Google Analytics free version is an online browser-based analytical web intelligence reporting application. It tracks your website traffic and outputs it into human readable format. The great thing, other than the fact its free is that you don’t have to worry about installation or management because Google takes care of that for you, all you need to do is input a few lines of code on the pages you want tracked, log into GA, and check data. The server side configurations and implementations are managed by Google behind the scenes.
Even with all the features in the world, Google Analytics will have limitations, but it’s not Google fault — it’s Javascript’s. Browser-based web tracking programs will always have limitations and inaccuracies because the data retrieved will only be partial. Since Google Analytics depends on Javascript it also depends on no fallacies in the browser and this being the case there will almost always definitely be some decrepencies.
First problem with browser-based programs which rely on Javascript support is that some people may disable Javascript in their browsers and therefore are not being tracked. Some people surf the web through proxies and this also plays a role in inaccurate data. Lastly, some people install antivirus/antispyware programs which automatically disable Javascript.
Other discrepancies can be caused by Google Analytics code not being on every page served, this could be because a website could have an large amount of pages and therefore an oversight is made. And a more likely cause would be the site serves dynamic pages which do not get the code because the page is created on the fly. However, any of these issues can be addressed with a little bit of web development to make the site behave in the way you wish.
Additionally, the analytics code relies on the page being properly loaded so it can actually report the metrics for that visit, but if the page does not fully load or unsuccessfully loads (without the user knowledge) then that visit does not get reported. Also, I’ve heard that Google Analytics treat search robots differently than many other analytic programs, whereas Google Analytics will count crawl bots every time it hits a page, while other programs treat this as one visit. However, I cannot make any claims that this is absolute truth. Also, this would mean you would more than likely see an increase in Google Analytics visits and not a decrease.
In conclusion, there will always be discrepancies between two different analytics programs as there are different factors for reporting for each program. In my opinion I think that server based reporting software is typically the best and most accurate even though they also have some disadvantages. I generally tell clients that they should use Google Analytics in the sense of a backup reporting (or when no reporting exist), but if they have a program which directly examines the server logs then it is probably wise to rely more accurately on that data than any browser-based reporting. Google Analytics and other browser-based programs have never given a high rate of accuracy when reporting, therefore I advise it be used as a general overview. You can notice trends using any reporting software, its just the data reported is not always as accurate.
What is your thoughts? What is your experience with Google Analytics? Leave a comment!
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