For a while, there’s been a possibility to separate your users in various segments in Google Analytics, by setting a (single) variable in the Analytics cookie, for example:
pageTracker._setVar("member-premium-true");
Earlier this year, Google introduced the neat possibility to use multiple custom variables, allowing more customization and flexibility. You are allowed to use five slots (1-5) and set a name, value and scope to your variable.
The old setVar method has been deprecated and replaced by the new setCustomVar:
pageTracker._setCustomVar( 1, // This custom var is set to slot #1 "Member Type", // The name of the custom variable "Premium", // The value of the custom variable 1 // Sets the scope to visitor-level ); pageTracker._trackPageview();
This isn’t really news, but it wasn’t obvious what had happened by just looking at the Google Analytics API docs, so I thought I’d mention it here just to “spread the word”.
<script type="text/javascript"> pageTracker._setVar('member-premium-true'); </script>