Everybody has goals (or at least, should have), so don’t make exceptions with your ecommerce site add it goals.
I know, the ecommerce site has the transaction as main goal/KPI, but sometimes it is not enough. You should add more micro and macro conversions to your site.
Why are goals so important?
Goals are “just” page views, events, etc (more about it later), so why the goals are so important (, not just in) Google Analytics(, but every other tracking system)?
You can also list the main events so as the goals, but you can’t assign eg. cost, you don’t have ROI about it and you can’t optimize your GAds campaigns based on just Google Analytics events.
Google Analytics goals are essential indicators of your page/shop performance. These are the main points you would like to optimize for your shop
Do I have to set up goals?
You should set up goals, no question. Of course, you have ecommerce tracking, that tracks at least the revenue and the purchased items. But think about it, your visitors and clients not just purchase on your shop (unfortunately), but do a lot of other thing, which should end up with a purchase. And of course every visitor could became your client in one day.
So, if you just focus on the purchase it is like you just focus on the end of the sales funnel, but a regular visitor doesn’t start with the purchase 🙂
Set up a funnel, determine main tracking points and set them as a goal and start optimize your site and campaigns based on these goals, too.
Plus one pros for the wide range of goals is your campaigns effectiveness. If you target your ads for new visitors they are less likely make purchase. If you only have the transaction as a “goal” (I know trasaction is a transaction, not a goal in Google Analytics :)) maybe you miss some promising future clients.
Why? Because these “cold” visitors won’t make a purchase, but do other useful things. If you don’t track these as a goal, your campaigns won’t have any feedback, so you just burn your money on these ads.
Don’t burn money on ads, feed the ad systems with useful information and they deliver high quality visitors.
Google Analytics Goals background
You only have 20 slots, no matter you use the free Google Analytics or the Google Analytics 360. Sometimes it is not enough, but that’s it, you have to accept it.
You can not delete a goal. If you set up one, you are not able to delete it. But you can modify it. In practice, if you set up one goal that are no longer exist or it is not needed anymore, you just modify the name and parameters and you have a “new” goal. Don’t forget to add a Google Analytics note, for clarification.
The goals are not retroactive. It goes live when you set up, you will have data after that point.
Because the points above you should plan your goals (and the overall tracking) first with just a simple pen and paper or a spreadsheet. And you will not run out of the slots 🙂
How Google Analytics Goals Count
Every goal counts one per session per user. It means, if you have an event based goal (later on about goal types) and your user trigger this event more than one in a single session, the goal increments only one.
If you add the transactions as a goal, too. You have less transaction goals than “regular” transactions, because the ecommerce transactions don’t have this limitations.
I guess, this limit is not a deal breaker, because the goal has reached and this is the actual point. If you create higher level goals, it won’t be triggered unlimited times per session.
So keep in mind this and use this knowledge over your reports and analysis.
If you would like to know more about the Google Analytics goals you should definitely check this post – https://www.ecommerce-tracking.com/2020/09/21/google-analytics-goal-setup
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