Google Analytics is a great tool to understand how traffic is coming to your website, how long people are on your site, and what pages people are visiting.
With Google Analytics you can learn more about your visitors and target specific keywords or phrases to drive even more traffic.
- You’ll learn how your site ranks
- You’ll see where in the world people are coming from
- And whether people are coming back or hate your website (let’s hope this isn’t the case!)
So without further adieu, let’s show you how to install google analytics in this quick video!
Step 1: Get a Google Analytics Account
Google Analytics:
http://www.google.com/analytics
It’s just like signing up for any Google Account. Fill out some website information and you’re set.
Step 2: Get Tracking ID
Once you fill out your website information, just click Get Tracking ID and a new page will pop up with that information.
Step 3: Go to Your WordPress Dashboard
Log into your wordpress dashboard
Step 4: Download a Plugin and Install
Go to plugins > add new > and search for “Google Analytics by MonsterInsights”
- The plugin we are going to download is Google Analytics by MonsterInsights (previously was Google Analytics by Yoast)
- This plugin is super easy to use and allows us to install Google Analytics with one step
Step 5: Activate the Plugin and go to Settings
Once you’ve downloaded the plugin, make sure you install and activate it.
- The name of the plugin has changed!!!!!! See below
- “GOOGLE ANALYTICS BY MONSTERINSIGHTS” is the name of the plugin now
The plugin will show up in your list of plugins. Go to Settings for Google Analytics by MonsterInsights (previously Yoast)
Step 6: Copy and Paste Tracking ID
Once you’ve gone to the settings page
- Click Manually Add Tracking ID
- Go to your Analytics Account page and copy the tracking ID
- Go back to the settings page and paste it in
- Click Save
Now you’ve installed Google Analytics on your website.
You can stop here…or you can keep going and finalize the process to learn even more about your traffic
Step 7: Verify Website with Webmaster Tools
Either go to Webmaster Tools (by google) or go to your analytics page and click on the following:
- Right side bar go to Acquisition
- Search Engine Optimization
- Queries
This whole section tells you how people are finding your website and what pages they are going to. So we should get this up and running.
Click Set up Webmaster Tools Data Sharing
Click Enable Demographic and Interest Reports (as you scroll down the page)
Click Save (I forgot to mention this step in the video)!
Then at the Webmaster Tools Settings section click EDIT
Step 8: Add Your Site to Webmaster Tools and Verify
It’s as easy as just typing in your website domain address 🙂
Once you’ve added your domain and clicked continue, you’ll have to verify your website
The way to do this is by following one of the google methods
I suggest you go to “Alternative Methods”
And add HTML Tag (if you don’t have the same theme I use or access to header.php in your dashboard, follow one of the other simple methods)
- Copy the meta code
- Go to your wordpress dashboard > appearance > editor
- Find your header.php on the left hand side
- After the first <head> line paste in the code you copied
- Click save
Step 9: Final Step!
Now go back to your analytics dashboard
- Go to Acquisition > Search Engine Optimization > Queries
- And click Set up Webmaster Tools Data Sharing (again)
- Click the button for your website on the next page
- Click Save
And You’re done!
Now let your analytics populate as the days go on 🙂
Congrats!
Hi, as always a great help and advice. Regarding this plugin: It seem it has been taken over by MonsterInsights and looks totally different. It looks like they want to track everything and don’t allow me to use my own code. Would it be possible to update this tutorial, please