Hi All, I pasted in the Digital Point search engine code (the easy option that doesn't require any instillation -just copying and pasting code) to all the pages on a test site of mine. This test site also is running the new Google Analytics. I was wondering whether Google Analytics records data of searches performed on my site using Didital Point's search tool (powered by Google)? If it does then how does it present the data? Does it see it as a regular Google search? If it does then that would mean my Google.com referrals would be incorrect. Please could someone confirm whether my Google Analytics data is affected by using a Google site search on my site? Thanks!
If you add your Google Analytics code to the search results page (the search.php file), then it should track the searches just fine. It would not be considered a search from Google though since GA looks for google.com in the URL.
Hi Shawn, Wow that must be the quickest reply ever, thanks! I'm not sure I explained myself clearly enough though - I'm using the option at the bottom of the http://www.digitalpoint.com/tools/search/ page: "If you don't want to run a search engine script on your own server, this HTML code can be used to add search functionalty to your site (powered by Google):" When I run a search from my site for 'recipes' the results page is as follows: http://www.google.com/custom?domains=www.proteinbodybuilding.com&q=recipes&sitesearch=www.proteinbodybuilding.com&client=pub-5676236325709660&forid=1&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&cof=GALT%3A%23008000%3BGL%3A1%3BDIV%3A%23336699%3BVLC%3A663399%3BAH%3Acenter%3BBGC%3AFFFFFF%3BLBGC%3A336699%3BALC%3A0000FF%3BLC%3A0000FF%3BT%3A000000%3BGFNT%3A0000FF%3BGIMP%3A0000FF%3BFORID%3A1%3B&hl=en If someone clicks on one of the results they are coming from Google.com (see URL above) right? I checked my other stats at my hosting company and their 'referring urls' data shows I got a few referrals from www.google.com/custom - this is something I don't see in Google Analytics. Any ideas whether Google Analytics ignores www.google.com/custom? Obvioulsy I can't add the search code to the results page as I don't control it. Thanks again
Oops sorry... missed that part. Yeah, for the "easy" way to do it (on Google's site), it's not possible to track those because you don't control the Google page, and when a user clicks back in from there, it's going to be logged as a Google search (well technically it IS). I've never tried it, but maybe you could create a filter to your Google Analytics profile to filter those out somehow? I know there are filters, but I've not messed with them before.
Thanks for the filter suggestion. I'll take a look and let you know if I am able to set up a filter. I may just go with the full digital point tool though. Cheers