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Goals in Web Analytics

What is a Goal in Web Analytics?

An goal is the result of a series of steps taken by a user leading to the validation of a crucial action defined beforehand. In Web Analytics, measuring goals helps refine a digital strategy and increase a website’s performance, particularly the conversion rate. Analyzing the steps of the goal allows us to discover user behavior and quickly identify various friction points in their journey through the visualization of a conversion funnel.

What goals Should Be Measured for a Website?

For a website, goals are used to measure:

  • The conversion rate of an advertising campaign or a referrer.
  • Organic search engine results.
  • Form completions.
  • The impact of social networks.
  • Negative points in the user journey.

Creating an goal with AFS Analytics

AFS Analytics provides a highly advanced goal creation tool. It allows you to create goals by defining numerous interactions.

Steps to Create an goal

In the left menu:

  • Menu -> goals -> Creation and management of goals.
  • The new page displays all existing goals.
  • Click on the "Create a new goal" button.

The "goal Name and Value" Table

This table allows you to define the goal’s title, its monetary value, time limit, and activation options.

  • Monetary Value: a financial value (fictitious or real) representing the validation of an goal.
    Example: If you spent 1,000 euros on an advertising campaign to sell eBooks at 20 euros each, you can set the goal's monetary value to 20 euros.

  • Time Limit: represents the period (in days) granted to the visitor to validate the goal. The starting point begins when they are selected in the segment and ends when the last step of the goal is validated.

  • Dashboard: by checking this box, the goal will appear in a widget on the dashboard and in the list of widgets that can be displayed.

  • Activated: enables or disables an goal. If the goal is disabled, it will no longer be measured.

Defining the goal's Segment

"Segment" Table

The segment allows you to select the users eligible for goal measurement.

The "Source" Section

Here, you can define the visitor's acquisition source. Several options are available:

  • Advertising campaigns (UTM).
  • Referrers.
  • Search engines.
  • Social networks.

A second field allows you to select the campaign or search engine.

  • Contains: allows specifying a term that the source URL must contain. This could be a UTM parameter in the query string or simply data in the referrer’s URL.
  • Does not contain: excludes all referrers whose URL or query string contains the specified term.

The "Entry Page" Section

This section allows defining a page or group of pages that users must visit to be eligible. This could be a word in the page title or its URL.
If you chose the URL, this could be a parameter present in the query string.

  • The checked box "Remove query string" ensures that the query string is not considered when searching for terms in the "Contains" and "Does not contain" fields.

The "Users" Section

This section allows selecting users eligible for the goal.

"Steps" Table

Creating steps is available in the "Steps" table. To add a step, click on the "Create a step" button.

Different Parameters:

  • Label: Give a name to the step.
  • Interaction: Two choices are possible: Pages or Interaction.

Page:

If the choice is "Page", the type defines the string to analyze, i.e., the title or URL of the page.
The operator allows defining the depth of the analysis:

  • "contains" or
  • "exactly matches" the defined string.

If the "contains" option is chosen, you can also define a term to exclude strings containing this term.

  • If the "Remove Query String" box is checked, the analysis will exclude the query string.

Interaction:

Several choices are possible: click, download, form, video sale, popup window.
Each category has its own parameters.
For example, a form can be:

  • Opened
  • Closed
  • Submitted
  • Its validation can be successful or failed.

Reminder

Ensure that event tracking is correctly integrated into your site: Event Tracking - AFS Analytics

Reminder

The "Mandatory" checkbox in the options specifies whether the step is required to proceed to the next one. If checked, only its validation will trigger the test of the next step.

"Notification" Table

This table allows you to receive a notification by email or SMS when an goal is reached, and the visitor is added to a list that you have previously created.
AFS Analytics allows you to create visitor lists.
This option is available when you click "Follow" in the profile sheet of each user.

Reminder

Receiving SMS notifications requires an additional option in your subscription. Please contact support to activate this feature.

"Preview" Table

This table displays a preview of a conversion funnel representing the different steps of the user journey to reach the goal.

Save Changes

Don’t forget to save by clicking the "Save Changes" button.

Conversion by goal in the goal Menu

This option allows you to view the statistics of each goal over a defined period.

List of goals

Displays the list of validated goals over a defined period.

Performance Indicators or KPIs on the Dashboard

Performance indicators for goals are available in the dashboard widget menu. Two indicators are provided: the first displays a scrolling list of results for all goals, while the second allows displaying the result of a specific goal by selecting its ID, e.g., Goal_2.

The Goal Displayed on the Dashboard

The conversion funnel displays percentages relative to total traffic and the segment. Here, the conversion is 11.11% relative to the segment and 1.77% of total traffic.