By Rich Brooks
Expert Author
Article Date: 2009-02-10
Traffic reports are an essential tool if you have a Web site or if you're running an online marketing campaign. Tools like Google Analytics give great insight into how people found your site and their behavior once they get there.
However, if you spend time on your own site you may be skewing the reports which reduces their effectiveness. Luckily, Google Analytics gives us filters so that we can, well, filter out internal traffic. In the Google Analytics Filter video below I walk you through how to create filters that will block your own activity at your site.
If you want to filter your own traffic and you have a range of static IP addresses, or you have a dynamic IP address you have a little more work ahead of you. Google Analytic's help section has loads of information on that, but here's the quick start guide:
For Ranges:
Range: 176.168.1.1-25 and 10.0.0.1-14 IP address value : ^176\.168\.1\.([1-9]|1[0-9]|2[0-5])$|^10\.0\.0\.([1-9]|1[0-4])$
Filter Type: Custom filter > Exclude Filter Field: User Defined Filter Pattern: test_value Case Sensitive: No
Comments About the Author:
Rich Brooks is president of flyte new media, a Web site design and Internet marketing company in Portland, Maine. Flyte works with small businesses to build professional Web sites that often include e-commerce, Flash and content management systems. They promote their clients' sites through search engine optimization, e-mail marketing, business blogs and social media. You can follow him on Twitter at http://twitter.com/therichbrooks.
By Rich Brooks