Set-up a Custom Report

Custom Reports are similar to Dashboards in that they are templates that display information pulled from your account. Unlike reports determined by Google, Custom Reports are customized to only display the information you want to show.

For example, a regular 'Pages' report includes the metrics: 'Pageviews', 'Unique Pageviews', 'Avg. Time on Page', 'Entrances', 'Bounce Rate', '% Exit', and 'Page Value'. If only half of these metrics are useful to you and you'd like other once included instead, you can set up what you have in mind as a Custom Report.

Finding GA’s Custom Reports

To find your custom report(s) look in GA’s top-navigation. It is the third option and labeled ‘Customization’. When you click on it, you will see a list of all Custom Report(s) in your account.

How to set up your own Custom Report:

1. Click on 'Customization' in GA’s top-navigation.
2. Click on ‘+ New Dashboard’. You will go to a page named 'Create Custom Report' with several fields to fill out:
   • General Information - Title: this is the name of your report
   • Report Content - Report Tab: by default you have one tab, if you would like more than one, add it here.
   • Report Content - Name: you can also give specific names to your tab(s) here.
   • Report Content - Type: the report defaults to 'Explorer', which is similar to most reports within GA.
     Changes to what the type of report you choose affect your options later on.
   • Report Content - Metric Group: 'Metrics' are what data displays in the columns of your report. You can select several -- be sure to arrange the list as you would like the list to appear in your report by clicking and dragging on the dotted lines on the right side of each Metric.
   • Report Content - Dimension Drilldowns: You can display one 'Dimension' on your report (to add another on a single report, you must use the 'Secondary Dimension' option within your report.) A 'drilldown' allows you to link the results in the Dimension column with deeper results, eg. when you click on a (primary) Dimension 'Source' result you then see the associated Landing Page results that are unique to that first result.
   • Filters: you can customize the report to only display results associated with your pages. This requires the use of Regular Expressions. Click on 'Add Filter' > select 'Page' > ensure it reads 'Include', 'Page', 'Regex', and your url displayed as a Regular Expression.
   • Views: by default the Custom Report will appear in the account you are creating it in; you can also apply it to all accounts you have access to.
3. Click 'Save' and your Custom Report will be available in the left-navigation within the 'Customization' section.

About sharing Custom Reports

If you have set up a Custom Report that one of your colleagues is interested in, you can share it by following these steps:

1. Click on the ‘Customization’ link in your top navigation – a list will appear with all your Custom Reports.
2. To share a Custom Report privately, click on the button to the right of the Custom Report you'd like to share marked ‘Actions’
3. Select 'Share' and a pop-up window will appear with the option to 'Share template link' (recommended) or 'Share in Solutions Gallery' (not recommended: as it will share with everyone with access to Google Analytics including those outside of York)
4. Click 'Share' and you will be provided with a unique link -- share this with your colleague(s) so they can apply your Custom Report to their account.

If you’d like to share data reports that include data from a specific website with someone without access to GA, you can export or email it to them.