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  4. Tracking pdf downloads

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Tracking pdf downloads

Reporting & Analytics
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  • Socialdude
    Socialdude last edited by Sep 12, 2011, 8:27 AM

    hello,

    I have a site with 100's of pdf's for download and I would like to track how many people are downloading these, does anyone have a simple solution for this?

    Is there anyway I can do this in Google Analytics using one piece of code, thanks...

    1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
    • Socialdude
      Socialdude last edited by Sep 13, 2011, 5:17 AM Sep 13, 2011, 5:17 AM

      Hi Guys thank you to all for your help on this topic 🙂  It's very much appreciated, cheers...

      1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
      • alue
        alue last edited by Sep 12, 2011, 10:25 PM Sep 12, 2011, 10:25 PM

        For hundreds of files you might want to consider these Ga hacks: Brian Clifton's GA add-ons http://www.advanced-web-metrics.com/blog/free-to-use-plugins/ There is another by Stephane Hamel http://gaAddons.com/ Both will do the job...

        1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
        • mickey11
          mickey11 last edited by Sep 12, 2011, 3:19 PM Sep 12, 2011, 3:19 PM

          install piwik it will tell you how many times that url with the pdf was downloaded, also awstats which usually comes standard on cpanel will tell you the number of downloads.

          1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
          • EnhancedPath
            EnhancedPath last edited by Sep 12, 2011, 8:47 AM Sep 12, 2011, 8:47 AM

            You could use some jQuery to pull the name of the file into the trackPageview GA call from the href, that would automate populating it anyway. If href contains pdf, onClick is now this, etc.

            1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
            • PeterAlexLeigh
              PeterAlexLeigh last edited by Sep 12, 2011, 8:44 AM Sep 12, 2011, 8:44 AM

              One method would be to use the logs on your server. If you're using IIS for example, every time a pdf was downloaded or viewed, this would be stored in the IIS Logs. It would normally show the time, date and IP address that viewed the pdf file.

              You can get software to analyse these logs here;

              http://www.iis.net/community/default.aspx?tabid=34&i=1864&g=6

              Otherwise instead of linking directly to your pdf in your website, you could point the link to anther html page, which then in turn opens/downloads the pdf. You could then put the Google Analytics tracking code in this html page and then you would be able to track how many time that page was viewed in analytics (and therefore how many times the pdf was viewed).

              The html page would just need to contain a simple redirect to the pdf, eg.

              <title>Your Page Title</title>

              Optional page text here.

              You would also need to insert your analytics tracking code in the section.

              Hope this helps.

              1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 1
              • StalkerB
                StalkerB last edited by Sep 12, 2011, 8:40 AM Sep 12, 2011, 8:40 AM

                You want to track individual pdfs?

                Off the top of my head adding ="javascript: pageTracker._trackPageview('/spoofpage')>anchor text will spoof a page view to your spoofpage in analytics.

                That will require individually tagging each pdf though.

                Let me have a think if there's anyway to change the 'spoofpage' to the href 'url' to allow you to add the same code to each.

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