Web Analytics

New Google Analytics Treemaps

Google Analytics recently added a new Treemaps feature to Acquisition Reports as part of the March 30, 2015 Google Analytics update.  Treemaps are a very useful way to understand how traffic arrives to your website. You can find Google Analytics Treemaps under:

Acquisition > All Traffic > Treemaps

So what are Treemaps and what can they tell you?

What are Treemaps?

Treemaps are a type of visualization that represent data as rectangles. Each segment of data is a rectangle. The sizes of the rectangles communicate the size of that segment. The color of the rectangle shows how that segment measures for a different, secondary metric on a scale of high (green) to low (red).

In the screenshot below, for example, the color indicates Pages / Session. You can easily see that while Organic is the channel responsible for the most sessions (it is the biggest rectangle) Direct is the channel with the highest Pages/Session (it is the darkest green).

Google Analytics Treemap

By hovering over the dialog icon in the rectangles, you can see the value of the metrics.

Google Analytics Treemaps: hover to view more information

By clicking on the rectangles, you can drill down to see more details about the segment. For example, clicking on the Social channel will break down the selected metrics by different social networks, while clicking on the Referral channel will show the performance of sessions by the different referrers. Here you can see the specific landing pages that had direct traffic, measured by how many Sessions each had and how many Pages/Session began with each page.

Google Analytics Treemaps Drill Down

You can change the Primary and Secondary Metrics of the Treemap to generate different kinds of insights.

Google Analytics Treemap: change the primary metrics

What Can Treemaps Tell You?

Treemaps let you quickly identify which channels are performing best, across a variety of different metrics. Some examples of questions you can quickly answer with Treemaps :

  • Which social network referred the most sessions to my website?
  • Are there differences in the level of engagement of users from different social networks?
  • Which referrers send the most new users to my website?
  • How does my conversion rate compare for different landing pages?
  • Is there a channel that sends less overall traffic but has a better conversion rate than others?

For more details on Treemaps , see Google Analytics Help.

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