Tracking Goals Without a Confirmation Page

What are Goals?

Using goals is how online advertisers are able to measure the performance of their website in comparison to their expectations and objectives.

With goal tracking, advertisers are able to measure both minor and major actions taken within their website by its users. This may include things such as; form submission, order completions and the amount of time an average user spends on a particular are of a website.

Virtual Pageview vs Event Tracking

Both options provide a similar functionality. However with event tracking now being linked with goals, this is becoming a more popular option than virtual pageview. The table below aims to highlight the strengths and weaknesses of both options:

	Virtual Pageview	Event Tracking
Bounce Rate	Reduced Bounce Rate	Reduced Bounce Rate
Page Views	Artificial Increase on total Pageviews	No increase in pageviews
Detailed Tracking	Tracks more details correlated to actions	Limited information
Limitations	Up to 500 GATC requests per session	Up to 500 GATC requests per session
Function	_trackPageview()	_trackEvent()

Virtual Pageview tracking using  _trackPageview() function.

If you or your web developer have little insight to Analytics Goals, then Virtual Pageview will work.

Advantages/Benefits:

• Quick and Easy
• Doesn’t require any configuration in Google Analytics
• Reduced Bounce Rate

Disadvantages:

• Artificial increase on total pageviews
• Limited Information
• For each visit (user session), a maximum of approximately 500 combined GATC requests can be tracked

 

How to implement Virtual Pageview Tracking

1. Find the Submit button for the form in question.

[code] <input name=”submit” type=”submit” id=”Submit” value=”Submit Form”/>[/code]

2. Add for following code:

[code] onClick=”_gaq.push([‘_trackPageview’, ‘/form-submitted.html‘]);”[/code]

3. The end result will look something similar to this:

[code] <input name=”submit” type=”submit” id=”Submit” value=”Submit Form” onClick=”_gaq.push([‘_trackPageview’, ‘/form-submitted.html’]);”/>[/code]

4. Create the goal in analytics (Optional).

By default, this goal will show in Google Analytics as “/form-submitted.html”. If you would prefer it to have a name such as “Contact Form Submission”, you can do the following:

1. Once logged into Analytics, select the profile
2. Click on “Admin” from the navigation
3. Open the “Goals” tab
4. Create a new goal by clicking ‘+ Goal “
5. Enter Goal Name. Eg “Contact Form Submission”
6. Under “Goal Details” select “URL Destination”
7. Enter the “Virtual Goal URL” Eg. “/form-submitted.html”
8. Select “Exact Match”
9. Save

 

Screenshot of URL Destination Goals – Google Analytics:

Event Tracking using _trackEvent() function.

Event Tracking is the preferred way of tracking contact form goals in Analytics.

Advantages/Benefits:

• An extra page view wont be generated every time an action is tracked
• Categorise actions into groups
• Reduced Bounce Rate
• Actions show up in the event tracking section of content reports
• Ability to view unique actions

Disadvantages:

• Requires extra configuration
• For each visit (user session), a maximum of approximately 500 combined GATC requests can be tracked

 

How to implement Event Tracking

1. Find the Submit button for the form in question.
[code] <input name=”submit” type=”submit” id=”Submit” value=”Submit Form”/>[/code]

2. Add for following code:
[code]onClick=”_gaq.push([‘_trackEvent’, ‘Contact’, ‘Contact Request’, ‘Contact Form1’,, false]);”[/code]

3. The end result will look something similar to this:
[code]<input id=”contact-submit” class=”button” type=”submit” value=”Submit” onClick=”_gaq.push([‘_trackEvent’, ‘Contact’, ‘Contact Request’, ‘Contact Form1’,, false]);”>[/code]

4. Create the goal in analytics.

1. Once logged into Analytics, select the profile
2. Click on “Admin” from the navigation
3. Open the “Goals” tab
4. Create a new goal by clicking ‘+ Goal “
5. Enter Goal Name. Eg “Contact Form Submission”
6. Under “Goal Details” select “Event”
7. Enter a Category (eg “Contact” or “Contact Forms” etc), Action (Eg “Contact Request” or “Online Quote” etc), Label (eg “Contact Form1”)
8. Change the type for all details to “that matches”
   
9. Save

 

Screenshot of Event Goals – Google Analytics:

Further information on Event Tracking in Analytics be found in the Event Tracking Guide. This guide provides detailed information Setting Up Event Tracking, Anatomy of Event Tracking, and Implementation Considerations.