Google Analytics is a powerful, and free, analytics tool, but in many ways very limited out-of-the-box.  Often, I find myself wanting to get a better understanding of how users find a website, and referral URLs are a good way to do that.  So, if you’ve ever seen a referral come up in Google Analytics and thought “I wish I had the full string”, here’s a filter you can add to do just that!

How To Get A Full Referral URL In Google Analytics

First, you need to add an advanced filter to your profile.  To do this, you need to go to the “Filter Manager” on the bottom right corner of your “Analytics Settings” page:

This will show you all of your current filters for your website profiles.  To add a new filter, simply click “Add Filter” in the top right hand corner:

Here is where the fun begins!  What we’re going to do now is build a filter that catches all of the referring URLs (query strings and all) and drop it into the often unused “User Defined” report.  Keep in mind, if you are using custom User variables, you may want to make a copy of your current profile to apply this filter to, as it will overwrite any current reports!

So, first off, you’ll want to name your filter in the “Filter Name:” field.  I used “Full Referral URL”.  Then, in the “Filter Type” click the “Custom Filter” radio button.  At the very bottom of the filter types is a radio button that says “Advanced”.  Choose this one.  Below these radio buttons, you will see “Field A -> Extract A”, a dropdown menu and an empty field.  Here, you want to choose “Referral” from the dropdown menu, and you want to add (.*) to the field.  (.*) is a regular expression term that is a wildcard, and will capture everything after the Referral URL (Google Analytics truncates this by default).

Leave the “Field B -> Extract B” blank.  We’re not constructing two fields here.. just one.  Next, our filter requires an output type.  So, in the dropdown menu next to “Output To -> Constructor” choose “User Defined” and add $A1 to the empty field.  What this does is takes the Field A extraction we just did and assigns it to the “User Defined” report.  All that’s left is to require Field A and Override Output Field in the options below the constructors.  When you are done, the filter should look as follows:

Last step is to assign this filter to an available profile, then wait…

After Google has updated your analytics data (I’d recommend waiting 24hrs), you can go to Vistors, and under the User Defined report, you’ll find a report that outputs the full referral URL.  It’ll look something like this:

This report is a quick and handy way to find out the exact links users are finding your site with!

For expert consultation, business intelligence and analytics installation, contact Thirdi!

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Tags: Google, Google Analytics, SEO Tips

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