The Five Best Resources for Getting Help with Google Analytics

How to get help, tips and tricks to drive more value from Google Analytics and fast answers to your questions

By Phil Kemelor, Principal, PKWeb Communications LLC

The introduction of Google Analytics has certainly popularized the use of analytics, but you're pretty much on your own when it comes to figuring out how to use it, much less extend its value. In this article, I'll provide links to excellent sites that can help you along.

Start with Google Analytics Help Center

Basically what passes for the User Manual. While it may be good at explaining how to do things, it doesn't always tell you why you should be doing them. Nevertheless, this is the "mother lode" of official Google Analytics (GA) support.
Try: Google Analytics Help Center as your starting point for GA, and as a good reference point if you run into something that you can't figure out, or want to get into more advanced analytics.

Stay current with the Google Analytics Blog

The most significant value of the blog is staying current on outages, delays and new feature announcements. Although it bills itself as "The latest news, tips and resources straight from the Google Analytics team" there are better resources out there.
Try: The Official Google Analytics Blog as a source you should read daily in order to stay current with the "official" postings from the GA team.

From Basics to Advanced

Justin Cutroni's blog, Analytics Talk, is simply one of the most authoritative and well written sources on Google Analytics. Justin works for EpikOne, a Google Analytics Partner, and he knows GA inside and out. EpikOne offers a full range of GA training and support if you should want to go that route.
Try: Analytics Talk as a daily or weekly read if you really want to learn how to master GA.

Tips, Tricks and Techniques

ROI Revolution produces a monthly email newsletter that mixes good advice with promotions for their training and services. There's usually at least a few nuggets of value that you'll come away with to make it worth your time.
Try: ROI Revolution Analytics Newsletter on a monthly basis.

Call in the Reinforcements

Ok, so Google Analytics is free, but you or your team doesn't have the time or experience to figure out how to set up tracking of ad campaigns, e-commerce, visitor segmentation and report access. What do you do? Pay someone to help you. For this you'll go the Support page, where you'll find links to certified Google Analytics Partners, who can help you figure things out, or do all your analytics for you.
Try: Google Analytics Support if you need to find a support option.

I did not list the Google Analytics Group. I would avoid this source because you won't be able to quantify the authority of the answer, and you'll have to search through thousands of entries to find a possible answer to your questions.
Analyze the data. Although I've focused this guide on technical assistance with GA, remember that all the data in the world is worthless unless you dedicate yourself or someone on your team to analyze it in context with your web site or web marketing goals.
Google Analytics is a great tool, but because there is no one you can speak to for technical support, it can get frustrating. When assessing web analytic tools, don't just think of the upfront cost, think of the time you'll need to put in to learn how to use it and maintain the tool. After doing this, you may determine that spending the money on a supported tool is a better business value.