Cross-domain / subdomain tracking in GA?
-
Hi there,
My client has a site website.com and a booking engine, booking.website.com
They are currently tracking the main site and the booking subdomain as two separate properties in the same GA account. The issue is we can't see where users are originating on the subdomain property; it's all being counted as referral.
My understanding is we need to set up subdomain tracking using Google Tag Manager in order for GA to pass the user data between the two subdomains.
This is fine, except for this one line I am reading on Google's guide to cross-domain tracking:
Subdomains
If you have updated your tracking code to analytics.js, then no additional configuration is required to track subdomains.
You can use cross domain tracking to collect data from a primary domain, like www.example.com, and a subdomain, like www.subdomain.example.com, in a single Analytics account property.
That last line makes it sound like we should be using cross-domain tracking for this purpose.
Are we correct in setting up subdomain tracking and NOT cross-domain tracking to be able to track users across subdomains on the same domain?
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
-
Need advice on setting up primary domain and shopify site analytics to work best together
Hello, I have a client that I have been working on their primary site for the last year or so. In the last month they decided to have one of their internal employees setup a small shopify store. Now they are asking for the analytics tracking codes for it. My question for you is what would be the best way for me to set that up? variables: primary domain and shopify domain, google and bing analytics Have been looking at how cross domain tracking works (https://support.google.com/tagmanager/answer/6106951), and the instructions for setting up ecommerce in analytics for shopify (https://help.shopify.com/manual/reports-and-analytics/google-analytics/google-analytics-setup). But am still not 100% which route would be the best, any input would be greatly appreciated! thank you, Dustin
Reporting & Analytics | | pastedtoast1 -
Domain Authority and Links drastically decreased in less than a month
I'm fairly new to SEO, and am left completely perplexed about why our two SEO client's links and DA decreased so drastically in so little time. Looking at their stats on Moz, between May and June, their DA's went down by 3-5 (which, they were fairly low to begin with), and external links were halved! This is rather concerning to me as building their external links has been my focus for the past few months for both of them. There are a number of tweaks that I could make to site structure in terms of meta descriptions and page title length (though I can't fix that as the clients want to keep the titles as is), however there are no critical errors. I have also placed a lot of filters on both of their Google Analytics pages as they were getting what I just now realized was a ton of spam, though I don't see how that would affect anything. I just can't imagine what lead to all of those external link suddenly dropping. I imagine the drastic drop in those lead to the DA decrease, but again, I'm very new, so I'm not certain. Any help at all would be greatly appreciated. I have been panicking quite a bit since I've seen this!
Reporting & Analytics | | everestagency0 -
Gets traffic on both domain.dk and domain.dk/default.asp
Hi. Im runnning a couple of sites. And in my analytics/webmastertool I get both traffic on domain.dk and domain.dk/default.asp which are both essentially the same page. I'm pretty sure it would be better, if I somehow could make the default.asp "redirect" to "/". I dont wanna loose the linkjuice thou. Any smart suggestions for an easy fix? /Kasper
Reporting & Analytics | | KasperGJ0 -
Can I move Google tracking from one account to another?
Hi: We've recently taken over the hosting of a client's web site. Is there a way to move the Google Analytics tracking from the old host's account to the client's account without losing all the history?
Reporting & Analytics | | Stamats0 -
Google Webmaster Tools During GA Transition?
I'm working with a client that is launching a new website. Google Webmaster Tools can just be disconnected, then reconnected to the new Google Analytics property, correct? Without any data loss in Webmaster Tools? Thanks! Becky
Reporting & Analytics | | Becky_Converge0 -
Cross-Domain Tracking Urgent Query :-(
Hi Mozzers! One of my clients is having an issue with cross-domain tracking, in other words their own domain is seen as a huge referrer. When you land on their site, which is www.sunway.ie, and then choose a holiday to book it then takes you to another domain which is www.sunwayholidays.ie, during the booking process. I'm just wondering if there is a Google Analytics genius out there who may be able to take a quick look and let me know if there is any obvious solution to this within the Google Analytics code? Thanks in advance everyone! Gavin
Reporting & Analytics | | strategemilabs0 -
How do I set up goals in analytics to track the sales funnel when several pages of the steps required to checkout have the same url?
I have found this in Google Analytic but it makes no sense to me - is there are better resource which explains how you do this step by step ( or a good video perhaps?) Identical URLs Across Multiple Steps In some situations, the URL does not change across a sequence of activity. For example, a sign-up process might have the following URL path: Step 1 (Sign Up): www.example.com/sign_up.cgi Step 2 (Accept Agreement): www.example.com/sign_up.cgi Step 3 (Finish): www.example.com/sign_up.cgi To track visitors' progress through a funnel with the same URL for each step, modify the tracking code to create a virtual URL for each step in the sequence that you want to track. For details on how to use this in your tracking code, see Virtual Pageviews in the _Asynchronous Migration Examples_guide, which shows how to do this in all versions of the tracking code. The following example shows how you might fabricate 3 URLs using the asynchronous tracking code: _gaq.push(['_trackPageview', '/funnel_G1/step1.html']); _gaq.push(['_trackPageview', '/funnel_G1/step2.html']); _gaq.push(['_trackPageview', '/funnel_G1/step3.html']); You would then define your funnel and goal URLs using the ones you created in the tracking code modifications.
Reporting & Analytics | | pookiepro0 -
KissMetrics Experience / Feedback
Hi Mozzers. Can anyone share their experiences using KissMetrics: pros, cons, how it compares to Google Analytics etc? Thanks, I appreciate any input.
Reporting & Analytics | | David_ODonnell0