Google Analytics Glossary
This page is a glossary of terms that often present themselves in Google Analytics and Google AdWords.
It will be updated as time goes by with more terminology relevant to analytics.
Bounce Rate: This is the percentage of single-page visits. These are visits in which the person left your site from the entrance page. Bounce rate is a measure of visit quality and a high bounce rate generally indicates that the site entrance (landing) pages aren’t relevant to your visitors.
Clicks: When clicks are mentioned in Google Analytics they refer to a single instance of a user following a link from one page on a site to another. When referred to in Google AdWords, clicks are a measure of how many times an advertisement is clicked on by visitors. More information on clicks can be found on this site in the Clicks VS. Visits post.
Clickthrough Rate: CTR is calculated by taking the number of times an advert is clicked on and dividing it by the number of impressions it receives. For example, if an advertisement is shown 50 times and it receives 10 clicks, then the Clickthrough rate is 10 divided by 50 which equates to 20%.
Conversion: Conversions occur in Google Analytics when a visitor completes or reaches a pre-determined goal page. The page needs to be specified in the ‘goal settings’ section of each analytics profile. Good goal conversion examples include, purchase confirmation pages, registration pages, contact form completion pages and download pages. In Google Analytics you can specify the path leading up to a goal page. This produces a goal funnel, allowing you to see how users follow and leave the specified series of pages which navigate to the goal.