What it is: The level of rigidity Google Analytics uses when deciding to track or dismiss a visit to your page. This is based on the URL attached to an incoming user, and only a specific, pre-designated URL (with absolutely no added code or characters) will be recognized and counted.

When to use it: When URLs for your site or page don't vary. For example, exact match would help monitor traffic on www.brooksbell.com/services, because the URL always remains the same.

When to avoid it: When your URLs differ. If you're an e-commerce site, chances are you have dynamic URLs that change based on visitor preferences or how they've sorted your products. Google Analytics will not recognize these page visits as exact matches because of the unique URLs—and worst of all, they won't count toward your metrics or KPIs. Any other additions to your URL, such as adding new a code or string for different visitors, sessions or parameters will prevent these visits from being tracked through exact match.

The bottom line: If your URLs remain the same, using exact match is a simple way to track incoming activity for a particular page.