June 21, 2020

Google Analytics for Digital Signs in 15 Min | OptiSigns

ou can get your Google Analytics data on to your Digital Signs very quickly

Google's Free Dashboard tools calls Google Data Studio, and it already have Google Analytics Dashboard template and data integration.

High level steps:

1) Create and account & Log in to Google Data Studio (it's free)

2) Link your Google Analytics account to get your real data

3) Create a Google Analytics Dashboard from Template & map your data

4) Put the dashboard into OptiSigns and display on your screens

Here's how your dashboard would look. This template has:

  • Users, Sessions, Page views, Bounce Rate
  • Traffic by geographic
  • Traffic by channel
  • Engagement by demographic

Of course, you can edit to add data that you'd like to see.

Google Analytics dashboard for marketing website

Let's dive in on how to get this created.

1) Create and account & Log in to Google Data Studio (it's free)

Google Data Studio is Google's free business intelligence and dashboard tool. Using it, you can connect to a wide range of data sources and create reports, dashboard.

Go to https://datastudio.google.com/ and log in with your Google Account.

Arrow pointing to button on Google Data Studio to start for free

2) Link your Google Analytics account to get your real data

After logging in you will see this page. Click Create

Arrow pointing to 'Create' button to create a new project on Google Data Studio

Then click "Data Source"

Arrow pointing to 'Data source' button to create a data source on Google Data Studio

You may need to accept the Google Terms if this is your first time using Google Data Studio.

Google Terms of Service for Google Data Studio

Then click Google Analytics.

Arrow pointing to Google Analytics data source on Google Data Studio

Click "Authorize"

Arrow pointing to 'Authorize' button for allowing Google Analytics to be connected to Google Data Studio

Then select the website/view in your Google Analytics account that you want to use. Google will get data from there & map to this dashboard. Then click Connect.

Arrows pointing to settings for Google Analytics data source on Google Data Studio

You can rename the Data Source by clicking on its name.

When you done click on the Data Studio Icon on top left to return to home.

Arrows pointing to Google Data Studio icon to return to the home page

3) Create a Google Analytics Dashboard from Template & map your data

Click on "Report" tab and click on Google Analytics template to use it.

Arrow pointing to how to select the marketing template under the reports section of Google Data Studio

Then "Use Template"

Button pointing to confirmation button to select template on Google Data Studio

Then select the Google Analytics data source you just created.

Arrow pointing to selecting the data source for the template

Click "Copy Report"

Arrow pointing to button to copy the report

Then you can rename the Dashboard, remove the "Sample Report - Make copy to edit" text.

And feel free to modify the dashboard to your liking, or you can just use it as is.

Arrows pointing to titles you can alter on the dashboard

Once you done editing, click Share, then Embed

Arrows to share settings and embed report button

Then click Enable Embedding -> Embed Code

Change Width to 1920, Height to 1080 (best resolution for Digital Signs, you can use 4K if your TV and player support it, it may make the text a bit too small to read).

Then click "Copy to Clipboard"

Embed report settings for Google Data Studio

Now you are ready to put this Embed Code to OptiSigns and display on your digital signs.

4) Put the dashboard into OptiSigns and display on your screens

First, you will need to have your screens set up and paired. For more information on how to do that, click here.

Then log on to our portal: http://app.optisigns.com/

Go to Files/Assets, Click on "App"

Arrows pointing to the apps list for OptiSigns Digital Signage Software

Click Embed App

Arrow pointing to Embed app on OptiSigns Digital Signage Software

Enter a name for your assets & paste the Embed Code copied from Data Studio here.

You can also set refresh interval so OptiSigns will refresh the dashboard for you.

Embed settings for OptiSigns Digital Signage Software app

Then click Save.

Your Google Data Studio Embed asset is created in OptiSigns and ready to be assigned to your screen.

Arrow pointing to Embed app created in OptiSigns Digital Signage Software

That's it!

You have created a Google Data Studio Dashboard that connected to your live Google Analytics Dashboard, and you have put it in OptiSigns.

You can assign the newly created wall to your screen by going to Screens, click Edit screens and assign the wall to screens that you want.

You can put the created Data Studio dashboard in a Playlist, Schedule too.

Ready to get started?

If you are not using OptiSigns yet, you can sign up now for a free 30 days trial, all features included.