Making sure your audience likes how it interacts with your website is the key to success, which is why you need traffic statistics.
Adding Google Analytics to WordPress is the easiest way to keep track of visit stats, and the best part about it is that it comes for free.
This article aims to show you how to setup Google Analytics on WordPress, and to explain why having Google Analytics in WordPress is important in the first place.
What is WordPress Google Analytics, and why is it so important?
Google Analytics in WordPress or other CMS platforms act as free-of-charge business intelligence services that give you insights on how website traffic is moving, how prospects are behaving and converting, and more relevant information.
There are many BI systems like this available on the market, but experts will almost always recommend you to add Google Analytics to WordPress because it is powerful and free.
The Google Analytics WordPress plugin reveals the traffic your site is receiving, but also indicates where that traffic could come from. Another important thing you can find out is whether visitors like how they interact with the site, and what needs to be changed.
The data Google Analytics reveals can be exported in many different formats, or stored on a custom dashboard from where you can access it any time, and from any device.
If you are a WordPress blogger, Google Analytics will be even more important, as they will allow you to measure the following indicators:
Who are your visitors?
Basically, Google Analytics capture the geographical location of the visitor, the browser he used to access your data, the resolution of his screen, JavaScript support, the language he uses, and much more.
Data like this will help you in many different ways, and will make sure you’ve designed the interface your audience likes to interact with. For example, if most of your visitors’ devices don’t support Flash, it would be a good idea to get rid of it.
Another good example is if your users are reading your information on 1280 screen resolutions, in which case you have to ensure compatibility between your design and their resolution.
What are they looking to do on your website?
Once the visitor lands on your pages, Google Analytics help you follow their movement, the time they spend on particular pages, the bounce rates and the reasons for them (number of users that leave after their first visit), and so on. Every website owner needs to know this in order to increase the number of page views and conversions.
When are they visiting the most?
Depending on your audience, there will be a particular period of the day when they arrive the most, and you can use this information to publish exactly during those hours. This is especially helpful to bloggers posting for readers in different time zones, so that they can always adjust their schedule appropriately.
How did they find your website?
Google Analytics offer a separate section where you can track referrals such as direct links, search engines, other sites, and so on.
The platform will allow you to drill into detail and find out just how many visitors arrived to your site from each of these sources. Consequently, it will rate sources and arrange them in categories, paying the most attention to the search engine that brings you traffic (Google, Bing, Yahoo, and so on).
Basically, what you will find out is which your most valuable referrals are, and be able to focus your work on those. If we’re speaking about Twitter, for instance, you should provide Twitter exclusive content to make readers there feel more special. In case your website is visited because of another website, try to establish a partnership with its owner, and exchange links.
Do they like how they can interact with your website?
What makes Google Analytics really special is that it measures users’ satisfaction with the website’s interface and content, by simply revealing the percentage of users that clicked on a particular link or page. You can also trigger the service to perform A/B split testing, and to perform content experiments to help you achieve your goals.
Having the whole picture of user interactivity helps you deliver better content, and find out exactly what users want or need. This way, you will direct your energy towards improving content, and get rid of strategies and posts that no longer work.
How to add Google Analytics on WordPress
The process is very simple. These are the steps you should follow:
Step #1: Create your account on Google Analytics
You can create a whole new account, or use the Google account you already have. In most cases, your Google credentials will already be associated to your website.
Step #2: Login
Once the account is ready and verified, open http://ift.tt/1p32JCz, and log in.
Step #3: Set it up
Upon arrival, Google Analytics displays an introductory screen with setup instructions. Follow the guidelines, and adjust settings as you need them to be.
Step #4: Get your code
Once you’ve completed all fields with information, locate the ‘Get Tracking ID’ button, and start using it. This button will reveal the snippet code you will further use to track your data. Highlight and copy the entire code.
Step #4: Install the code
There are many ways in which you can install the GA code to your blog, but two of them are the simplest most widely used. As it always is with WordPress, inexperienced users may require a bit of guidance to complete the operation.
How to add your GA code on the website?
The first and most popular method is to install a GA plugin. You will find yourself overwhelmed by the number of available plugins, but we recommend you to opt for the most light-weight one you can find.
Google Analytics by MonsterInsights
The Google Analytics for WordPress by MonsterInsights allows you to track your blog easily and always stays up to date with the newest features in Google Analytics.
Google Analytics
Google Analytics plugin from ShareThis is a good way to add GA tracking code to your website without modifying any files. Just log in with Google right from your WP admin dashboard and choose which website you want to link.
Then you can disable GA tracking of specific users, so that when you are browsing your own site it won’t affect your analytics.
Google Analytics Dashboard for WP
This Google Analytics for WordPress plugin enables you to track your site using the latest Google Analytics tracking code and allows you to view key Google Analytics stats in your WordPress install.
In addition to a set of general Google Analytics reports, in-depth Page reports and in-depth Post reports allow further segmentation of your analytics data, providing performance details for each post or page from your website.
Analytics
Google Analytics Counter Tracker
Google analytics counter tracker – analyse the visitors hits on you website and display it graphically
Google Analytics
Enable Google Analytics on all pages without tracking your own visits. You can exclude any logged in user as well as ignore a device completely by setting a cookie.
Google Analytics by webdorado
Google Analytics WD is a powerful plugin, which adds tracking to your website, lets you view Analytics reports, manage goals, filters, etc.
Analytics Cat – Google Analytics Made Easy
Analytics Cat – Google Analytics is a lean, fast, simple, no-frills way to add your Google Analytics / Universal Google Analytics code to your WordPress site.
This bloat-free, simple Google Analytics WordPress plugin doesn’t add tons of features. Instead, Analytics Cat – Google Analytics simply focuses on letting you add your Google Analytics (Universal Analytics) Code to your site in less than 2 minutes, without slowing your site down.
Google Analytics
Adds a full width Google Analytics dashboard widget for WordPress admin interface, and inserts latest Google Analytics tracking code to all your pages.
Copy pasting the code into the theme files
The second method is to copy-paste the code you received to the theme’s header.php, and that must be completed before you’ve closed the </head> tag.
Unlike installing a plugin, this method will require some basic experience with WordPress templates to help you manage content and track data. If you wish to add the code manually, here is what you should do:
- Copy the code, open the ‘Appearance’ menu on your WordPress website, and click on ‘Editor’
- Look through the list of themes and templates that will appear on the screen’s right side. You should find the ‘header.php’ file there, either by chance or using the CTRL + F command.
- The next thing to do is to locate this tag: </head> (the same as with the theme, you can use CTRL +F to find it). Once done, paste the snipped code right before it, and complete the process by clicking on the ‘Update File’ button.
Bonus tip: Adding the code to ‘Function.php’ files
Results will be the same if you copy the code to the theme’s function.php files, but this process is way more complicated and trickier, so we only advise you to do it if you have experience.
To do so, open the theme’s functions.php file, and paste the GA snippet code inside:
<?php
add_action('wp_footer', 'add_googleanalytics');
function add_googleanalytics() { ?>
// Paste your Google Analytics code from Step 4 here
<?php } ?>
Remember: Google Analytics starts processing actual traffic data only after 12 to 2 hours, so in case a day has passed and your website is still not analyzed, go to the Reporting option in the main menu, and notify support of your problem.
Conclusion
For the time being, Google Analytics is the frontrunner of both free and paid business intelligence services online. This is not only because it doesn’t cost a dime, but also because it is easy to use, and doesn’t require you to have any special experience in order to use it.
Source: http://ift.tt/2kLikjD
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