Question

I’ve read the docs here about 100 times and I can’t figure this out.

I have a platform that basically creates spoofed domain names on top of one backend:

1. mysite.com
2. yourface.com
3. example.com

Since all domains point to the same root index file, I would like to have one Google Analytics tracking code that I can put in the footer that will track activity on all these domains.

Right now, I am using the following, and it only tracks activity on mysite.com (not the other ones):

<script type="text/javascript">

  var _gaq = _gaq || [];
  _gaq.push(['_setAccount', 'UA-XXXXXXXX-1']);
  _gaq.push(['_setDomainName', 'mysite.com']);
  _gaq.push(['_setAllowLinker', true]);
  _gaq.push(['_getLinkerURL','mysite']);
  _gaq.push(['_trackPageview']);

  (function() {
    var ga = document.createElement('script'); ga.type = 'text/javascript'; ga.async = true;
    ga.src = ('https:' == document.location.protocol ? 'https://ssl' : 'http://www') + '.google-analytics.com/ga.js';
    var s = document.getElementsByTagName('script')[0]; s.parentNode.insertBefore(ga, s);
  })();

</script>

I know I can set up separate profiles but that defeats the point of needing aggregate data.

Any ideas?

Answer 1

The culprit is probably this

 _gaq.push(['_setDomainName', 'mysite.com']);

because that limits the GA cookie to the mysite.com domain. If you drop the setDomainName call alltogether it should track all domains where the code is deployed (and you’ll need to filter by hostname if you want to see data for one particular domain).

That is, if I understood you correctly and your domains use the same backend but are independent on the frontend; if there is traffic between the domains you’ll need to set up cross domain tracking to track correctly (else user sessions will end when a user visits another domain).