If you wish to track the clicks of a mailto link in Google Analytics as a Goal Conversion then read on. First, you’ll need to edit the HTML used to create your mailto link. It should start out looking something like this:

<a href=”mailto:email@address.com”>Email Me Now</a>

Edit your HTML to look like this (depending on which version of the Google Analytics tracking code you use):

For GA.js:
<a href=”mailto:email@address.com” onClick=”javascript:pageTracker._trackPageview(’/mailto/agent-email’);”>Email Me Now</a>

For urchin.js:
<a href=”mailto:email@address.com” onClick=”javascript:urchinTracker (’/mailto/agent-email’);”>Email Me Now</a>

(If you’re not sure if you’re using GA.js or urchin.js look at your Analytics snippet which should be located just before the </body> tag at the bottom of your webpage.)

In the above example /mailto/agent-email can be anything you want it to be. Just be sure to make a note of it because you’ll need it when setting up the Goal.

To setup the goal, open the profile in Google Analytics and click on Edit in the settings column. Next, click Edit next to the Goal you’d like to configure. It should look like this:

I recently encountered a scenario where a simple 301 redirect was setup in IIS which winded up breaking Google Analytics for AdWords tracking. What happened is that a 301 redirect was setup in order to combine www.website.com and website.com into one as www.website.com. This is a standard SEO tactic used to ensure that search engines only see one version of a website. This prevents duplicate content issues and focuses any PageRank received from inbound links to one site.

Here is the correct way to setup a 301 redirect in IIS:

1. Open IIS.
2. Right-click on your site (www.website.com) and select properties.
3. Next to the IP Address field click ‘Advanced’ there should only be one IP with a host header value of www.website.com.
4. Click OK.
5. Create a new site (website.com).
6. Right-click the new site (website.com) and select properties.
7. Next to the IP Address field click ‘Advanced’ and add the same IP from www.website.com then set the host header value to website.com.
8. Click OK.
9. Click the ‘Home Directory’ tab.
10. Click the ‘A redirection to a URL’ radio button.
11. Insert the new URL, www.website.com in the ‘Redirect to:’ field.
12. Check the box next to ‘The exact URL entered above’.
13. Check the box next to ‘A permanent redirection for this resource’.
14. Click OK.

Guess what – you just broke your website. Here’s how; If a backlink to your site uses a deep link, like website.com/folder/page.html and you set your redirect to www.website.com then anyone clicking that backlink will be sent directly to the root of your site (or worse) at www.website.com instead of the deep link page that you intended them to visit.

In order to properly execute a 301 redirect in IIS you must follow the ‘Redirect to:’ URL with $S$Q in order to pass the suffix of the URL to the redirected URL like this http://www.website.com$S$Q (note there is no / after the .com).

This change will allow http://website.com/folder/page.html to redirect to http://www.website.com/folder/page.html properly within IIS.

-Enjoy!

Check out this link if you need to setup 301 redirects in PHP / Apache.

Check out this link if you need more IIS 301 information.

As an SEM Developer I frequently meet with clients to discuss their monthly reports. I use Google Analytics for all of my clients and while GA’s reports are usually self-explanatory there are occasions where the results can be somewhat confusing. Today I met with a client who works for a company that sells luxury homes ($1.5m+) in the Atlanta Georgia area. She was wondering why she was getting so many visits from Brooklyn, NY. I pulled up the report and give her an answer on the fly during the meeting. It turns out that AOL has a connectivity point in Brooklyn. This causes the reports to reflect a large number of visitors from Brooklyn but those visitors could be anywhere in the country. Brooklyn just happens to be where they’re connecting to the internet. Today I’ll show you how we figure out what cities are driving traffic and then how to find out more about why.

1. First, login to Google Analytics and click on View Reports for your web site

2. Click on the ‘Visitors’ button on the left

3. Click on ‘May Overlay’

4. Click on the United States (or your country)

5. Below the map you’ll see a line that says ‘Detail Level:’ next to that click ‘City’

Now your map will look like the above image, below that you will see a list of the top 10 cities by traffic. Now, let’s assume there’s a city on the map that you’re getting traffic from and you want to know a little more about where it’s coming from.

1. Click the name of the city on the list

2. Below the chart you’ll see a line that says ‘Segment: None’

3. Click ‘None’ and you’ll see an entire list of options – in this post we’re focusing on ‘Network Location’

By clicking on Network Location you’ll see a list of ISPs and Businesses where visitors have connected through to your site. This is also a great way to see if employees of a certain company are visiting your site.

Enjoy!