Google Analytics - Explanation of "/cart" vs /cart/show, etc.

babymelons — Thu, 24 Sep 2009 12:48:44 +0000

Hi there - Can someone please explain to me exactly what pages my visitors are on when I see the following paths in Google Analytics? I do realize they are one of four pages: the Cart, Billing/Shipping Address, Shipping/Payment, and Confirmation page. I would really appreciate any insight. Please note, these are in no particular order: /cart (I'll do the first one, CART.) :) /checkout/carts/show /checkout/orders/pay /checkout/orders/show /checkout/orders/commit /checkout/carts/create_order Thanks so much! Tom S BabyMelons.com

Caroline Schnapp commented

Caroline Schnapp — Thu, 24 Sep 2009 13:49:18 +0000

As a rule:

- an order starts to exist on page 2 of checkout.
- an order is abandoned if page 2 is reached but buyer stops there.
- an order is completed if buyer reaches page 3, aka the ‘Thank You’ page. (To be be strict, the order will appear in your Admin as completed as soon as the Payment gateway sends back to Shopify some nod, so there may be some time before the order shows up in your Admin – and until then the order will show up in your ‘abandoned’ list.)

Page 1 of checkout will have an URL like this:
https://checkout.shopify.com/carts/193982/c27943d7e5cd55718d23e15e1678e332

Page 2 of checkout (where you have to enter credit card number) has an URL like this:
https://checkout.shopify.com/orders/193982/d30c1946cfa6bd5a223595162dd93c20/pay

Page 3 of checkout has an URL like this:
https://checkout.shopify.com/orders/193982/d30c1946cfa6bd5a223595162dd93c20

Many of the paths you were given are POST requests so won’t appear as such in the URL. After a POST request is sent to server, the server does something and then redirect to an URL, the one you see in the address bar of your browser.

/checkout/carts/show

This is the POST or GET request to see page 1. So this is when buyers are on page 1.

/checkout/carts/create_order

This is the POST request that creates the order, between page 1 and page 2.

/checkout/orders/pay

This is the GET request to see page 2. So this is when buyers are on page 2 and about to fill up their payment info.

/checkout/orders/commit

This is the POST request that submits credit card info, between page 2 and page 3.

/checkout/orders/show

Not sure.

jonathanbriggs commented

jonathanbriggs — Fri, 06 Nov 2009 18:38:07 +0000

In my top content I only have the following:

/checkout/carts/show

/checkout/orders/pay

/checkout/orders/show

/checkout/orders/forward

Any ideas about the last of these? (PayPal forwarding? - I offer PayPal and SagePay). I also don't appear to have create_order or commit? Are these dependent on the type of payment integration used?

What do other people use to to indicate that the customer has reached the Thank You page as this does not appear to be in my analytics at all?

All insights greatly appreciated.

Jonathan