Imagine your bistro overflowing with patrons, but you have no clue which dish keeps them coming back. Are they here for your truffle fries or just the free Wi-Fi? Operating a website without proper link tracking is precisely like that: bustling yet blind.
Most restaurant owners struggle with incorrect conversion tracking with their website. They know their site has been visited by a lot of people, but they don’t know which menu page has droven people to order or book. Link tracking by Google Analytic 4’s Path Exploration will let you check website traffic accurately, revealing which pages actually lure real humans, not bots.
Quick Ways to Check Your Website Traffic
Before diving into GA4’s labyrinth, click here to start with the quick stuff. For example, if you just want a peek at your daily visitors.
If you just wanna know your daily visitors, hop into Google Analytics → Reports → Realtime. That dashboard instantly tells you how many people are browsing and what pages they’re on. You’ll even know what city they’re from, too.
It’s the digital version of glancing around your website and counting heads.
But if you’re craving something juicier, like knowing where those visitors came from, head to the Reports menu.
From Reports, → Acquisition → Traffic Acquisition. This view lays out your sources: organic search, socials, referrals, or paid ads. You’ll spot, for example, that your “Sandwich Menu” page is pulling loyalists from ChatGPT while your homepage attracts searchers from Google.
And if you’re running a campaign about your new seasonal menu in search engine ads and social media, you can find also which channels work in this GA4. GA4 will tell you exactly which post or email brought people in. For small restaurant websites, this is often enough to decide whether to invest more in ads or just tweak what’s already working.
Google Analytics 4 empowers you to see exactly where visitors venture next. Inside GA4’s Explore → Path Exploration, every click in every pages unfold into a living map, along with scroll.
(Find out how to detect scroll events in your webpage.)
It shows which menus.. sorry, pages, that everyone crowds around, and which cosy pages they ignore.
The image below shows the way Google Analytics 4 helps restaurants track their users’ behaviour on their website.
This ain’t just data, but it’s storytelling in metrics.
(Think of it as gossip from your analytics dashboard, whispering where people lost interest.)
Over the years, I’ve used this feature regularly on my own site, and that diligence has paid off significantly. Tracking internal movement helps me reposition underperforming CTAs and rephrase anchors that felt too stiff. It also occasionally discover unexpected “traffic magnets” that deserve more attention.
The more I track, the more I notice that thoughtful link placement actually grows my traffic.
If your clicks don’t appear here, don’t panic. You probably just need to set up custom events, or configure Google Tag Manager to track link clicks properly. (I learned this the hard way after wondering why my special link looked ghosted for a week.)
Track Every Internal Link Click
This is where it gets juicy (and personal, too). Tracking internal link clicks via Path Exploration is my go-to ritual (and I swear by it). Let me break it down like I’m sharing my grandma’s secret sauce recipe: simple, spicy, no fluff.
Step 1: Access Path Exploration
Launch GA4, click Explore, and pick Path Exploration. That’s your playground to uncover visitor odysseys.
Step 2: Navigate the Interface
You’ll spot three zones: Variables, Tab Settings, and a big “All Users” visualisation.
The leftmost bar, “Starting Point,” branches into “Event Name” and then options like page_view, session_start, and click.
Step 3: Switch to Page Titles
Switch the branch from “Event Name” to Page title and screen name to see which articles or pages are pulling eyeballs.
Step 4: Select Your Target Article
Hit the pencil icon on “Step 1” and type your article title in “Select nodes for step +1.” Apply it, and voilà..your article pops up as a branch.
Step 5: Reveal the Clicked Links
Click the article title, and sub-branches bloom, revealing every internal link that has received attention.
No lines? That means nobody clicked (ouch!). That’s your cue to test a new anchor text, relocate your link higher up, or scrap it entirely.
From my own audits, a 10–20 minute sweep through Path Exploration often reveals dead internal links, unappealing anchors, or misplaced call-to-actions. It’s all of which are worth testing immediately. [That reality check stings but saves your content strategy.]
Diligent tracking isn’t glamorous, but it’s the caffeine shot behind a site that keeps readers circulating instead of bouncing off.
Stop Serving Empty Plates
Link tracking ain’t rocket science, but it’s like tasting your own dish before serving it. You wouldn’t send out a meal without checking the balance of salt and spice, would you? The same rule applies online.
When you consistently verify which links are clicked and which pages retain attention, you’ll stop wasting effort on “empty plates”. Empty plates are something like content that looks pretty, but serves no real business nourishment.
So, ready to ditch guesswork and start making data-driven moves? Try experimenting with your own internal links in GA4’s Path Exploration.
Still don’t understand? Ask me in my email that you can find at Page of Vicky Laurentina. I have a lot of more down-to-earth digital marketing advice that actually clicks with small business owners who’d rather perfect their espresso shots than decode analytics jargon.
I am a blogger who love making content about planning and optimizing contents. Follow me in my Linked In and Instagram below.
thank you bangeeet mbak ini sangat membantu bagi aku yang masih meraba-raba cara baca GA hehe. semoga makin sering kasih step2 perihal GA hehe *mulai banyak mau. anw, berarti ini untuk tahu yang internal link yang di click ya? kalo misal untuk tahu external link yang di click gtu bisa nggak ya? misal di artikel review skincare aku kasih link shopee. apakah bisa di track juga?
Bisa banget ngelacak jumlah click link eksternal di Google Analytics. Tapi syaratnya perlu pasang alat lain dulu, namanya Google Tag Manager.
Kapan-kapan ya aku tulisin caranya.
Tulisannya simpel tapi ngena yaaa.. penjelasannya jelas banget! Keren kak vicky 😀
Sama-sama, Mbak Fina..
Ini baru aku pelajari tatkala sudah update GA4, tapi pertanyaan sperti ini emang pernah terbersit tapi ya ga dicari dulu gmna bisa tau pembaca itu klik internal link nya atau tidak.
Suuwun mbak Vicky ya. Tak praktekkan nih, masih proses belajar GA4 cekne ndang weruh, ehehehee
Ya, kabarin kalo kesulitan waktu praktekin..