Spotlight customer reviews:
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Customer Rating: 
Summary: A fantastic reference for a fantastic resource for Web analytics
Comment: I welcomed the arrival of Google Analytics 2.0 after having found the preceding edition to be very useful. The authors walk the reader through the basics of web analytics, going into as much detail as a novice would need to set up your first Google Analytics account, dissecting the platform section by section and not skimming when it comes to dealing with the advanced topic of Goal Setting, arguably one of the toughest (and most important) things you can do with Google Analytics.
The one downside of this book is the same problem any book dealing with software has: it will get outdated, which is the reason why the authors published this new edition. Outside of this, it's an excellent reference for anyone seeking to become familiarized with analytics at large and, specifically, with how the world's best free analytics package (and one of the best ones, including those that you pay for!) -Google Analytics. Take my word for it: I have been a Google Analytics user since I could get my hands on it and a WebTrends user (a very expensive alternative) since 2002.
Customer Rating: 
Summary: Just a manual, nothing more....
Comment: I bought this book to try and get some more insight into the use of GA 2.0
I had already been using the regular version, 1.0, so I thought a book would help me understand the new release better. Unfortunately, this book does not do this. If your a regular user of GA, do not think that this book will give you any more insight than Google already does via there own site. It is not a copy and paste from the GA Help Center, but after skimming through the book I can honestly say that I only picked up 1 or 2 new items, of which I needed to go online in the end to get the real answers I needed.
My 2 cents... wait for Brian Clifton's book "Advanced Web Metrics with Google Analytics". It might be the book that I had hoped this book would be.
Customer Rating:
Summary: Essential Manual For Anyone Who Wants To Get The Most Out Of Google Analytics
Comment: There is a ton of out-of-the-box functionality built into Google Analytics, but if a user never goes beyond that they will miss out on some of the biggest benefits that can be found in features like goals, and custom filters. These features can be used to track the success of your web site, your marketing efforts, and your products and services ... which could be important. This book presents these fairly complex concepts in plain language that anyone who is fairly technical can understand.
The book also explains how to setup profiles and other users so that multiple people in an organization can have access to the reports. This is pretty easy to do, but again the book explains it in such a way that almost anyone can understand the importance of assigning users to a particular profile and the differences in roles (i.e. reports only or account administrator).
It also walks you through each report section of Google Analytics, and gives you an overview of what each report is displaying, it's drill-down capabilities, and any assumptions or "gotchas" that might exist to help you understand the data behind the report. It also points out a few real-world business uses of a few of the reports, and how you can leverage a particular report to make business or design decisions ... which also could be important.
Overall, I think this is an essential manual for anyone who wants to get the most out of Google Analytics. Like I said, the software really has a lot of power and functionality out-of-the-box, but if you can go beyond that into some of the more custom features you will get a lot more value out of it ... and this book helps you get there. Its an easy, light read and most people can probably read it in just a few sittings. I would recommend it to anyone in your organization that is going to ever log into Google Analytics.
http://www.stuffthatjustworks.com/2007/11/11/GoogleAnalytics20.aspx
Customer Rating:
Summary: Somewhat useful basic guide for GA but lacking in areas
Comment: I have read a ton of guides and information on Google Analytics, have taken a 6 week training course (provided by ROI Revolution who happen to be mentioned in this book as it would have it) and have used it for my companies sites as well as some of my clients. I had never read the first version of this book due to the not-so-flattering reviews of it so I decided to take a look at the latest version to see what it had to offer and if it had any useful content I had missed.
After reading it I would say that it is a useful basic guide for anyone getting started with Google Analytics as well as for those looking to brush up on their knowledge and to have a handy guide. There are also some solid, advanced topics they cover in the book such as regular expressions, advanced filters, as well as many side bars and notes during chapters. However,some of these advanced topics feel like they have been thrust upon the reader under the assumption that the reader already has some understanding of some of the advanced topics. I feel as there was not enough back-story to properly introduce some of their advanced topics and many times the location of these advanced topics messed with the flow of the book; they were introduced at times when the section of the book you were reading was rather basic.
The flow of the book (and the interesting tone at some points) seemed a bit off to me and one of the biggest things in Google Analytics was completely left out or barely even touched upon and that was setting up tracking for an E-Commerce site. There is a lot that goes into this (though it is not necessarily difficult but there are many different variables and codes you will need to know and utilize) and you truly need to assess your website and how it is structured before setting up the tracking code, the hidden form and some of the other utm functions (too little time and space to explain all that here). I was very surprised, and quite dissapointed actually, this was completely left out as it it really is a huge part of Google Analytics. They also did not mention or explain many of the other different variables and codes that allow you to more fully take advantage of Google Analytics and make it work just right for you and your business.
Not a bad basic guide to have handy for understanding the reports and some other things but really surprised at how much they left out for the sake of some of the really basic stuff they left in or espoused upon way too much. There are other resources you will need to truly grasp the whole setup process for more complex websites; this book makes it all seem so simple and basic as it doesn't explain that all too well.
Customer Rating:
Summary: Too basic
Comment: I found nothing particularly insightful in this book. Should be less "how to" and more "why".
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