Linking your Google AdWords account to your Google Analytics allows you to gather detailed information about the behaviour of your AdWords visitors on your website. You’re paying for the traffic, so make sure you get the best value you can by building your future web and AdWords strategy around real visitor data.

But, getting the two interacting together properly and getting real value is a little more complex than you might think. Despite the fact that it’s not that hard to do, we’ve seen several clients who haven’t properly linked them up, or even who haven’t linked them up at all. So, here are some pointers to help you get these two Google products working together like well oiled cogs in a machine!

Linking Analytics and AdWords

To link up Analytics and AdWords you must have both an Google AdWords and Google Analytics account, so make sure these are set up before you proceed.

Then do the following:

1. Log into Adwords and click into the preferences tab
2. Select “I already have an analytics account”
3. From the “Existing Google accounts” select the website you want to link up
4. Tick check boxes you want to retain
5. Click “Link account”

That’s it! Read on for a few tips on how to make sure they are working in perfect harmony.

Tip #1: Enabling auto-tagging

If you want to track an advertising campaign in Google Analytics, you have to manually tag all your ads including up to 5 different variables so that details can be captured in Google Analytics.

The beauty of using AdWords and Analytics together is that all your AdWords campaigns will be automatically tagged, saving you valuable time and money!
However, you DO need to make sure that auto tagging is enabled. Otherwise you won’t capture your data properly.

Auto tagging is enabled in the Ad Words interface:

1. Click the My Account tab and select Account Preferences
2. In the Tracking section, make sure the Auto-tagging field is set to yes.

Tip #2: Keep an eye on timezones

The timezone on Google AdWords takes precedence over Google Analytics, so if you link your accounts together, and the timezone is set differently, or is still set to a U.S timezone, then it will override your Analytics settings and the times on your reports will be skewed.

So, when you are linking the two up, make sure that you have set the timezone in AdWords correctly.

Tip #3: Isolate AdWords traffic for thorough analysis

To analyse your AdWords visitors in a single profile in your Analytics account, create a new profile for your website and set it to include only AdWords visitors by setting up a custom include filter as follows:

Then you can segment away to your heart’s content!
(Auto-tagging must be turned on for this to work.)

Any other hints or tips?

That’s all from me at the moment – if you have any more tips on Google Analytics or Adwords, feel free to add them below!

UPDATE: If you’ve already linked a different analytics account to your Adwords
account you will need to contact Google to have them unlink the
accounts.