Information Technology Reference
In-Depth Information
Installing Google Analytics for Tracking
Note: You can watch me installing Google Analytics in the second half of my video
lesson about Google Adsense found on this page:
ht-
google-adsense/
. I highly suggest watching this video in addition to the reading below.
Google Analytics is a fantastic piece of software that tracks all the traffic to a website and
provides all kinds of interesting statistics regarding that traffic. It is something I install on
every website I make right at the beginning of the process, because that information that it
collects over time becomes very valuable later on (especially when figuring out the most
intelligent way to expand your websites and continue promotion). Not only is this software
extremely useful, it is completely free!
To install Google Analytics on your website, the first thing you do is visit
ht-
tp://www.google.com/analytics/
and register for an account. Once you are registered, you
are going to click on “Create New Website Profile.” Then type in the URL of your website
that you'd like to track, and then press “Finish.” On the next screen Google will give you the
Analytics HTML code. Take that code and paste it onto a document because you are going
to need it soon.
Now go back to your website backend and click on “Appearance” and then click on “Editor.”
We are about to look at the HTML / CSS code on the backend of the website - the code can
be a little intimidating but don't be scared! This is how a website backend truly looks like
when constructed from scratch (instead of made with WordPress).
Once you are on the editor screen, click on “header.php” on the right hand side. Once you
are at this document, search for the line that says “</head>”. That is the closing head tag.
Once you find that, insert the Analytics HTML code directly before it and save the docu-
ment by pressing “update file”. The Analytics tracking code is now installed.
Note: If there is more than one “</head>” in the header.php document, look for the one
that isn't part of a description or note (usually the last one on the document).
Now you can go back to Google Analytics and see if it has confirmed that the code has been
properly installed on your website. Once you see that it has, you are done!
