Content grouping: What are they? What are they for? and how are they configured?

Content grouping: What are they? What are they for? and how are they configured?

As digital analysts each day we face different types of sites composed of many pages of content, where the analysis can become very complex. Without too much complication we are able to understand the performance of the pages that our site contains, but what if we want to go a step deeper? Through the grouping of content or content grouping we will give an exponential leap in our analysis, having a more strategic vision about our products or services presented on the web site. A grouping of content is an option in Google Analytics that allows us to compare different metrics for similar contents of our website. In this way, we will group the contents in a logical way according to the structure of our site, being able to be used as a main dimension and obtaining more powerful analysis. Google Analytics gives us the option of creating a maximum of 5 content groupings and they are valid from the date of creation, that is, the data can not be viewed retroactively. Content groupings are made at the view level. For this we will go to Manage / View / Content Grouping. Below, we detail the three ways to make a content grouping.

• Grouping by definition of rules:

This is the simplest option, but at the same time more laborious and manual. It consists of creating rules to assign content. First we will choose the dimension (Name on screen, Page and Title of the page) and then the matching option. For example: Page> contains> / pants /

• Grouping by extraction: This option will allow us to extract pages through the dimensions Name on screen, Page and Title of the page using a regular expression. It will consist of detecting a common part and a differentiator within our dimensions to form a pattern.

For example: using the Page dimension / men / shirts / / men / pants / / men / shirts / /mens/(.*?)/ (. *?) It is the differentiating part that we are going to extract to classify our content.  

The most important thing about this step is to set the correct index number (in example 1 the index number is set) and to configure the same index number in GTM(Google Tag Manager). This is the only thing that should be done in this step. At this time we have to quote the dataLayer, since it will be through this layer where we will declare the variables to be collected. In the following link you will learn more about what a dataLayer is. The rest of the steps will be executed in Google Tag Manager. We will create variables (of variable type of data layer) that will collect the values ​​(static or dynamic) of all our pages thanks to the dataLayer. Once the variables are created in GTM, the next step will be to associate them with a Google Analytics tag. Within the option of Content Groups, we will put the same index that we put in Google Analytics. In the previous example, two variables have been created (template and category_name) that will be used as a content group (indexes 1 and 2). With this, the entire Google Tag Manager configuration would already be present. Now, from Google Analytics we can use these groupings of content as primary and secondary dimensions. We can see them in the Behavior / Content / All Pages report as a primary dimension if we display “Content Grouping”.

• Grouping by tracking code:

This way of grouping the content can be done using Google Tag Manager, in this way we avoid inserting it directly into code. The first thing we will have to do is enable the tracking code in Google Analytics:

Other reports where we can also see the content groupings will be in: Behavior / Content / Pages of destination and in Behavior / Flow of behavior. In the same way, and as a secondary dimension, we can use these content groupings in the Acquisition reports. There are no longer excuses to prevent us from focusing on those data that truly interest us.