Clarification on Analytics Goals & Funnel Logic

[kirmeliux]

I have a few questions about funnel flow and how my goals are tracked.

1. My goal is a user completing a contact form, form.html. Upon completion, user is redirected to thanks.html, ending the flow. Every page header contains a direct link to form.html. Does this mean every page on my site is considered a "step" leading the user to the contact form? If so, do I list each page containing the form link in the steps, or only form.html?

2. If the above isn't correct, how do I track how the user wound up completing my form. I'd love to know which pages are performing better and leading to more sign-ups (goal completions). Currently I think I'd only be setup to know when a user is on the form.html page and whether they complete it or leave, not how they got to form.html in the first place.

3. My .html pages are actually embedded via iFrame on WordPress pages. My form.html page is hosted on .com/quote and upon completion, form.html redirects to thanks.html within the iFrame (.com/quote remains the actual page). I'd assume this is going to throw off my stats since the physical .html pages don't have Analytics code embedded?

4. How would I track different CTAs on the same page which lead to the same goal? For example, header vs. footer CTA's to the same sign-up sheet.

Let me know if you need anything clarified. Thanks a lot for the help.

[kirmeliux]

Nope, no data yet so I'll delete it since it doesn't enhance much. I can use the Reverse Funnel Path to see if they hit the homepage first. I'm hoping to verify I have this setup properly in the next few days. I appreciate the help. Have a great day!

[Matthew_Edgar]

Yeah, you could delete that home page just for cleaner reporting if no other reason. That said, if you already have data you need to keep that is in there for historical purposes, might be easier to create a new funnel/goal that excludes the home page and then just use that new goal moving forward.

[kirmeliux]

Yes, but I wouldn't know which one led to the conversion, I don't think. The UTM's wouldn't be connected. The internal UTM would show the conversion, even though it was the email UTM which brought me the visitor. I may be wrong about that. Here's a helpful link if you're interested. Thanks for the help, Dmitrii.

[kirmeliux]

Thanks again, Matthew. If you have the time, I have a quick follow-up question regarding #1 and then I believe I'm good.

1. It's likely the majority of my goal completers will go from homepage > form > completion page. But some may land organically on a different page and go to form > completion. And of course, people can land on the form page directly from Google.

I currently have the goal set up in Analytics as homepage > form > completion with required checked as No. Should I just delete the homepage as Step 1 since it's not required?

As I understand it, if someone's flow is Page X > Form > Completion, it'll still register as a goal, they'll just show up in the funnel at Form and then go to completion. The homepage there will just show me how many went in that particular flow of Home > Form > Completion. Right?

4. I'm definitely going to look into event tracking. Thank you for the suggestion. I agree about UTMs getting messy.

[DmitriiK]

Good point. However, I believe you'd be able to differ the source/medium in campaigns (for utm) and in usual source/medium for usual source medium I hope this makes sense

[Matthew_Edgar]

1. Ah, gotcha. You could do that as a two step funnel. You can also look at total sessions on the first page and see how many people from there complete a goal.

2. Cool!

3. Then, in that case, you should be able to add GA on there vs worrying about cross domain (phew!). Looks like Dmitrii suggested the same thing.

4. In that case, I'd use event tracking on the buttons and links so that you know what people are clicking that leads them to the form. UTMs could lead to messy reports since these are internal pages. You'd just have to be careful how you set it up and walk through all the various edge cases to make sure it will work, but it should.

[kirmeliux]

4. Wouldn't UTM's skew the reports if there's multiple trackings going on? For instance, if a user lands on my site via email promotion (which I'm tracking via UTM) and then clicks a footer link to my contact form (which by your suggestion would have UTM as well), won't the original email UTM not register? I thought that would consider it a new traffic source.

[DmitriiK]

3. Since it's on the same domain - yes, it'll work. Still not my preferred method But if it's how it has to be, go ahead

4. Either UTM or different goals. Personally, I'd go with UTM - less trouble reading reports etc.

[kirmeliux]

Hi Dmitrii,

Thanks for your insight.

1 & 2: I believe both of these issues have been solved by your suggestion of Reverse Goal Path. Thanks!

3. To clarify, the iframes are hosted internally on the same domain as the tracking code, not externally on a 3rd party. Our CRM software is necessary and loading an iframe this way is safest way for us to display their web form. So again, not trying to connect multiple GA's, just this code to Analytics. I'm pretty sure I can add the standard Analytics tracking JS to in contact.html and thank-you.html and be good, right?

4. So you use UTM codes internally? I was considering this for header/footer links.

Thanks again, Dmitrii!

[kirmeliux]

Thank you for the response.

1. The example I gave was probably fairly poor. The end result is a form submission, so I probably don't need to track it as a funnel. I would like to see how many people loaded the contact form and abandoned it though and I thought this would be the optimal way.

2. It seems like segmenting between converters and non-converters only tells me specific user data? It seems Dmitrii's response was what I was looking for. The Reverse Goal Path details the last 3 pages the user navigated before completing the goal.

3. My iframe is hosted on the same domain. There is no secondary domain.

4. I'm talking about both buttons and links. They all lead to the same contact form page (which has the .html displayed via iframe). For example, I have city specific pages that have buttons built within that lead to our contact form. I might try different tactics on city specific pages and want to see if one converts higher. Could I just use UTMs internally? Or I guess only the Reverse Goal Path.

I also added a different thank-you.html page for a different goal (our residential vs. commercial contact forms). But since we only have 2, that's all I did.

Going to look into event tracking so I can see where they click.

Thanks again for the response.

[DmitriiK]

Hi there.

Oh boy, I'm glad you said you need "clarification" First off, funnels are created for deeper analysis for specific(!) steps of goal flow, not every possible variation. Alright, so:

1. Does this mean every page on my site is considered a "step" leading the user to the contact form? It would be if that was the page, which user was before completing the form If so, do I list each page containing the form link in the steps, or only form.html? You sure can, but it will just pollute your reports, and will create trouble reading your results, because you'd have to create dozens, if not hundreds of funnels.
2. In Google Analytics, Conversions -> Goals -> Reverse Goal Path. Choose the goal, voila!
3. brain explosion Surely very unusual setup. I'd recommend not to use IFrames whatsoever. And yes, with iframes tracking and analytics will be very hard, if possible. Because, as you said, iframe is a part of different website, which can have no Google analytics at all, or it can be inaccessible by you. But there would be no way to connect two of GAs anyway. Looks like very painful setup to me
4. The way i have it setup for us and our clients - I use either different goals (which is not the best way), or use custom campaign tracking - URL builder for Google analytics. This way you'd be able to look at header and footer completed goals separately, under Acquisitions -> Campaigns.

Hope this helps.

[Matthew_Edgar]

Hey,

1. It sounds like you don't have a funnel, you have a destination goal. A funnel would be something like a form that was several pages - users go from page 1 to page 2 to page 3 and then thanks (think of a cart). So, your site (in the funnel sense) is not a step toward thanks.

2. To know which pages are performing better getting people to thank you page, you can use segments to look at converters and non-converters. That sounds like what you want to know - how do those groups compare? Here is a Google support article about this:
   https://support.google.com/analytics/answer/3125360?hl=en

3. For the iframe issue, you should check out cross domain tracking. Without that, yes, your stats will be skewed weird.
   https://support.google.com/analytics/answer/1034342?hl=en

4. For CTAs, are you talking about buttons or links? For instance, a linked image that says "Contact Us Now!"? Do the links lead to the form.html page? If it is something like that, event tracking can give you an idea of where people are clicking on the page. If, instead, you have the form itself on multiple locations of a page (instead of links) you can get creative - one way I've pulled this off is to have the forms send to a different thank you page so that you can track as multiple goals.

Hope that helps!