5 Google Analytics reports and tools that all UX Designers should know

Google Analytics often seems to me simultaneously simple, yet horrifically complicated. “Never mind,” I think to myself, “for I am a UX Designer!” Surely, I can leave the marketing efforts to the marketeers and concern myself with the true experience of the users? Conversation and deeper understanding of the human – those are my concerns. 

After all, it’s quite easy to silo yourself when you work in a multi-disciplinary team. When you’re surrounded by experts, you can lean on those that know more than you. This can be a double-edged-sword. Of course, you can delegate work that falls outside of your usual remit (particularly when it comfortably sits under the umbrella of a different department), but in doing so you deprive yourself of the opportunity to learn. By avoiding looking into Google Analytics reports, I was inadvertently missing out on a much deeper level of understanding about the user: the very thing I claim to care about.  

If there is one shortcoming when it comes to the traditional UX process, or rather the methods, it is that often there is a higher focus on qualitative research. Of course, this isn’t always the case; there are many quantitative methods out there, but it’s still true that the definitive tool in the UX kit is speaking to people.  

User needs are the most important thing, of course. However, it’s an unfortunate reality for the purists out there that client needs are equally important, and by extension, so is the need to help the client understand why we're making certain design decisions. This is where quantitative data steps in: to push the sceptics over the line and convince them that we’re taking the right path. As such, it makes sense for UX designers to find every available way to bolster their rich qualitative research with more irrefutable quantitative data. 

This brings me back to Google Analytics. I previously assumed that the extent of the data available was far smaller and more focused on marketing reports, limited to insights about SEO with some extra gems about page hits thrown into the mix. How wrong I was.  

So, we move on to the point of this article. Here are 5 Google Analytics reports for UX designers that I’ve found the most useful during my recent attempt to expand my horizons. 

1. Behaviour flow reports 

User journeys are a wonderful thing. They help to visualise the moves taken by users, highlight the areas where usability issues may lead to a less than desirable experience, and show the areas where the experience can be improved. But when setting out to create user journeys, how do we decide what journeys to cover? How do we decide on a starting point, let alone an end?  

This can be achieved in multiple ways. During conversations with users, we can establish common needs and chart the journey taken to achieve this goal. Or you could consider the primary goals of the client's website and scrutinise the journeys surrounding these specific objectives. In either scenario, there will inevitably be some creative license and a degree of assumption. It’s likely a golden path will be identified and form the backbone of the journey that is mapped.  

Behaviour flow reports to the rescue! These are detailed flow diagrams showing the landing page (entry point) followed by all subsequent interactions (pages), ultimately leading to the user’s end point (where they drop off, or the point where the journey is ’complete’).  

Understanding where the user journey begins is of paramount importance. This is where the ‘starting page’ (landing page) insight comes to your aid. It’s all too common for clients to be overwhelmingly homepage-focused, with far less thought given to the following category pages. This is due to the assumption that most users will enter through the front door. In practice, this is often far from reality. A shared link, a search engine result, a bookmark… these all make it likely a user will jump straight into the site, bypassing the homepage entirely. So if you’re hoping to accurately represent the common user journeys, you must examine the traffic source and find out where the common journey begins. The ‘starting page’ is the first important takeaway from the behaviour flow report.  

You also have access to the flow sprouting from all potential starting pages, meaning that you can indeed find the common steps taken from the homepage. We can see the real user journey, not the assumed journey.  

The default view will show the most common starting pages, in descending order of popularity. If you’re mapping current-state user journeys and you find the homepage is not a common starting point, this raises the question: what is the function of the homepage? How much focus does it really deserve? 

Importantly, we can use behaviour flow reports to show us the user journey, rather than trying to guess what it might be. We can see the common behaviour events, and by extension, understand the priorities and needs of our users. With this information, we can begin to establish a game-plan for deeper auditing to uncover usability issues that exist throughout the entire journey, on all commonly accessed pages. 

2. Landing page report  

It’s important to make it clear that in this context, a landing page simply refers to the first page viewed in a session. It is the entry point for the user into the site. This could be found as a result of a bookmark, search, email or banner ad. What matters is that it’s where the user’s journey begins.  

The landing page report gives us a deeper breakdown of this step in the user journey to what we get from the behaviour flow report. As such, we can use this report for a different function. Rather than trying to understand the user journey overall, we can use this to focus our efforts onto the pages that need attention most.  

Many valuable insights can be attained in the landing page report, including conversion paths and goal completions. Depending on the nature of the site, the measure of success will differ. But if we consider an e-commerce site, if one page template has a higher conversion rate than its cousin on the same site, you must question why. The differences between the two pages could point to successful measures not being universally applied. There may be crucial information that is not prominent enough, or CTAs in unintuitive positions. With this information, we can unearth where a real issue exists, and scrutinise the reasons without being led by subjective opinions. 

These data points are hugely important, but I’d also like to focus on sessions, new users and bounce rates.  

Redesign projects will often cast a fairly wide net, where everything must be changed and improved. But in many cases, the website in our sights may not be performing equally across the board; there are places where our focus can be channelled to make the biggest impact in the most efficient way.  

To begin with, if we can observe that 90% of our users enter onto 1 of 3 landing pages, we immediately know the importance of these pages in our user’s journey. If these pages also had a very high bounce rate, then we need to focus heavily on why these pages are failing our users. Once successfully diagnosed, we must fix those issues. With this method of ranking our design priorities, we can direct our attention and make a huge impact on the website’s UX, without taking a scatter-gun approach; we can solve issues for the most users with the least effort.  

Beyond this, if a high proportion of sessions are from new users versus returning, then we can begin to ask meaningful questions. Depending on the type of website, we may question why so few users are returning. If new users are coming in droves directly to a surprising page, we can dig deeper to understand what is making this page relevant to so many new users. The insights and questions raised can go on to shape our approach to user interviews and other UX research tasks. 

Crucially, the assumption that all users enter through the front door may not be correct; if our way-finding is poor across our other key landing pages, then we may well be driving users away before they even get started. The landing page report can help direct us towards the biggest issues first. 

3. Exit page report  

As the name suggests, the exit page report highlights the page on which the user journey comes to an end. This is the opposite-number of the landing page report, and similarly it offers us a deeper insight into what is happening at this stage of the journey. In doing so, it facilitates an understanding of why users are leaving, and helps to direct us towards the real issues we need to be mindful of when designing a solution.  

It’s important to note that exit rate and bounce rate are not the same thing. Bounce rate refers to a session ending with no user interactions. Exit rate shows how many users are leaving after visiting a number of pages. 

If a page has a high bounce rate or exit ratio, we can ask why. We can audit the page, share it with users during interviews, and figure out if there is a particular reason. Is this simply the end of the journey? Have we inadvertently designed a cul-de-sac where it feels like there’s nowhere to go because the user has technically ‘completed’ their goal? (Think a news article without related news links). Of course, the worst-case scenario is that we find pages that are expected to be a ‘step’ have turned into a barrier for the user. If a product page has a high exit rate, we can safely assume that there is an issue with how we are driving users towards conversion; CTA design, available information on delivery, and so on. These are all issues that can be observed during audits and put to users in interviews/user testing.  

At this point I wouldn’t blame you for thinking that all these reports serve the same purpose. It’s true that there are similarities. These are 3 methods to paint an accurate picture of the crucial stages of the user's journey. But it's all about gaining a deeper awareness, a full understanding of where the issues are to prevent the designer from operating on assumptions. Furthermore, it is about ensuring that we have all the available data to support us when informing the client of where we are planning to focus our efforts.  

4. Devices report 

‘Mobile first’ design is often considered to be the default in this day and age, and the prevalence of smartphones means that this is often the correct approach. Certainly, if designing for e-commerce, news or social media platforms it’s highly likely that the smartphone will dominate as the device of choice for users. But is this always the case? In short, no. 

If you’re designing a website or platform that, for example, is used most often in a professional context, then it is very possible that users will be on a desktop device. Mobile first by default may mean you don’t utilise the strengths of a desktop device, and vice versa. Ultimately, the issue is about understanding which device is being used most commonly. By no means do you have to default to mobile first if the use case is not there.  

Furthermore, if mobile is indeed the choice for most users, then it’s important to be sure so you can optimise the experience for that platform; among other things, you’ll need to consider load times due to the likelihood of inconsistent network coverage, and the option to implement AMPs (accelerate mobile pages) for a smoother and more instantaneous mobile experience.  

Even if you’re confident that smartphones are the primary device type for users, there remains the question of Android vs iOS. Both operating systems have different core interface and navigation components, design systems and conventions. Understanding the balance is key to predicting how your design could be affected by the device. For example, will your navigation design clash with the native buttons in the operating system’s UI? 

As such, the devices report is invaluable in directing the approach taken towards interface design. Google Analytics can provide you with the device category breakdown (including a handy pie chart) which will highlight the split between desktop, mobile and tablet. There’s also a specific device breakdown, detailing the specific handsets in use. The key point is where to place your focus so that you can optimise your designs accordingly, ensuring a better user experience. 

5. Site search  

Navigation is one of, if not the biggest, challenge in UI and UX design. Mega menus are critical, but many users will default to the search bar to quickly find what they’re looking for. A user who has tried and failed to use the menus will use the search bar as a life raft for navigation. 

Google Analytics reports can help with 2 key questions here: how many people are using search, and what are they searching for? The site search overview report may well be enough to satisfy the needs of most, particularly designers. Within this report, you can see the number of sessions that utilised search, as well as the most common search terms. 

If you consider the number of sessions that used search, and compare this with the total number of sessions, you can begin to draw conclusions about the way users are engaging with the site. Put simply, if most sessions use search, then either this is just the way that users want to navigate the site, or there are navigation failings elsewhere that drive users towards search. This means the UX practitioner can focus on things like information architecture and menu design in order to make the non-search journey as simple and user friendly as possible.  

Also, if we can understand the prevalence of search among our users, we can focus on the search experience itself. Is the search bar prominently positioned? Are the search results clear? Is filtering adequate? These factors should be carefully considered anyway. But again, in terms of being able to focus your efforts, understanding the role of search for your users can help you to prioritise focus appropriately.   

The second key observation is what search terms are being used. Knowing what users are looking for with such specificity is invaluable. You’ll be able to learn not only the common needs of users, but also what things the users find difficult to locate.  

If the most common search term on a clothing website is ‘men’s jackets’, and the website has a page called ‘men’s coats’ which is tucked away within a complicated mega menu, you can start to paint a picture of the issue. Firstly, are you speaking the same language as the user? Do users actually use the terminology that the site is using? Does the mega menu accidentally hide sections that are important to users? Does the homepage highlight the most popular sections and ranges? And so on.  

Site search is a great way to get a quantitative measure of user needs and behaviour. It can offer a much deeper insight than you can necessarily achieve with user interviews, because you’re observing the behaviour of all users, not just the few you can arrange a meeting with. It can help to reveal the specific content that users are struggling to find and help you to prioritise and surface the right things in the architecture and navigation of the site. 

In summary, there’s always room to improve your process. I believe these Google Analytics reports for designers can help you not only to produce a better result, but to explain your actions to stakeholders more effectively. Besides these five, there are many other aspects of Google Analytics that offer huge value to UX designers as well as digital marketers, from session duration to custom reports made especially to highlight something that’s relevant to your particular project. Now that my eyes have been opened, I plan to continue learning more to improve and underpin my work at Cyber-Duck and would encourage all in UX to do the same. 

#uxdesign #googleanalytics #ux