Moz Q&A is closed.
After more than 13 years, and tens of thousands of questions, Moz Q&A closed on 12th December 2024. Whilst we’re not completely removing the content - many posts will still be possible to view - we have locked both new posts and new replies. More details here.
Comparing % Change, Google Analytics
-
Hey Mozzers,
Is there a simple way to compare the "% Change" in traffic when comparing two separate time periods in a single Google Analytics report?
When comparing data from two separate time periods, an exported CSV doesn't include the % Change (booo!), and there's no option to sort by % Change within the GA report, essentially forcing you to scroll through all the results to pinpoint the major movers and shakers.
I'm not averse to using spreadsheets to sort this data, but I'm thinking that I'd likely need a macro to make this work, something like this. However, none of the macros on that page are working (possibly because they were designed for a previous version of Analytics).
All suggestions are appreciated.
Thanks!
-
Got it! Pivot table led me to the promised land. Thanks for the advice.
-
Appreciate the suggestions! Forgive my Excel ignorance, but the difficulty stems from not being able to directly compare and sort the data.
So let's say I want to pull my top 500 keywords driving traffic for a week's time and compare them to the previous week. If I pull a CSV from Analytics in a report comparing the two weeks, it'll show the same keyword (biscuits) in rows 8, 9, the same keyword (sandwiches) in rows 10, 11, the same keyword (buns) in rows 12, 13. I could use formulas like =D8-D9 to compare the difference in total traffic for a keyword, and =(D8-D9)/ABS(D8) to get the percentage, but then I can't sort by the difference (because the formula will calculate whatever moved during the sorting), which leaves me in the same bind as I have with Analytics -- not being able to sort by the change in traffic over two different time periods.
If I try to pull two separate CSV's from GA, from two separate weeks, and copy/paste that data into two separate columns, the data won't align correctly. For example, "buns" have been the top keyword driving traffic one week, so it'll be A1, but it was the fourth best keyword the next week, putting it into A4. In other words, the data isn't aligned.
I'm all for trying to display this data with a pivot table, but I'm not sure where to begin. Do you have any resources you could recommend?
-
Excel FTW! A pivot table could handle this for you as Basil said. Or if you wanted to do a one-off formula, it would look something like this:
=(B1-A1)/B1
Where B1 is your number from the more recent time period and A1 is the number from the previous time period.
Hope this helps!
Tim
-
Hi Dan,
There is no way to do that with GA, but you can with excel. What you're trying to accomplish can be easily done and summarized in an excel pivot table (which can also include predefined formulas).
Let me know if you need any help figuring out how to create one.
Basil
Got a burning SEO question?
Subscribe to Moz Pro to gain full access to Q&A, answer questions, and ask your own.
Browse Questions
Explore more categories
-
Moz Tools
Chat with the community about the Moz tools.
-
SEO Tactics
Discuss the SEO process with fellow marketers
-
Community
Discuss industry events, jobs, and news!
-
Digital Marketing
Chat about tactics outside of SEO
-
Research & Trends
Dive into research and trends in the search industry.
-
Support
Connect on product support and feature requests.
Related Questions
-
Android Webview & Safari (in-app) without any referrer information in Google Analytics
I've got a client that gets a considerable amount of traffic that: Enters on an interior page (that we are running properly tagged ads for on various platforms) Bounces Has a browser of either Android Webview or Safari (in-app) which I believe indicates the website is being viewed within a mobile app Has no referrer data: (direct) / (none) We've tested several scenarios (Facebook app, Gmail app, etc.) and ruled them out. Anyone know what this might be? Thanks in advance!!
Reporting & Analytics | Jul 3, 2017, 3:28 PM | SarahLK0 -
Would updating Meta Titles affect Google analytics tracking?
Hi All, I need a little bit of help. We need to optimize our blog's articles Meta titles for SEO which all exceed 100 characters. I was told that if we change the titles, google analytics would split the tracking pages and count the data as 2 pages (old title and new title). Has any of you have this experience before and if so, is there a way to avoid google analytics counting this as two pages? Thanks in advance! Viviana http://analyteguru.com/ http://analyteguru.com/ http://analyteguru.com/
Reporting & Analytics | Mar 11, 2016, 2:29 PM | mchoi0 -
Google Analytics - Organic Search Traffic & Queries -What caused the huge difference?
Our website traffic dropped a little bit during the last month, but it's getting better now, almost the same with previous period. But our conversion rate dropped by 50% for the last three weeks. What could cause this huge drop in conversion rate? In Google Analytics, I compared the Organic Search Traffic with previous period, the result is similar. But the Search Engine Optimization ->Queries shows that the clicks for last month is almost zero. What could be the cause of this huge differnce? e9sJNwD.png k4M8Fa5.png
Reporting & Analytics | Mar 18, 2015, 4:18 PM | joony0 -
Google Analytics shows most referrers as "Direct" -- What are some better tools?
Very often Google Analytics will show 50-90% of our referrers as (direct) which is not very helpful. Are there other tools out there that will provide a clearer breakdown of what other websites are sending us our traffic? Specifically, I want to be able to be able to tell who are the top traffic referrers to my top performing pages on my site for the last 30 days. (I want to be able to study this on a per-page basis.) Thanks in advance!
Reporting & Analytics | Aug 24, 2014, 7:47 PM | Brand_Psychic0 -
Whats 'Other' in Google Analytics (in Acquisition)
When i look in GA under Channels (under Acquisition) 'other' is listed What is 'other' ? I have been told its other unidentified channels as they did not allow 3rd party cookies or surfers were in anonymous/private mode. Other is usually organic traffic that couldn't be identified for the aformentioned reasons. This data is encrypted and available but it violates Google guidelines as they are not allowed to pass personal info//data to third parties so it is automatically filtered. But they are not 'Not Provided' (since that still shows under organic) but is usually/mainly some form of organic visits. Hence Seo can take credit for much of that traffic, is this correct ? Many Thanks
Reporting & Analytics | Jan 30, 2019, 12:27 AM | Dan-Lawrence0 -
Why are plus signs (+) suddenly showing up in Google Analytics organic search keywords reports?
Since June 13, 2013, the number of organic search queries containing a plus sign (+) has gone up over 1,000% compared to the previous period on my site in Google Analytics. These plus signs appear to be taking the place of spaces in these search queries (i.e. "word1+word2+word3"). This appears to be almost (or completely) Google organic traffic, not other search engines. Since I highly doubt searcher behavior would change so suddenly, I'm trying to figure out why Google is replacing spaces with plus signs. Is anyone else seeing this? Any ideas?
Reporting & Analytics | Jul 15, 2013, 6:43 PM | RCF0 -
No Social Sources in Google Analytics - what am I doing wrong?
Hello Everyone, I'm having a strange issue: I DO NOT have in my Google Analytics the "Social" tab under the Traffic Sources category. Look at the first image of this post: http://marketingland.com/google-analytics-social-reports-8138 How do you "get" that to show? Hope somebody has this issue and can help, Thanks a lot, Alex
Reporting & Analytics | Apr 5, 2012, 5:24 AM | pwpaneuro0 -
How do shortened links show up in Google Analytics?
Hey, How do shortened links show up in GA? So if I tweet about something and use bitly, does twitter get the referral? I am thinking not. I have never seen bitly show up as a referrer, but we gets lots of clicks from those links. Hmmmm. Anyone? E
Reporting & Analytics | May 24, 2011, 12:35 PM | ErinTM0