CMEI uses Google Analytics to capture analytics on its websites and Data Studio to produce analytics reports. These analytics help website managers report on the number of users, sessions, visited pages, and more. The CMEI Digital Team can provide you with CMEI's username and password and answer questions about your site analytics.
ON THIS PAGE: Adding Google Analytics to Website | Definitions | Reporting | Campaign Tagging
Adding Google Analytics to CMEI Websites
In order for Google Analytics to capture statistics on a site, Google Analytics code has to be included on all of your web pages. This code is automatically added to all websites in the Energy.gov Drupal environment. If your website is outside of the standard hosting environment, contact the CMEI Digital Team for the Google Analytics code. Please note that this email address is only for internal inquiries regarding CMEI digital communication projects.
Google Analytics 4 Definitions
Google Analytics sorts data into dimensions and metrics. For example, on a webpage, a dimension would define a category for the data like Event Type or Page Title, while a metric would define the measurement of events on that webpage, like number of clicks, time on page, etc. Dimensions describe what kind of data it is, while metrics help define how many.
Metrics
A metric is a quantitative measurement, such as an average, ratio, percentage, and so on. It's always a number as opposed to text. One way to think about metrics is that you can apply mathematical operations to them. Some of the more common metrics are detailed below.
A user is defined by Google as "a person who interacts with an app or site whose activities you measure with Google Analytics." Think of it like a visitor to the site. This definition remains the same across both versions of Analytics, but the primary metric has changed.
Google's previous version of analytics, Universal Analytics (UA), highlighted Total Users (the raw number of users who have visited your webpage) in most reports, whereas GA4 focuses on Active Users in its reports. Total User counts are still available as a separate metric in GA4.
Active Users count the number of website visitors that have taken part in an engaged session.
As defined by Google, a session is a group of user interactions with your website or app that take place within a given time frame. Think of it like a visit on the site. One user can log multiple visits, or sessions.
A session begins when a user views a page or screen and no other session is currently active. There is no time limit to how long a session can last as long as the user is active.
By default, a session ends (times out) after 30 minutes of user inactivity, but the session timeout period can be adjusted.
Additionally, GA4 makes some changes to how sessions are tracked. For example, if a user is on a page and the clock passes midnight, a new session is no longer created as it was in Universal Analytics.
An engaged session is defined by Google as "a session that lasted 10 seconds or longer, or had 1 or more key events or 2 or more page or screen views."
For example, a person who visits a web page for 15 seconds without clicking on any links before leaving, or who scrolls down and clicks on a link would be defined as an engaged session. A person who visits the same web page and leaves after 9 seconds without taking any actions would not be counted in this metric.
Views (formerly called pageviews) count the number of total pages viewed by all users during all sessions.
One user can log several visits with multiple page views, so CMEI generally reports these three top-line metrics.
GA4 removed the Unique Pageviews metric that was present in UA. Also, GA4 counts a combination of screenviews from apps and pageviews from browsers, whereas UA tracked mobile screenviews separately.
An event is any action that a user takes when interacting with a webpage. These include file downloads, scrolling down a page, or clicking a button; some events are automatically collected and defined by GA4, while others are set up by website administrators. The event is the basic unit underpinning GA4.
All actions on a website are events and counted. This overall number is captured in the Total Events metric in GA4 reports.
Event count rolls up the number of actions that users have take on a web page or group of pages, such as a file downloads, scrolling down, clicking a button, starting a video, etc.
CMEI reports also include event counts per user, which provides an easier way to understand how many actions the average user takes on a page or group of pages.
Engagement rate is the percentage of sessions that were engaged sessions with a user logging an event or engaging with our content.
For our GA4 reports, CMEI has moved to engagement rate as it shows a better percentage of our users that are actively engaging with the content we create. As Google notes, "Bounce rate, as it's calculated in Universal Analytics, is a reasonable measure of site engagement, but it has become less useful as websites and apps have changed." Engagement rate, as a metric, better captures the number of people actively viewing CMEI websites.
This metric measures the average time a user is engaged on a page. It replaced Average Time on Page as a metric in Google Analytics 4; Average Time on Page metrics recorded only time that a user spent on a page during a session, regardless of if the user engaged in any events (link clicks, scrolling, etc.).
Dimensions
A dimension is a non-numeric category or attribute of your data. It describes your data and it's usually text as opposed to numbers. Some of the more common dimensions are detailed below.
This dimension tracks where a session originated. Generally, sources will include communications channels such as email or social media, as well as search engines and other websites.
This dimension tracks how the user starting the session arrived. Common examples of mediums include organic traffic, direct link clicks, paid traffic and referrals.
This dimension tracks the browser used to access the website, page, etc.
This dimension tracks the type of device that accessed the website, page, etc. Generally, this is filtered by whether the user or session came from desktop, mobile, etc.
This dimension tracks where a user/session originated from, via IP address. Region replaced Metro as a dimension in Google Analytics 4 and defaults to state-level reporting.
Reporting
CMEI uses Data Studio to report on website performance analytics. This cloud-based solution centralizes reports, ties directly into our GA4 data set, and allows for interactive charts and tables. The following options are available in Data Studio:
- Navigate pages: Click the page names on the left side of the screen to change pages.
- Download pdf: This is an interactive report hosted online, but you can download a static pdf version that can be viewed behind the DOE firewall. Click the down arrow next to "Share" at the top of the report, then click "Download report."
- Go Deeper into data tables: Use the pagination arrows to the bottom left of each table to view additional results beyond the Top 10 or Top 5 initially listed. Find the pagination arrows at the bottom of each table on the Web Content page.
- Zoom settings: On your keyboard, hold "Ctrl" and press "+" or "-" (this command may not work in all browsers), or use your browser zoom settings.
Please contact the CMEI Digital Team for examples of Data Studio reports and information on how to create them. Please note that this email address is only for internal inquiries regarding CMEI digital communication projects.
Campaign Tagging
You can use campaign tagging to measure the effectiveness of outreach campaigns across non-web platforms, including email, social media, and print QR codes.