Google Analytics: Best practices for tracking multiple domains?

September 27, 2012 2:58 AM

What is the best way to set up Google Analytics to track multiple domains?

I have a website that has 2 TLDs: example.com & example.de. I have already seen what google recommends here for tracking code changes for treating top domains as one entity and tracking them in the same profile. These changes are in the process of being implemented and should be online soon.

My main questions concern how I should then set up my profiles in GA to track them. I'm not sure what the best practices would be. I'm not sure what types of things I should be specifically looking for in my profiles. I know I'll probably want to be able to examine both domains as a whole, but also be able to view them separately and also track the movement between them and see how users get from one domain to another, from what page, section, etc.

What is the best way of going about this? There is a short explanation on the page I linked to, but it isn't quite clear.

What are some other things I should be looking for or examining with a multiple domain set-up?

Are there any other not so obvious on-site changes to the tracking code I should consider for use in tracking multiple domains?

What are some common mistakes I should avoid?

What do you wish you knew when you tried to so something like this?

posted by chillmost to computers & internet (1 answer total)

One simple way would be to put two different tracking codes in there. This is what I do with the sites I manage(websites that are part of a much larger government agency site). One tracking code snippet is for my sub domain, and the other is for the site as a whole.
posted by rockindata at 4:59 AM on September 27, 2012