Getting Started With Google Analytics

I'm going to start this off with implementation of Google Analytics. There are a number of great tools out there, but if you are just testing the waters on your personal blog, Google Analytics is great (and free!). For those of you deciding on a package for your company, Google Analytics provides robust reporting and statistics. All in all, it's a great place to start and understand what your company goals are. Also, you'll find out looking for in your web analytics package when you are shopping around. So let's start from the very beginning: putting Google Analytics on your website. Doing so is a fairly simple process. Just hop over to the Google Analytics website and create your account to get started. After entering the standard info, you'll presented with the tracking code which will open up the Gates of Analytics Insight for you! (Whether you want to share your info with Google is up to you. It's anonymous and will give you benchmarking stats which can be useful)


Follow the instructions putting the Analytics code on all your webpages just before the </body> tag.


If have dynamic content or just have access to a template, you can add it to your template.


Congratulations! You just set up Google Analytics. Quick and painless, huh? Data should be pouring in, and you'll be able to see it in 24 hours! (I know it's exciting, but you have to be patient!) In fact, if you haven't already you should probably think about the purpose of your website. What pages do you want your visitors going to? For e-commerce, it will be a 'thank-you for your purchase!' page; for blogs, maybe the about me section. I'll let you think about it because we'll be setting up goals and funnel reports next time!