Read your analytics

Where to look

1. In your site's admin, open "Insights", then "Analytics". One "Period" governs every tab: "Today", "7d", "28d", "90d" or "Pick dates", up to 365 days. The period stays in the page's address, so a link reopens the same view.
2. "Overview" opens with a plain sentence about the period, then tiles for "People", "Visits", "Pages read" and your site's goal, each with its change and a small trend line. Below them sit "People over time", "Where they came from", "What they read", "What they did" and "How these numbers are made".
3. "Reports" starts from "What do you want to know?". "Change what this counts" splits, filters and compares, and a selected row can open the people behind it.
4. The "Funnels", "Sources", "Campaigns" and "Measures" tabs sit beside them, and "Set an alert" sits beside any answer in "Reports".
5. In "Insights", then "Explore", the "Events" tab shows events as they arrive, refreshed every 5 seconds.

What the numbers mean

• People are distinct visitors. A visit ends after 30 minutes without activity, or at 24 hours. An engaged visit has at least 10 seconds of visible time, at least 2 pages, or a goal reached.
• Where they came from credits each visitor to how they first arrived, and keeps their latest arrival as well.
• A goal counts the past. Define one today, and it counts what happened before it existed.
• Revenue is purchases minus refunds, and a refund counts in the period it happened.

Good to know

• Every number is computed from the events stored in your site's own database, with no sampling. A question too large to answer exactly is refused rather than sampled.
• Visitors who have not allowed analytics are not counted as people. Their purchases still count as revenue, without identity, and every answer says who is missing.
• Your own previews, and migration previews, are never counted.
• Changes shown in "Overview" and "Reports" are plain differences. Significance testing lives in Experiments and in the funnel drivers.

In a sentence

Ask the copilot "Visitors this week, by source?". Reading changes nothing. An alert such as "Email me if sign-ups fall 30% below normal" pauses for your approval first.