When it comes to SEO, Google Analytics is a necessity.  By adding Google Analytics to your website you will gain considerable insight into the visitors to, and performance of, your website.  In a later lesson we’ll run through the main areas of Google Analytics that you should be looking at, but for now we will set up Google Analytics.

There are two main things you will need to access Analytics for your website.  The first is a Google Account, and the other is the ability to add code you your website.

Creating a Google Account

To create a Google account, simply visit https://accounts.google.com/SignUp.  At this point you simply need to fill in the details.  You can either use your own email address or have a new GoogleMail Address.  However, you will need to have an existing email address for verification purposes.

Once set up is complete you will receive an email from Google, from which you will simply need to click on the link, within, to verify your account.

Setting Up Your Analytics Account

There are a couple of stages involved in this, as follows:

Adding Your Website To Analytics

Here are some step by step instructions on adding your website to Analytics:

    1. First login to Analytics using your Google Account: Analytics Login
    2. Here there will be an option to sign up to Analytics, simply click the “Sign Up” button

  1. Here you, again, simply fill in the form and and click the button at the bottom [Get Tracking ID]
  2. Next a window will open for you to read and accept Terms and Conditions.
  3. On this last screen you will see the tracking code.  There are accompanying instructions for this, which involve copying and adding to the tags on your website.

Adding The Analytics Code To Your Website

This is the simple part. Please ensure this is included in the Head tag on all of the pages on your website.  This is very easy to do on a static site (i.e. one that a developer changes the pages directly).  It is also a simple process on a Content Managed Website.  There is normally an area specifically set up in the SEO section of the website.  If you have problems with this please let us know (jon@janklin.com) and we’ll be able to help.  We’ve added this code to hundreds of different websites over the years.

To check this is working you can simply visit your website. Then open another tab and login to Analytics. In Analytics, click on Real Time on the left side. This will then show a graph. You should have at least one current visitor on the graph.

So there goes, you should now have Analytics up and running.  In a later lesson we’ll advise you on some great ways to use this data.

If you have any problems setting this up, or have any problems with Google Analytics in general, please don’t hesitate to get in touch.