Setting Up and Reading Tracking Goals

Analyze records every click automatically. A goal takes one of those clicks and marks it as important, which unlocks conversion reporting for it. Goals are the difference between knowing what visitors clicked and knowing whether the site is working.

What a Goal Can Track

Goals track clicks on buttons and links. A goal cannot track a scroll, a video play, or the content of a form submission. If the action you care about ends in a click, it can be a goal.

Creating a goal requires Designer permission or above. See Who Can Access Analyze.

Choosing Good Goals

Fewer, clearer goals are more useful than many overlapping ones. A goal earns its place when the answer would change a decision.

• Start with the actions tied to pipeline. Demo requests, contact sales clicks, and trial or access requests come first.
• Add the content actions that signal intent. Gated asset downloads, webinar registrations, and event sign-ups.
• Add navigation actions only when a question depends on them. A click from a solution page into pricing is worth tracking if someone is asking whether that path works.
• Skip the obvious. Header and footer navigation clicks generate large numbers and rarely change a decision.

Naming Goals

Goal names appear in reports with no surrounding context, so the name has to stand alone. Use the pattern Action - Location.

• Demo request - Solution pages
• Gated download - CAS Insights
• Contact sales - Global footer

Avoid names such as Button 2 or New goal. A vague name costs someone time every month for as long as the goal exists.

Reading the Results

Goal conversion rates appear at the top of the site overview, and goal results have their own reporting view. Two numbers matter:

• Completions. How many times the goal click happened.
• Conversion rate. How often sessions included that click.

Read both together. A rising conversion rate on falling traffic is not the same result as a rising rate on steady traffic, even though the percentage looks identical.

Cautions

• A click is not a submission. A demo request goal counts the button click. Someone who clicks and then abandons the form still counts. Compare goal counts against the marketing systems before reporting a lead number.
• Goals depend on the element they were built against. Rebuilding a section or swapping a component can break a goal silently. Check goals after any significant page rebuild.
• Goals do not backfill. A goal reports from the day it was created forward, so create goals before a campaign launches rather than after.
• Localized and tested variations combine. See Using Analyze With Localize and Optimize.