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Asynchronous Tracking with Google Analytics

2010 March 19
by Barry

There are a lot of interesting improvements happening with Google Analytics which are bringing enterprise level features to the masses.

I’ve blogged before on speeding up web pages, as well as a handy tricky on storing the GA code locally, and now Google have added a new method of calling their tracking code, called Asynchronous Tracking.

  • Faster overall page load time.
  • Improved collection for short visits to rich media or script-heavy pages.
  • Collecting (and retaining) user clicks that occur before the tracking code loads.

I recently took the GAIQ exam, and a large amount of questions were geared towards rich media & session data, where effective tracking is a little cumbersome (especially in flash) – so this is a welcome development from Google. Impressively it also comes with an API with the push function looking particular powerful.

google analytics asynchronous tracking code1 600x161 Asynchronous Tracking with Google Analytics

Installing the code is pretty simple, either grab the updated snippet from your Google Analytics account, or use some of the migration examples and drop that code in high up your page after the <body> tag.

from → Google Analytics, Web Analytics