4 Custom Alerts You Should Create in Google Analytics

Custom alerts are notifications regarding your Google Analytics account, based on conditions you...

March 20, 2024

Custom alerts are notifications regarding your Google Analytics account, based on conditions you have created.

For example, you canset up a custom alert when the number of sessions exceeds a certain number.This will let you know if there’s a sudden drastic increase in visits to yourwebsite, which could be due to hackers or spam traffic. Being aware of this andof other sudden changes on your website will help you remedy any issues as soonas possible.

Here are 4 GoogleAnalytics custom alerts every marketing team should create:

1) No Website Traffic

Create an alert totrack zero visitors on your website. When there’s no website traffic tracked byGoogle Analytics, this generally means that there’s something wrong with thetracking code or the Google Analytics account. This could mean that the GoogleAnalytics code has been removed or that the WordPress plug-in that you’re usingto set up Google Analytics tracking on your website needs to be updated.

To set up a customalert for no website traffic, go to the admin section of your Google Analyticsaccount and click on Custom Alerts.

Google Analytics

Then create an alertname, select the respective view, period (e.g., “Day”), and the email address orphone number for receiving alerts. Set up the following alert conditions:

  • Thisapplies to > All Traffic
  • Alert me when > Sessions > Is less than 1
Google Analytics

2) Average Page LoadTime

Create a custom alertto track the page load time. If the page load time in a day exceeds the averagepage load time, you can contact your IT team or web designer to see if there’sanything wrong with your website or web hosting. To create a custom alert foraverage page load time, set up the following conditions:

  • Thisapplies to > All Traffic
  • Alert me when > Avg. Page Load Time (sec) > Is greater than > ___(I normally use 3 seconds as the value)
Google Analytics

3) Bounce Rate ofGoogle Ads Campaigns

You can also trackspikes or drops in the bounce rate of your Google Ads campaigns. If you havemade changes to your Google Ads campaigns, you can use Google Analytics customalerts to see if those changes have positively or negatively impacted your campaignperformance. To create a custom alert for a Google Ads campaign bounce rate, setup the following conditions:

  • This applies to > Campaign; Condition > Matches regular expression;under Value, enter the campaign name
  • Alert me when > Bounce Rate; Condition > % increases by more than____; under Value, enter a percentage (e.g., 30%); Compared to > Previousday
Google Analytics

4)  ReferralTraffic

Use Google Analyticscustom alert to track a spike in referral traffic. If there’s an unknownincrease in referral traffic, there’s a good chance that it’s spam traffic. Tocreate a custom alert when the number of sessions increases by more than 30%compared to the previous day, set up these conditions:

  • This applies to > Medium; Condition > Matches regular expression;under Value, enter referral
  • Alert me when > Sessions; Condition > % increased more than; underValue, enter a percentage (e.g., 30%); Compared to > Previous day
Google Analytics

Custom alerts are useful to advise marketers and managers of sudden or unwanted changes to their website, Google Analytics account and paid campaigns. Being aware of issues or unwanted changes on your website or campaigns will help you respond and address issues quickly!

Written by Ray Wang