Track subdomains in the same analytics property/view

[Enrico_Cassinelli]

Hello to everyone, this is my first question (kind of a newbie here :-D).

I have a website that spans over 4 subdomains + the main domain and I'd like to have a place where I can see the total page views, events and goal completions. Main domain is langhe.net, and subdomains are eventi.langhe.net, servizi.langhe.net, shop.langhe.net, about.langhe.net.

The website is based on wordpress and I'm using google analytics for wordpress by yoast as analytics plugin.

The configuration of the plugin is as follows:

• all the website have the same UA-XXXXXXXX code
• The Subdomain Traking field (setDomainName) is filled with .langhe.net
• Cross-Domain tracking is enabled
• Cross-Domain Primary Domain (setDomainName) is langhe.net
• Cross-Domain Tracking, Other Domains field is filled with: about.langhe.net, eventi.langhe.net, servizi.langhe.net, shop.langhe.net.

In the GA property I've created an Advanced Custom Filter configured this way:

• Field A -> Extract A = hostname (.*)

• Field B -> Extract B = request URI (.*)

• Output To -> Constructor = request URI $A1$B1

• Field A Required: yes

• Field B Required: No

• Override Output Field: yes

• Case Sensitive: no

I was wondering it this is the best way of doing it, or if there are other "best practice" ways to obtain what I'm looking for (for example with this configuration it's become quite difficult to separate the traffic sources for each website).

Thank you in advance
Cheers!

[KristinaKledzik]

Hi Enrico - welcome to Moz!

Combining subdomains into one Analytics profile is definitely a good way to do things, and totally doable. Have you had a chance to look at Google's guidelines for this?

https://developers.google.com/analytics/devguides/collection/gajs/gaTrackingSite

I know you're enabling this in Wordpress, so you can't follow their guidelines exactly, but it's probably a good idea to make the edits that you've proposed, then look at the code Wordpress puts out and compare it to Google's recommendation.

Then, best practice is to keep the separate profiles you already have running, plus add a profile that combines all subdomains into one profile. Then you don't lose historical data, and you can compare total pageviews of the combined profile to the pageviews of the all the separate subdomain profiles added together to make sure you implemented the new profile properly.

Good luck!

Kristina

[Enrico_Cassinelli]

Hi Cibble!

That's how I started, but now I'd really prefer to have a place with consolidated statistics. It's not just a matter of pageviews counts, but also the webistes are becoming more and more interlinked with each other so I'd like to understand what's the visitor's flow (landing here, then going there etc.)

but thx anyway

[cibble03]

Hi,

I have many sites that have subdomains and have faced the same problems you are facing. My solution; create a new GA code for each account. It takes seconds to create a new account and even less time flicking between reporting account. Sorry I have nothing insightful to add.

Best,

cibble.