Linking Google Analytics and AdWords: Better Together

Link AdWords and Analytics logos

We don’t think that we need to do any more convincing—it’s pretty clear that using Google Analytics allows you to make data-based, rational decisions about your campaigns.

You’ll be able to know exactly how many new visitors your site got, how many pages are checked out per visit, what the bounce rate is, plus other bits and bobs of very interesting information too.

Although it might not be a desirable character trait in your personal life, being nosey when running AdWord campaigns is an absolute necessity. Putting the analytics side of things together with creative ad writing will lead to the improvement of your ads, website traffic and, ultimately, your ROI. But to do all that, you must get these two brilliant (yet isolated) Google products to ‘talk’ to each other by linking them.

Six Steps to Link Analytics and AdWords

Luckily, linking AdWords and Analytics is so easy that we won’t even need ten steps to do it. Here is our simple and quick six step-by-step guide to do what you need to do to get Analytics and AdWords to have not just a chat, but a wholehearted conversation. Let’s get to work.

Warning

Don't Get Caught Out

Before we start, we have to assume you’ve got a website that’s associated with an Analytics account. Otherwise, what the heck you’re doing reading this chapter on linking AdWords and Analytics? It is also mandatory that the Google account you’re using has edit permission for Analytics and administrative access for AdWords. After the linking is complete, you can change the permissions without affecting the link itself.

  1. Log in to your AdWords account.
  2. Select Tools > Google Analytics from the drop-down menu.
  3. Go to Admin and in the ‘Account’ column and select the Analytics account you want to add.
  4. Under the ‘Property’ column, choose which Analytics property you’d like to link. Click AdWords Linking.
  5. Select the AdWords account you want to link with the Analytics property. Click Continue.
  6. Choose a link group title under Link configuration and specify the Analytics views you wish to see for your AdWords data.
  7. Click Link Accounts button and hey, presto!

Note: You might not be able to see your Analytics data immediately, as it could take up to 24 hours

Quick Reminder

An account is the access point for Analytics, the highest level of organisation. A property is a website or an app (each with a unique tracking code), multiple of which can be controlled under one account. A view is a concrete view of data within a property that contains data filtered based on your preferences.