Alex Ortiz, from the Google Analytics team, posted a very useful how-to tip on the Official Google Analytics Blog the other day.

Entitled "Tip: Tracking 404 Pages", Alex says:

Besides telling you from which sources your site traffic originates, Google Analytics also tracks just about any activity that occurs on your site, including popular navigation paths, plus track downloads, outbound links, and activities on cross-domain properties. But one shortcoming is the lack of reporting on 404 pages, which appear when there's no file or page that corresponds to the visitor's request. For example, sometimes visitors will type in a filename that they think is available on your site, or sometimes your site might have a obsolete link which routes to a deleted or non-existent file or directory. In both cases, a 404 or "Not Found" error page will appear on the browser.

It's valuable to see these requests so you can learn what visitors are looking for, and consider adding new content or fixing the broken link.

How easy is this to do? Piece of cake...and in just 3 simple steps:

1. Create a custom 404 error page and add the Google Analytics javascript code to the page.

2. Modify the script on this page by adding one line of code using the urchinTracker method.

3. Wait a while, then go to the Google Analytics Dynamic Content report and expand the list for "/404.html."

So what are you waiting for? Learn how to modify the script here.