It has been a popular criticism of Google Analytics for some time now that it didn’t allow the creation of more than 4 separate conversion goals. All that changes today with the introduction of a range of new goal functionality.

Google Analytics now allows for the creation of up to 20 Goals per profile. In addition to expanding the number of goals available, Google has also expanded the types of goals available, to include ‘threshold’ goals for time on site per visit and pageviews per visit.

Tracking goals/conversions is a key performance indicator which can provide highly valuable data enabling you’re website to reach its fullest potential. If you are not currently tracking goals, you should start today!

Goal Sets

Google Analytics now allows goals to be organised into 4 sets. Each set containing up to 5 different goals. These sets introduce a new way for the additional goal data to be accommodated within the Google Analytics Reports.

Goal Types

Previously a goal was typically defined as a pageview that resulted from the completion of a valued action on a website. For example the checkout completion page following a successful online sale. Now goals can be based on actions which do not relate to the viewing of a page. Goals can now be based on how much time a visitor spends on the site or how many pages the visitor visits.

i) Time Based Goals
Time based conversions are triggered after a visitor has spent a certain amount of time on a website. A goal can now be configured to register a conversion when a user has spent a specified amount of time on a website. Interestingly time based goals can now also be configured to register conversions if a user leaves a site before a certain amount of time. This can be useful if you wish to set a goal up as a failure metric.

ii) Pageview Based Goals
Another new goal type is pageviews per visit. In a similar fashion to time based goals, a conversion is triggered when a visit exceeds a certain number of pages. Like time based views, pageview based goals can also be triggered by virtual pageviews.

iii) URL Destination Goals
Traditional goals have been renamed URL destination goals. These goals can still be constructed using regular expressions, head match or exact match to identify a page that represents a particular conversion. Now with the availability of up to 20 goals you can easily measure all of those micro conversions (RSS subscription, email signup, reaching a product page, downloading white paper… etc, etc, etc). And yes, you can still use a virtual pageview as a URL Destination goal.

Funnels

Google has spent some time updating the funnels interface. Funnels are still limited to 10 steps. The big question is, do we still need funnels now we have the ability to setup up to 20 goals. The answer is unquestionably yes! Funnels provide a nice visualisation of critical processes and in particular abandonment rate.

Summary

If in the past you have been tracking lots of goals through different profiles, you may want to consider consolidating these goals into one profile. The benefit is you can have all your conversions in one interface allowing much easier analysis.

A key point to remember is visitors can only convert at each goal level once per visit. This is the way it has always been and is likely to remain.

Creating new goals will not modify your historical data, only future data. So all newly created goals will only track future traffic!