Re-branding with Google Analytics

[NiallSmith]

GM Mozzers,

I apologize in advance if my description of this issue is confusing, but I'm doing my best here.

Anyway, due to legal reasons, one of the publications I manage was forced to change their name. We set-up a 301 redirect from the previous domain and have also set-up an analytics profile for the new domain, however, as it stands, visits to the old domain outnumber those to the new domain 12:1.

Is there anyway to set-up my analytics profile to the new URL so that this traffic is being attributed to the new domain and the new site, since, after all, it is a redirect.

I hope that I explained this sufficiently. Any and all insight will be very much appreciated. Thank you in advance.

[OlegKorneitchouk]

You can either 1) update current analytics profile with new url and use the compare feature in analytics or 2) export all of the old data in excel for data comparison and create a new analytics profile.

The 301 concept remains the same in both scenarios.

[NiallSmith]

Travis,

Would this assist me with the redirect issue. How would I be able to assimilate all of the traffic that's currently redirecting from the old domain onto the new domain?

Likewise, am I making sense here?

[choiceenergy]

You can export all your data to csv/google docs?  Then just run comparisons through excel or however you see fit w/ that data.

[NiallSmith]

Oleg,

Well, here's the problem:

We want to keep the old profile (the URL we are redirecting from) so that if needed, we can compare current/future numbers against previous years.

So are you saying that it would be better for me to update the 'old' analytics profile and simply update the information in the 'profile settings', i.e. the new URL?

Is there a way I can set it up so that we can keep the old account and 'deactivate it', for lack of a better word, so we can archive all of that old data and again, be able to compare it to the new data.

Likewise, is there anyway to set it up so that the domain we're redirecting from can somehow be included in the new profile.

[OlegKorneitchouk]

If you properly set up a 301 redirect, the old site shouldn't be sending any tracking information as the page's content shouldn't be loading.

RewriteEngine On
RewriteBase /
Rewriterule ^(.*)$ http://www.newdomain.com/$1 [R=301,L]

Make sure you change the URL inside Google Analytics settings as well (Load account > Admin > select profile > Profile settings)