Google Analytics notifications (diagnostic) is a feature of Google Analytics that makes regular evaluations of your Google Analytics tracking code, account configuration, and data to find implementation issues and configuration anomalies.
Once it finds issues, it alerts the GA user through a special message known as a diagnostic notification (also known as ‘Google Analytics Notifications’).
These notifications appear as a number over the notification bell in your Google Analytics (GA) view:
However, only users with edit permission (on GA account, property or view) can see diagnostic notifications. So if you do not have ‘edit’ permission, you will not see the analytics notifications.
In order to see the list of analytics notifications, you need to first get the ‘edit’ permission and then click on the bell icon:
Each notification includes a brief description of the problem, recommends a solution and provide the following buttons/links:
DETAILS
Click on the ‘DETAILS’ link to get more details and a possible solution about the identified implementation/configuration issue.
You can also see when the issue was first and last detected:
Google diagnostic group similar implementation/configuration issues. When you click on the ‘SEE GROUP’ link, you can see the list of all the implementation/configuration issues in the group:
LEARN MORE
Once you click on the ‘DETAILS’ link, you get the option to learn even more about the identified issue via a Google Help article.
A click on the ‘LEARN MORE‘ link will redirect you to the Google help article related to the identified issue.
Click on such links to fix the implementation or configuration issue from within the reporting view.
For example, if you click on the ‘ADJUST FILTERS’ link:
Google Analytics will automatically redirect you to the ‘All Filters’ setting page, where you can edit the existing filters:
Note: These links (ADJUST/CONFIGURE/CHANGE…..) are displayed only when it is possible to fix an implementation/configuration issue from within the reporting view, property or account.
CHECK AGAIN
Once you think you have fixed the notified problem, click on the ‘CHECK AGAIN‘ link.
Google Diagnostic will now re-examine the issue in its next crawl (usually within 24 hours), and you will see the following notification:
Until the issue is re-examined, you will see that the notification has greyed out (i.e. archived), and there is a ‘Pending Verification‘ message:
After the re-crawl is complete and the problem is fixed, you will see the ‘Resolved‘ message in the archived notification:
However, if the problem still persists, the analytics notification will re-appear un-archived.
Since Google diagnostic regularly evaluates your account configuration and tracking code, there is no guarantee that the issue that was once resolved won’t reappear unresolved in the future.
So, for example, if you resolved the ‘Missing Campaign Parameters‘ issue once, it can reappear un-resolved later, in the subsequent diagnostic crawl(s), if the problem occurs again in your implementation set up.
CHECK GROUP AGAIN
Once you think you have fixed all of the implementation/configuration issues listed under a group, click on the ‘CHECK GROUP AGAIN‘ link.
IGNORE
Click on the ‘IGNORE’ link if you want to ignore the implementation/configuration issue for a while. Your notification will be archived.
If you want to restore the notification, then click on the ‘UNDO’ link.
You can also choose to ignore the notification for a particular time by selecting: 1 week, 1 month, 3 months, 6 months or All time from the ‘Dismiss for‘ drop-down menu:
Once you click on the ‘ignore’ link and specify a time duration, Google diagnostic will make no further check for the issue until the specified time duration has elapsed.
For example, if you ignore a notification for 3 months, then Google diagnostic will make no further checks for the issue until 3 months have elapsed.
You should avoid ignoring the notification for ‘All time’ as this will completely stop Google diagnostic from examining the ignored diagnostic issue ever again.
Once you ignore a notification, it is archived, and you see the ‘Ignored’ message in the archived notification:
Click on the ‘RESTORE‘ link to un-archive the notification.
IGNORE GROUP
Click on the ‘IGNORE GROUP’ link if you want to ignore an entire group of implementation/configuration issues for a while. Your notification will be archived.
If you want to restore the notification, then click on the ‘UNDO’ link.
DISMISS
Click on the ‘DISMISS’ link if you don’t want to take any further action and ignore the notification for all time.
Google diagnostic occasionally report false positive alerts (i.e. positive results which are more likely to be false than true).
For example, let us suppose you have fixed the ‘Link Analytics and Search Console’ issue.
You are 100% confident that this issue has been fixed, but Google diagnostic continues to show the ‘Link Analytics and Search Console’ notification to you. In that case, you can click on the ‘Dismiss’ link:
Sometimes, Google diagnostic shows you a notification that is not applicable in your situation.
For example, you do not run an e-commerce website, but Google diagnostic show you a notification of ‘Missing Ecommerce Data‘ or Google diagnostic show you a notification for moving to Google Analytics Premium:
Here also, you can choose to click on the ‘DISMISS’ link.
Copy Analytics Notification to clipboard
Click on the ‘copy’ button to copy the selected analytics notifications to your clipboard. Then later, you can paste the notification text in notepad, word document or some other text editor or share it via email.
Categories of Google Analytics Notification Messages
There are 3 categories of Google Analytics Notification Messages:
#1Red Notifications
Address these issues as soon as possible. Always pay attention to these notifications and never ignore them as they indicate critical issues with your implementation/configuration set-up.
Address these issues when you can. These notifications are not as important as red notifications, but you should not ignore them for a long period of time as they can degrade your data quality.
These notifications denote unused Google Analytics features that may be valuable to use. These notifications are a gentle reminder of how to get the most out of your Google Analytics.
Examples of Blue notifications:
Filter Internal Traffic
Link Analytics and Search Console
Configure a Goal Flow
How Google diagnostics work
Google diagnostic crawls the web pages of your website as Googlebot.
It crawls those web pages of your website which get a significant amount of traffic and which are publicly available (not hidden behind a login or excluded via robots.txt file)
In other words, Google diagnostic cannot report on all of the implementation/configuration issues, if:
Your website has got pages hidden by a login
You have pages blocked via robots.txt file
Your website is very big (tens of thousands of web pages)
Google diagnostic crawl frequency varies from website to website. Some websites can get crawled within a few hours; some may take a few days or a few weeks.
the higher your website crawl frequency, the faster your code changes/fixes will be evaluated and reported via diagnostic notifications alerts.
As mentioned earlier, Google diagnostic can occasionally produce false-positive alerts. However, if you find that majority of alerts are false-positive, then it means your website most likely has got inconsistent tracking code implementation.
What that means, part of your website may be using the standard implementation while the other part may be using a non-standard implementation).
Non-standard implementation means your tracking code is either broken because of incorrect formatting, incorrect use of Google Analytics methods, or it is used in a way that is not recognised/recommended by Google.
Google recommends using only one type of implementation throughout the website. So if you are using standard implementation, then use that throughout the website. If you are using non-standard implementation, then use that throughout the website.
Do not try to mix standard and non-standard implementations on your website. That can greatly increase the likelihood of Google diagnostics to produce false-positive alerts.
Missing Tracking Code
If you get this notification, then it could mean some of the web pages on your website:
do not have the Google Analytics tracking code
have invalid tracking code
have valid tracking code, but it is not firing for some reason
If you click on the ‘details’ link, Google Analytics will show you the list of web pages that you need to inspect:
Note: GA does not always report all of the web pages that you need to look at in order to save its computing power.
Moreover, GA cannot report tracking issues for the web pages which can’t be crawled/accessed because of login or robots.txt exclusion.
You are most likely to see only a sample of web pages that need fixing, especially if your website is very big. So you need to make sure that every web page on your website has got the correct Google Analytics tracking code installed, and it fires on page load.
Once you have fixed the tracking code issue, then click on the ‘check again’ link in the notification.
If Google diagnostic doesn’t find any tracking issue after the next crawl, then you will see a notification that says the issue has been resolved:
Note: There is also a possibility that you still continue to see the ‘Missing Tracking Code’ notification even after fixing the tracking issue.
GA can continue to show you this notification until it has re-examined all of the web pages with ‘missing tracking code’ issues.
A non-standard implementation of Google Analytics tracking code on some of the web pages on your website may also trigger the ‘missing tracking code’ notification.
Sometimes there is nothing wrong with your tracking code installation, but you can still get this notification because of false positives. In that case, you can ignore this notification.
Your Google Analytics tracking has stopped working. Either someone has removed the GA tracking code from your website, or the tracking code has broken or is not firing any more.
Your website has got some pages with missing GA tracking code.
Some of your website pages are using the GA tracking code of another website.
GA tracking code is not firing on some pages of your website because of non-standard implementation or client/server-side error.
A referral is a traffic to your website from another website.
A self-referral is a condition where you see your own domain name showing up as a referral in the ‘All Referrals’ report in GA.
According to Google, a marginal level of self-referrals should be expected if you have implemented cross-domain tracking.
It is only when your domain name starts showing up as one of the top referrals that you should really be concerned about self-referral issues.
Make sure that every web page on your website has got the correct Google Analytics tracking code installed, and it fires on page load. This task alone can fix many self-referral issues.
You get this notification when some or all of the web pages on your website have got Google analytics tracking code which is meant for another web property.
In other words, you are using the Google Analytics tracking code of another website.
This type of issue is more likely to occur if you manage multiple websites. So you need to make sure that you install the correct GA tracking code, the one which is meant for your website.
You get this notification when the Google Analytics tracking code is missing on some or all of the mobile pages. You can also get this notification if the GA tracking code on some or all of the mobile pages is not executed for some reason.
Mobile Tracking Code Mismatch
You get this notification when some or all of the web pages on your mobile website have got Google analytics tracking code which is meant for another web property/website.
You get this notification when the destination URL of your Google Ads ad is either dropping or altering the GCLID parameter.
This happens because of some client-side or server-side issue. Whenever the GCLID parameter is dropped or altered, Google Ads auto-tagging stops working. Your web developer can help in fixing this problem.
Invalid Mobile Google Ads gclid
You get this notification when the destination URL of your Google Ads ad is either dropping or altering the GCLID parameter on mobile devices. This happens because of some client-side or server-side issues.
Your web developer can help fix this problem.
Unsupported URL Parameters
You get this notification when you are running Google Ads, and auto-tagging is creating issues on your website.
Your web server does not know how to handle the GCLID parameter in the URLs and is thus redirecting users to error pages instead of the correct landing pages.
Incomplete Exclusion List
You get this notification when you see your own domain name showing up as a referral in the ‘All Referrals’ report in Google Analytics, and the domain name has not been added to the referral exclusion list, thus making the exclusion list incomplete.
Bad Default URL
You get this notification when you set a default URL in your property settings which doesn’t work (because it is either incorrect or your server is down or is badly configured):
Malware Detected
You get this notification when Google has detected malware on your website. To remove this notification, you need to remove malware from your website.
Too Many URLs
You see this notification when one of your reported dimensions (like page or keyword dimension) has got more than 50,000 values (rows or records) in a single day.
Google Analytics Standard can store a maximum of 50k rows of data for a particular dimension in a single day. All other values are rolled up into the (other) entry.
The total number of unique values a dimension can have is known as its cardinality.
For example, the mobile dimension has got two possible values: yes or no. So the cardinality for mobile dimension is 2.
Dimensions that have got a large number of possible values are known as high-cardinality dimensions, and the presences of such dimensions often result in ‘too many URLs’ notification.
To remove this notification, exclude all those query parameters from your URLs that do not change the contents of a web page.
If that doesn’t solve the problem, then there is nothing much you can do other than moving to Google Analytics premium, which can let you store up to 75k rows of data for a particular dimension in a single day.
Enable Remarketing Data Collection (RLSA)
You get this notification when your GA property has at least one audience that is eligible for ‘Remarketing List for Search Ads (RLSA), but your Google Analytics hits do not include remarketing data.
By default, GA hits don’t include remarketing data. To include the remarketing data with GA hits, follow the steps below:
Step-1: Navigate to the Admin section of your reporting view.
Step-2: Click on ‘Data Collection’ link (under Property column > Tracking Info):
Step-3: Turn the ‘Remarketing’ toggle button to ‘ON’:
Enable Advertising Features
You get this notification when your GA property is configured to use one or more advertising features (like demographic and interest reports, Double click campaign manager integration), but your Google Analytics hits do not include advertising features data.
In order to use advertising features, your GA hits need to include advertising features data.
By default, GA hits don’t include advertising features data. To include the advertising features data with GA hits, follow the steps below:
Step-1: Go to the ‘Admin’ section of your view.
Step-2: Click on ‘Data Collection’ link (under Property > Tracking Info)
Step-3: Turn the ‘Advertising Reporting Features’ toggle button to ‘ON’:
Clicks and Sessions Discrepancy
You see this notification when you are running Google Ads, and there has been a significant difference between reported ad clicks and GA sessions.
It is normal for the number of clicks on your Google Ads to not match exactly with the number of resulting visits (sessions) reported by Google Analytics for that ad because of data discrepancies between Google Ads and Google Analytics.
But sometimes, this difference between ad clicks and sessions is abnormally large. This could happen when Google analytics tracking code on some Google Ads landing pages is not executed.
There can be many reasons for that, like:
the landing pages are blocked via robots.txt
landing pages have got incorrect GA tracking code or no tracking code at all.
there is some server-side or client-side issue that is stopping GA code from being executed.
sometimes GA tag does not fire on pages with low latency.
Click on the ‘Details’ or ‘see group’ link in the notification for more details and possible solutions for this issue:
Note: ‘Clicks and Session Discrepancy’ notifications can appear both as red or yellow notifications for different pages on your website depending upon how critical the data discrepancy issue is.
Manually tagging each and every ad destination URL is time-consuming and prone to errors. The best way to avoid this notification is to use auto-tagging.
You get this notification when your GA view is receiving Google Ads traffic from an unlinked Google Ads account.
Any data received from an unlinked Adwords account is reported as (not set) in GA reports. To fix this problem, link all the relevant Google Ads accounts to your analytics property.
#3 your GA view is configured for ecommerce tracking, but your website is not an ecommerce store. Consequently, you don’t sell any item on your website.
If your website is not an ecommerce website, then you should disable ecommerce in your view (profile) by going to Admin > View > Ecommerce Settings and switch off the ‘Enable Ecommerce’ toggle button:
You get this notification when you are not excluding internal traffic from appearing in your GA reports or when your IP-based filter has broken.
Internal traffic is the traffic generated by you, your employees and associates. Often employees, especially web developers and customer support, access your website multiple times a day and thus inflate/skew your traffic data.
Therefore, it is important that you exclude all such traffic from appearing in your reports.
Google recommends excluding internal traffic by creating IP-based filters (GA filters that exclude traffic from certain IP addresses). But I would suggest installing and use Google Analytics Opt-out add on instead. This is what I use.
The problem with IP-based filters is that your IP address can change any day, any time (unless you have got a dedicated IP) without any prior notice, which will break your IP-based filter.
Another reason is that view filters can create data sampling issues. So, minimize the use of view filters.
Goal Conversion Irregularities
You get this notification when either your goal conversion tracking has stopped working, or there has been a significant decline in goal conversion volume.
Your goal conversion tracking can stop working if someone has changed the tracked goal.
For example, if someone has changed the URL of the page you are tracking as a goal, then your goal conversion tracking can stop working.
Similarly, if you are tracking a click on a button as a goal and someone changed/removed that button, then also your conversion tracking will stop working.
By clicking on the ‘see group’ link in the notification message, you can determine the goal conversions which are no longer receiving the conversion data:
At this point, you can either configure your goal settings or choose to turn off the goal if it is no longer valid.
For example, if you are no longer distributing newsletters, then you don’t have the need to track newsletters subscriptions as a goal in GA anymore.
If you run a low traffic website, then you are most likely to get such notifications.
As the name suggests, you see this notification when one of your tracked goals has not received any conversion data lately.
This notification is similar to the ‘Goal conversion irregularities’ notification, and you should check your goal settings to make sure that conversion tracking is still working.
Brand new/small websites are more likely to see this notification often.
Goal Conversion Drop
As the name suggests, you see this notification when one of your tracked goals has received significantly fewer conversions in the last couple of days/weeks. This could be due to:
#1 Your Goal conversion tracking has stopped working.
#2 Your conversion tracking is no longer working the way it should. Check the configuration set up by clicking on the ‘Adjust goals’ link in the notification.
#3 Your marketing campaigns have started performing badly, which is resulting in fewer conversions.
#4 Your website has got some technical/design issues that are negatively impacting the conversion rate and volume of your website.
Create a Targeted Goal
You see this notification when you have not set up any destination or event goal for your website in GA. To remove this notification, create at least one destination or event goal in your GA view.
Try a New Goal
You see this notification when you have not set up any goal in your GA view.
Link Analytics and Search Console
You see this notification when
#1 you have not linked your Search Console (aka Google Webmaster Tools) account to your Google Analytics web property
#2 someone has an unlinked Search Console account from your analytics property.
You get this notification when you are running Google Ads without autotagging or manual tagging.
To turn off this notification and benefit from the additional Google Ads insight that you can get in GA reports, enable autotagging in the Google Ads account linked to your analytics property.
Untagged Email Campaigns
You get this notification when you are running email marketing campaigns that are either untagged or not tagged correctly.
By tagging, I mean adding the campaign tracking parameters (like utm_source, utm_medium, utm_campaign etc.) to all of the links embedded in an email.
You get this notification when you are running a non-Google Ads marketing campaign(s) that is either untagged or not tagged correctly with campaign tracking parameters.
Selecting an industry category does not affect your tracking and data collection. So you can choose to ignore this notification.
Old Tracking Code
You get this notification when some or all of the pages of your website are tagged by the oldest version of Google Analytics tracking code (i.e. urchin.js).
You get this notification when you have not selected any view (profile) as the default view in your property settings:
You must select one view as the default view so that Google Analytics knows which view is primary.
This makes linking GA and Google Ads express accounts easy.
Multiple Homepage URLs
You get this notification when your website has got multiple URLs for the home page.
For example, say your home page can be accessed via abc.com/ and abc.com/index.php.
Google Analytics consider abc.com and abc.com/index.php as different web pages. So GA will show a separate entry for abc.com and abc.com/index.php in its reports.
If you want GA to show only one entry for the home page, then make sure that the home page can be accessed via only one URL by applying a 301 redirect from one version to the other.
Redundant Hostnames
You get this notification when your website has got canonical domain issues (www vs non-www), i.e. your website can be accessed by both www and non-www.
For example, your home page can be accessed both by www.abc.com/ and abc.com/
Google Analytics considers www.abc.com and abc.com as different URLs.
Each web page of your website should be accessible only via a single unique URL. If a web page can be accessed via multiple unique URLs, you are likely to get this notification.
Redundant Views
You get the ‘redundant views’ notification when you have two or more reporting views in your GA property that are configured similarly. Google suggest that you delete the reporting views which you don’t really use.
You get this notification when you are not sharing your data with a Google Account specialist.
To remove this notification, go to Admin > ‘Account settings’ and then select the two checkboxes under Data Sharing Settings > Account Specialists:
You Are Eligible for Remarketing
You get this notification when you have updated your analytics to support display advertising feature and when you have got at least one active Google AdWords and/or DoubleClick Bid Manager account that is linked to your GA account but you have not created any remarketing audience so far.
To remove this notification, you need to create a remarketing audience under the Admin section of your GA account.
Other articles you will find useful:
#1Beginners guide to Google Analytics Debuggingwhere I have explained in great detail about various Google Analytics Debugging tools, ga_debug.js, analytics_debug.js and _utm.gif (the tracking beacon).
#3 Google Analytics Debugging via Fiddler where I have explained in great detail how you can use the tool called ‘Fiddler’ to debug various GA tracking code issues.
Other Articles on Google Analytics Notifications and alerts
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