How Google Analytics Tracking Code Works

How the Tracking Code Works

In general, the Google Analytics Tracking Code (GATC) retrieves web page data as follows:

1. A browser requests a web page that contains the tracking code.
   
2. A JavaScript Array named _gaq is created and tracking commands are pushed onto the array.
3. A <script> element is created and enabled for asynchronous loading (loading in the background).
4. The ga.js tracking code is fetched, with the appropriate protocol automatically detected. Once the code is fetched and loaded, the commands on the _gaq array are executed and the array is transformed into a tracking object. Subsequent tracking calls are made directly to Google Analytics.
5. Loads the script element to the DOM.
6. After the tracking code collects data, the GIF request is sent to the Analytics database for logging and post-processing.

Different PPC Competitors Tools Analysis Strategy

I have used keyword spy for a while now, but also use SEM Rush and Spyfu in the past. They all work under the same principal when it comes to PPC. In this particular instance I suspected that we spend more money on a segment of the business than others, but the actual “baseline” in these tools contradict my gut check.

I am comfortable enough with my gut check to challenge that baseline, so I started down a path of figuring out why my assumption is wrong. I would rather start off defeating my own thought with data before going down rabbit holes.

So here is what I did:

• Go to one of these tools, look for your own domain info and look at what they say you daily ad budget is.
• Copy that daily ad budget and multiply it by 30 (this is what the tool says your monthly spend is)
• Go to adwords and choose the last 30 days (if you have a huge up and down on spend, get a longer time frame and determine a consistent 30 day average)
• Figure out what the observed percentage difference between the tools number and the actual.
• Once you get that difference add it to the baseline in the tool. (it should be the same as your adwords account now.
• That baseline percentage difference (in most cases) applies to all of your competitor’s accounts. You can get a better feel for their spend (not 100% accurate, but closer than what these tools say)

So after I ran the number that way, I felt even more so that my gut was closer than the tool, so I need to validate my data. So I hopped on live chat, asked the rep at one of these tool vendors why the number was so far off from reality and how its derived. The rep explained that with these tools they and most companies will eliminate multiple keywords from campaigns and ad groups and treat them as a single keyword.

What this means is that if you have potted plant, potted planters and potted soil enhancer they will likely remove two keywords and use just one. I get that, but depending on how campaigns are set up, this can eliminate hundred, thousands, or even more keywords from the daily ad budget and provide a misrepresentative number.

This is AWESOME news for some people because after you do the math, the formula may not apply to everyone the same way. As such the result will be wrong data all together.

The end result of this is that PPC research tools are good for research, but trying to use them as a source of accuracy and planning needs to be considered strongly before actually using any of the data,

Even the keyword lists these tools provide are very broad search query reports and drags in everything that served up an ad on a domain, so it does not mean that you or the competition actively bid on these keywords.

Importance of Pageviews and Unique Visitors Individually

Page Views vs. Unique Visitors – which one Matters most?

While page views are a good measure of which pages people are visiting the most, unique visitors tell you how many different people are actually coming to your site in a given time period.

Page views are great for measuring ad impressions – each page view is a new ad impression, therefore media agencies and ad sales teams tend to focus more on page views. The problem with this is that it often translates to poor decisions around user experience and content. Solely focusing on page views may lead to companies neglecting the importance of engaging and interactive content. This engaging/interactive content is what will actually keep people on your site and get them to return in the future. Companies focusing on page views will also often choose loading a new page instead of leveraging richer interactions, as the new page triggers the coveted page view. The problem this causes is that savvy end users want smooth interactions (i.e. in page data refresh, lightboxed galleries, infinite scroll etc.), but advertisers want hard reloads so they can show more ads.

Unique Visitors are a better measure of engagement on your site since this metric shows the individual people visiting your site over a specific time period. Focusing on unique visitors allows a bit more creative freedom when designing a website and permits you do so with a better user experience in mind. When you don't care about page view count, you can deliver an experience that will delight people by using fancier interactive functions like lightbox video galleries.

If page views are high but the bounce rate (the percentage of visitors who enter the site and leave rather than continuing to view other pages on the same site) is also high, then you know people are not staying on the site, and thus are not engaging with the content. Also, unique visitors mean very little unless you are tracking how long each new visitor spends on the page.

Time Spent is Also Important

The amount of time spent on the page will indicate whether or not users are engaging with the content actively. If you are consistently producing good content, these metrics start to become more meaningful.

The more important metric really depends on what your goals are. Page views seem to be the obvious choice for ad driven sites looking to increase their advertising revenue, while unique visitors is a better focus for companies that want to build and grow a loyal audience. Once you have built up one metric you should start to focus on building up the other. In the end, the goal should be to have highly engaged unique visitors that are driving a high volume of page views.

Strategy to Get Benefit From Expired Domains

People who are trading in the online environment are constantly searching for expired domain names and expired domain name traffic, because this has become a huge potential income source.

In order to find such a domain, you will need some tools which you must acquire at a convenient price, so that your investment may pay off soon. There are plenty of tools available that will track the thousands of in name registration and abandoned websites that have been removed from domain registry and become available for anyone to buy.

Not long ago, expired domain registration and the expired domain name traffic associated with it were only available to those who had an automated system and tools to match, and there were just a few privileged individuals who had such tools.

Nowadays automated tools and resources are available to whoever needs them in identifying, evaluating and buying these domain names. Many internet traders search for expired domains with heavy traffic and they buy these domains, in order to benefit form that traffic and increase sales tremendously.

Basically, expired domain names are those previously owned by a certain person or company that has not paid the domain name renewal fees; such a domain name is returned to the market around forty-five days after the expiration date, and they become available for purchase for anyone who would be interested.

Many domain names point to fully functioning websites, but there are also many sites that are registered for speculation, by people hoping they will resell the respective website to someone else for a quick profit.

There are many other domain names which are registered for website development, but do not appear online; this is because the owners of the respective domain do not really go through with the website development and allow the domain registration to expire.

There are numerous domain names, though, that come with fully functioning websites and receive daily traffic statistics from search engines, links and banner ads. This kind of an expired domain can bring someone pretty nice incomes, if they are redirected to another web site or are marketed with the so popular affiliate programs.

Everyone can make a profit from purchasing and expired domain name; some buy for speculation, and this has become a greatly profitable market, because many manage to resell these domains and make a few extra bucks on the way.

Many people buy expiring domain names and redirect the targeted traffic, by the use of targeted keyword domain names which help them get the level of traffic they're aiming for. Whatever you decide to do, you will probably have success with it because the internet is a highly lucrative and profitable market.

There are many people buying expired domain names all over the world, and they all do so in different ways, but most of them (if not all) for the same reason: they want to improve sales. However, everyone searches for different things when looking for expired domain names, so what works for someone may turn out to be a disaster for someone else.

That is why there are different classes of expired domain traders and they all have different aims. One class of traders might be on the market for buying names for future site developments, while other traders might be looking for a specific domain name for a certain future customer.

Another category of traders is the one consisting in people who are constantly searching for expired domain names with a lot of expired domain traffic and a high degree of popularity among a specific class of customers. For these traders, an expired domain with quite a bit of traffic is a source of huge future income, so they value such a site greatly and are constantly looking for this category of expired domain names.

These traders buy expired domains exclusively for their high traffic, and they basically place their products where they would be accessible to many people who know the respective site and often access it. This is a great source of income and it brings them a boost in sales, making them maximize their profit at a fast rate.

Because they have such a huge commercial value, these kinds of expired domains come at a high price, because everyone knows the importance of an expired domain with plenty of traffic attached to it.

They are premium sites and they cost quite a bit, but still many pay the high price since they know their investment will soon pay off. If you're in the market for this kind of an expired domain name, you are probably wondering what the best way of finding such a domain is. Basically, what you need to do is track a domain name and check for statistics on its traffic.

There are some ways for you to find out whether a certain domain will actually help you achieve your goal of improving sales. You could use a tool which enables you to find how many links a certain website shows, in order to see is the website still has a traffic ranking, or you could use PageRank.net to see if the domain you are interested in has a Google PageRank or not.

However, when you are interested in buying an expired domain, you should be careful; you could get a high traffic because there are many other people like you searching for a domain name, but this is not real traffic and it will not be recognized by a search engine.

Free Online Unused CSS Removal tools

Page loading time is obviously an important part of any website’s user experience.Page loading time is becoming a more important factor when it comes to search engine rankings.
Tools to Remove Unused CSS
In External and Internal Files,they are downloaded every time an HTML.
Always place your CSS and JavaScript in external files; it’s a best practice and makes your site easier to maintain and update.

Through Google Chrome:

1. Open the “Developer Tools” in Google Chrome by hitting “Control-Shift-I” (Windows, your OS may vary). You can also find it in the wrench menu under “Tools”.
2. Navigate to the “Audits” tab.
3. Optionally, uncheck “Network Utilization”. It’s not need for the CSS auditing.
4. Select “Audit Present State” and click “Run”.

After following those steps, the results will display on the same tab. One of the results may be “Remove unused CSS rules”. If it’s not there, you are the best CSS artist in the world. For the rest of us, expand the tree.

Dust-Me Selectors :
Dust-Me Selectors is a Firefox extension (for v1.5 or later) that finds unused CSS selectors. It extracts all the selectors from all the stylesheets on the page you're viewing, then analyzes that page to see which of those selectors are not used. The data is then stored so that when testing subsequent pages, selectors can be crossed off the list as they're encountered. You can test pages individually, or spider an entire site, and you'll end up with a profile of which selectors are not used anywhere.