an increasingly important ranking factor as Google continues to improve search results with websites that are more useful and user-friendly. Second, page load speed metrics (in sweet detailed, decimal form) can also be used to improve conversion rates and usability. Here are questions that Site Speed Reports will help you answer:
How to Turn on Site Speed Reports to Track Page Load Speed with Google Analytics:It’s really simple. Just locate the Google Analytics JavaScript snippet embedded in your HTML, and add this method just after the line containing the _trackPageview method: _trackPageLoadTime(); Here is an example in context (default asynchronous snippet): <script type=”text/javascript”>
var _gaq = _gaq || []; _gaq.push(['_setAccount', 'UA-XXXXX-X']); _gaq.push(['_trackPageview']); _gaq.push(['_trackPageLoadTime']); (function() { var ga = document.createElement(‘script’); ga.type = ‘text/javascript’; ga.async = true; ga.src = (‘https:’ == document.location.protocol ? ‘https://ssl’ : ‘http://www’) + ‘.google-analytics.com/ga.js’; var s = document.getElementsByTagName(‘script’)[0]; s.parentNode.insertBefore(ga, s); })(); </script> For more implementation instructions, or if you’re using a different snippet version than the example above, go ahead and refer to Google’s official Site Speed implementation guidelines. More Screenshots:Here are some more examples of the new Site Speed report in the wild. Go implement it on your site and have fun!
 Site Speed Dashboard
 Page Load Speed by Country
 Load Speed by Page Posted originally: 2011-05-06 11:33:22 |
