understanding Google Analytics

Well I installed Google Analytics about a week ago. So now I'm looking to make heads or tails out of this mess. Does anyone care to explain some of these charts etc?

 

Well we could write a book explaining it all, but it's easier to help if you have some specific questions, or even a mere outline of what you're interested in.

ETA: If nobody else does, I will go through in a bit to list some of the first charts you see and a brief description of what it is.

 

It's actually not that bad once you spend some time on it. But there is still a few things I'm having issues understanding like Bounce rate? Is this the amount of people that views the site but never returns?

 

A visit counts as a "bounce" when a user visits your site and either:

• Leaves without navigating to any other pages on your site (e.g. lands on your site's index, but immediately closes the tab/window), or
• Remains on the landing page for a specified time (30 minutes, for example) and remains idle. If they resume browsing your site after this specified time window, it counts as a new visit.

 

Thanks Nick,

So what is a good bounce rate percent...I mean outside of zero?

 

I think it really varies from site-to-site. I have seen some extremely high bounce rates, and some extremely low ones. I'm not sure what is a "good" range though.

On my Linnie forum, the bounce rate is 25% and here on AA, it's 0.6% . :lol:
This thread may be of interest to you: http://www.adminaddict.net/forum/monetization-traffic/whats-your-bounce-rate-1571/ (maybe you want to "bump" it asking for some more responses, as not that many people have posted their rates, and I'm curious to see some more)