Some more helps with goals needed

[TheShortStack]

I'm looking at setting up some goals for a new site that's starting to see a bit of traffic, but I have a quick question that I could do with a bit of help with.

I've got all my affiliate links set up in a /go/ directory so the links in the individual pages look something like this:

• /go/pokerstars
• /go/full-tilt
• /go/pkr

With this structure in mind, what's the best way to set up my goals in Analytics?

I want to know exactly which link has been clicked on, but I'm aware that I'm only allowed to set up 20 goals. This is ok at the moment, but might not be if I start to promote more rooms/products.

Am I right in thinking that if I just set up my goals to look at the generic /go/ folder, then I won't be told which link has been clicked - I'll just get a generic indication that something in the go folder was click on.

If that's true, is my only option to set up 20 individual goals for the 20 most popular products on the site?

Cheers for the help.

[Unknown Webmaster]

I think the easiest thing to do would be to set up a single goal for everything in the /go/ folder and let it sit for 2 weeks. After that you can use the reverse goal path report to see what is best to track individually.

When you have 1 goal set up, you could use a couple of advanced segments as filters, so you can get more detailed stats and basically circumvent the 20 goal limitation.

[TheShortStack]

Thanks for the reply UW, much appreciated.

Got to be honest though, a lot of that went over my head. Is the best place to read up on Reverse Goal Path reports and Advanced Segement Filters the Google documentation? Or would you recommend a third party site?

Cheers,

[cprpoker]

Did you try this method?

Tracking clicks

[Unknown Webmaster]

I don't think anybody has written a good guide showing how to properly set up GA for affiliate websites - The guides I'v read all focused on webshops and corporate websites.

Google does pretty good at explaining the basics here: Conversion University Help
(there are also a pretty good explanation of how to use regular expressions)

[TheShortStack]

Did you try this method?

Tracking clicks

Yeah, I did think about doing things that way - but it would mean that all clicks would show up as page views rather than a measurable goal but perhaps more importantly it means I'd have to go through every href in a 70 page site and put in JavaScript code ... which I'd like to try and avoid if at all possible!

[cprpoker]

Gotcha, are there actual files in the /go directories handling the redirect to the rooms or are they just handled as redirects in htaccess. If they only exist in htaccess then you won't be able to track them in GA unless you use a similar method to above.

The javascript code has to run in order to trigger a hit in GA.

If you were using php files in the /go directory handling the redirects then there may be a way to fire the javascript code prior to the header redirect.

But this part I am unsure of.

Anyone else have a way to make this work?

[TheShortStack]

Gotcha, are there actual files in the /go directories handling the redirect to the rooms or are they just handled as redirects in htaccess.

Yeah, they're all individual redirect files.

Thanks a lot for the links, I'll have a look through them. It sounds like I need to do a fair bit of brushing up on goals.

Am I right in thinking that I'm going to need some sort of JavaScript involved in the links anyway? I was hoping that goals meant that Analytics would just naturally track any visits to a particular URL.

[Unknown Webmaster]

@TheShortStack
I'm pretty sure that the easiest solution for you would be to use a setup similar to the one I use, since I also have files handle the redirects.

You can see a simplified version of the code I use here:
http://www.unknownwebmaster.com/google-analytics-goal-tracking

There are drawbacks to this method, but I prefer it, since it is very fast to implement and is easy to make changes to.