google analytics real time
Google Analytics, the world’s favorite web analytics tool that lets you track visitors to your website, just got better. It now offers traffic reports in real-time.
Earlier there was a delay of 3-4 hours before Google could update their reports but now the Analytics charts on your screen will update almost instantly (see video) as visitors enter or leave your pages.
Google Analytics offers three key metrics for your site in real-time – where are people coming from (geographic location), how are they finding your site (search queries and referrals) and what are they reading on your site (top pages). You also get to know the number of visitors that are currently on your site.
The real-time reporting feature just got enabled in my Google Analytics dashboard and the traffic reports are now absolutely fascinating to watch. The location real-time report is integrated with Google Earth plug-in as well but for some reason, it didn’t work in any of my browsers.
Now if I share a story on Twitter, or if some popular site decides to link to this blog, I can quickly jump to Google Analytics’ real-time reports to see the jump in traffic.

Video – Google Analytics in Real-Time

If you don’t the real-time feature in in your Google account yet, just fill in this form to request early access. On a related note, this little announcement could possibly affect the business of several other players whose sole USP was real-time analytics.