Do you want to install Google Analytics in WordPress ?
Knowing how your audience interacts with your website is critical to your success. The best way to find out your audience is through your traffic statistics, this is what Google Analytics provides for free.
In this article , we will share why Google Analytics is so important , and how you can easily install Google Analytics in WordPress (Step by step)
First, we will explain why Google Analytics is so important and how it can help you grow your website.
Next, we’ll show you how to register for a Google Analytics account and the various ways to install it on your WordPress site.
Finally, we will explain how to display your traffic reports in Google Analytics.
Are you ready Let’s get started!
Why Google Analytics is important for bloggers?
Once you start a blog, your first goal is to get more traffic and subscribers. Google Analytics helps you make data – driven decisions by displaying statistics that are important to you. You can see that:
Who is visiting your website?
This part of the analytics answers What is the geographical location of your audience, which browser the user used to visit your site, and other important information such as screen resolution, JavaScript support, Flash support, language, and more.
This data is very useful and can help in many ways. When creating a custom website design, you can use user data to make sure that your site will be compatible with your audience.
If most of your users do not have Flash support, then you should avoid adding a flash element to your site. If most of your users are on a screen resolution of 1280, make sure that your design is compatible with this resolution or smaller.
What do people do when they are on your website?
You can track where users go on your website, how long they stay on your website, what is the bounce rate (the percentage of users who leave your site on the first visit).
Using this information, you can reduce the bounce rate and increase page views.
You can also find your most popular articles, the ones that don’t work well, and the type of content that users are looking for.
When do people visit your website?
Given the hottest hours of the day for your site, you can choose the best time to post your post . If this time zone is not compatible with yours, you can schedule your engagement to meet at that hour.
How do people find your website?
This section of Analytics shows you where users came from . For example, do they use search engines, enter direct links, or click on referral links from another site.
It also shows you the percentage of visitors who came from each of these sources. Google Analytics gives you a breakdown of each of these categories. If it is a search engine category, it will show you the search engine that has received the most traffic, such as Google, Yahoo, Bing, etc.
The breakdown of referral sources shows you which sites you need to work with the most. Facebook is Facebook’s referral source, you need to have exclusive content on Facebook to make your Facebook audience feel special.
If your main referral source is an external website, you may want to consider partnering with this site ( guest post exchange or something else).
How people interact with your content?
Google Analytics shows how users interact with the content of your site. It shows you the percentage of users who clicked on the link on your site and much more.
You can run Split A / B tests by creating content experiments in Google Analytics to understand what is best to achieve your goals.
By seeing the user interaction, you can work on your content about users. By seeing the answers to the questions above, you can focus on strategies that work with your site and avoid strategies that don’t work.
Simply put, get rid of guesswork and focus on important statistics, so you can make data-driven decisions.
How to register with Google Analytics?
Available for free and all you need is a Google or Gmail account to subscribe. The sign-up process is very simple, follow the step-by-step instructions below to create your Google Analytics account.
Step 1 : First you need to visit the Google Analytics website to register.
When you are on the website, just click on the “start today”button.
After that, you will be asked to log in using your Google account. If you already have a Google or Gmail account, you can use that to log in. Otherwise you can create a Google account for yourself.
Step 2 : Once you are logged in with your Gmail account, you will be prompted with a welcome screen like the one below.
This is where you will sign up for Google analytics using your Gmail account. Go ahead and click on the “start measurement”button.
After that, you will be asked to provide an account name. This name will be used internally so you can use anything like your business name.
Google Analytics will also display multiple account data sharing settings. These settings give you control over the sharing of Google Analytics data. You can keep the default settings and move on to the next step.
Step 3: on the next screen, you will need to create the Google Analytics property.
Google has introduced a new version of Analytics called Analytics 4 or GA4. It is the latest version that tracks your website and mobile apps in the same account. In addition, you get new features, metrics and a different interface for your reports.
Important note :
If you already have a Universal Analytics account, it is important that you start tracking data in Google Analytics 4 (GA4) as well. This is because Google will end Universal Analytics on July 1, 2023. After the expiration date, Universal Analytics will no longer receive any data and will eventually stop working.
Setting up Google Analytics 4 after the sunset date will mean starting from scratch. However, you can start sending data to GA4 today while still using Universal Analytics. This way, you will get historical data in Analytics 4 for comparison and analysis when Universal Analytics is closed.
To get started, go ahead and enter a property name and specify the reporting time zone and currency. Then click the “next”button.
On the next screen, you will need to select “industry category” from the drop-down menu of your website and choose “business volume” from the selected options.
Next, you’ll need to scroll down and decide how you intend to use Analytics with your business, such as measuring engagement, optimizing ad cost, increasing conversions, and more.
You can choose multiple options or all selected options that meet your needs. When you’re done, just click on the “Create”button.
As soon as you click the “Create” button, a pop-up window will open with the Analytics Terms of service agreement.
Just click on the checkbox for” I also accept the terms of data processing as required by the General Data Protection Act”, and then click on the”I Agree” button.
After that, you will see a pop-up window with options about which e-mails of communications you would like to receive from Google Analytics.
Just click on the checkbox of the updates you want to receive and then click the “Save”button.
Step 4 : Now you will be presented with Google Analytics Web streaming options.
Since we are setting up Google Analytics for a WordPress site, go ahead and choose “web” as the platform.
After that, you will need to enter The address of your website and the name of the broadcast.
By default, the enhanced measurement option will be enabled it . This allows you to track page views, scrolling, outgoing clicks, file downloads and more in Google Analytics.
After that, you can click on the “Create stream”button.
Now you can see theث address of the broadcast, the name, the measurement ID.
It will also show various improved measurements that it will record.
Google Analytics will also show various ways to add a Google Analytics icon to your WordPress site under the “tagging instructions”section.
If you click on the option ” universal site tag (gtag.js), you will see the Google Analytics tracking code.
You can copy this tracking code because you will need to enter it into your WordPress site
depending on the method you use below. You can also leave the browser tab open and come back again to copy the code when needed.
We suggest leaving the Analytics browser tab open as you may need to re-visit it once the code is installed on your WordPress site.
Now that you have set up a Google Analytics account, let’s take a look at how to install Google Analytics in WordPress in the next article .