Adjusting Google Analytics analytics.js (Universal analytics) for meaningful blog statistics

I’m running a wordpress site, where we want to keep an eye on the number of visitors and their behaviour on the site. It turned out to be very easy to get started: Create an account in google analytics and 10 minutes later, you’ll be instructed to enter a code snippet within your head tags (This is the version served for so called Universal Analytics, where the file analytics.js is called.):
<script>
(function(i,s,o,g,r,a,m){i['GoogleAnalyticsObject']=r;i[r]=i[r]||function(){
(i[r].q=i[r].q||[]).push(arguments)},i[r].l=1*new Date();a=s.createElement(o),
m=s.getElementsByTagName(o)[0];a.async=1;a.src=g;m.parentNode.insertBefore(a,m)
})(window,document,'script','//www.google-analytics.com/analytics.js','ga');

ga('create', 'UA-xxxxxxx-x', 'sitename.com');
ga('send', 'pageview');
</script>

Since I use the very functional wordpress theme graphene, adding the code was very easy: there’s a special section in the theme settings for that.

A few days later, I realized that there was more to do. The number of bounces was quite high, as if the vast majority of the readers were some kind of bots, who closed a page just after opening it.

Some reading revealed the sad thing to me:
By default, Google analytics only registers each pageview. The time of a pageview is calculated as the time from when the page is opened, until a new page is opened in the same session. Unfortunately, this means that the viewing time for the page last opened becomes 0 (zero). And: if someone opens only one page and reads it carefully, before closing it, this will be regarded as a bounce with zero time on site.

I found some scripts to handle this problem, but they didn’t work, and the reason for this seems to be that I’m using the latest beta-version of google analytics, whish employs a script named analytics.js.

So, here’s what I have done: I just needed to add a couple of lines, now my script looks like this (as in the previous code sample, the site specific details are redacted):
<script>
(function(i,s,o,g,r,a,m){i['GoogleAnalyticsObject']=r;i[r]=i[r]||function(){
(i[r].q=i[r].q||[]).push(arguments)},i[r].l=1*new Date();a=s.createElement(o),
m=s.getElementsByTagName(o)[0];a.async=1;a.src=g;m.parentNode.insertBefore(a,m)
})(window,document,'script','//www.google-analytics.com/analytics.js','ga');

ga('create', 'UA-xxxxxxxx-x', 'sitename.com');
ga('send', 'pageview');
var myintervalid = setInterval(function() {ga('send', 'event', 'top', 'top', 'top');},30000);
setTimeout(function(){clearInterval(myintervalid);},1800000);
</script>

So, what will these two additional lines do?
30 seconds after a page was opened, if the page still is open, it will start sending a "beacon" in the form of an event to google analytics. This is repeated every 30 seconds. (Actually, every 30000 milliseconds…). As soon as the first beacon arrives, the pageview stops being a bounce. And when the reader closes the page, the pageview time will correspond to the latest received beacon.

By the way, if I in Google Analytics open the tab for real-time events, I can see these beacons coming in every 30 seconds. It gives a nice, warm feeling!

However, some people open a page and forget about it. In order to not have google analytics count hours of (empty) viewing, I added the last row, which terminates the repetition after half an hour (i.e. 1800000 milliseconds).

Why I named the event top? Just my abbreviation for "time on page".

Possible further development:
I might inhibit the beacon if the user isn’t scrolling, but that feels like a slightly bigger project for a less busy day.

And yes, it works. Now the bounce rates and visit times look more realistic. (It’s very normal that some 20% of the visitors leave the site within 30 seconds without opening a second page.)

Here’s a link to an article, that pointed me in the right direction: http://analytics.blogspot.com.es/2012/07/tracking-adjusted-bounce-rate-in-google.html

Did this help you? Please comment below (or ping me).