Since releasing the new Google Analytics, we've received repeated requests for specific features. We felt strongly that these features deserved to be incorporated into the product immediately so, as of today, everyone has access to the most requested improvements. We are also removing the beta tag from the new interface and we'd like to remind everyone that the previous version of Google Analytics will be removed on July 18th.
What improvements can you expect to see? Here are the most prominent changes:
Hourly Reporting
Many of you listed hourly reporting as the most important feature missing in the new interface. We've put it back. Several of the reports now have a "View by: Daily/Hourly" switch that allows you to select whether you want to see your data by day or by hour. Andy Beal, our friends at Yelp, and thousands of others can rejoice in their hourly window to the world.
Clickable URLs
Danny Sullivan and a legion of others will be thrilled to see that we've added the ability to click straight through to external pages from links referenced in reports. Just click on the icon next to any link listed in the Referring Sites, Top Content, Top Landing Pages, and Top Exit Pages reports.
Cross Segmentation by Network Location
Many of you expressed disappointment that you couldn't cross segment reports by Network Location. Now you can.
Increased number of data rows per page
The interface now allows you to view up to 500 rows of data on a single report page, increased from a maximum of 100 rows.
Bounce Rate increase/decrease
Our always observant resident analytics evangelist, Avinash Kaushik, pointed out that an increase in bounce rate (not desirable) was displayed in green and a decrease in bounce rate (a desirable result) was displayed in red. He was right, so we flipped the colors. Bounce rate increases are now displayed in red and bounce rate decreases are displayed in green. Ah, much better.
AdWords Integration
It's now much easier to link your AdWords account to your Google Analytics account, so if you haven't done it yet, now is the time.
If you look very carefully, you may also notice the following changes:
- Google Analytics now recognizes the following search engines: aol.fr, club-internet.fr, voila.fr and mama.com.
- Reports that are newly added to the dashboard now have their data linked to their more detailed versions.
- We've added Help resources to the Email Reports interface.
- Several countries have been added to the list menu in Step 2 of the Account Activation process. The list is now consistent with available country choices in AdWords.
Finally, our release notes are posted in our Help Center if you would like to keep up to date on future Google Analytics changes. We hope you enjoy the new features.
