If you are a new or seasoned blogger, you probably at some point will want to know how many page views your blog is getting. There are a number of ways to track blog traffic, but one of the most popular is Google Analytics. Google Analytics can be confusing to decipher, and even I don’t claim to be an expert (I will share one of my favorite, simpler alternatives below) but particularly if you are looking to monetize your blog, potential advertisers or sponsors will want to have some idea of your blog traffic, and it can also help you figure out how much to charge for advertising, etc. Setting up an Analytics account and adding it to your blog is fairly simple, so I have created a tutorial below to walk you through the steps.
Step 1: Go to http://analytics.google.com. You must log in with a Google account. You can create a new one if you don’t have one already (I highly advise having a Gmail account, the benefits are really too many to list here), but it’s got to be a Google account, you can’t use Yahoo, aol or any other email address. This will bring you to the Analytics dashboard.
Step 1:
Click on the Admin button in left hand column. Then, under the Account dropdown, select Create New Account
Step 2:
Step 3:
Select your data sharing settings (or not) and scroll down to the bottom of the page. Click the blue “Get Tracking ID” button. This will take you a Terms of Service prompt, accept the Terms of Service.
Step 4:
Now, just use CMD or CTRL + C to copy the website tracking code provided. For the next step, you want to head back over to your WordPress dashboard. This tutorial is specifically for readers who have a custom blog design by Little Blue Deer and have the Genesis theme (it will work on any Genesis-themed blog though).
Step 5:
In your Dashboard, go to Genesis > Theme Settings.
Step 6:
In Genesis Theme Settings, scroll down to the Header and Footer Scripts section. Paste the tracking code you copied in Step 4 in the Header Scripts box and click the blue Save Changes button.
Now, it’s important to note that it can take a day or two for your code to start tracking. Additionally, you will not view your site traffic stats in your blog dashboard, but in Google Analytics. If you prefer to view your site stats in your WordPress dashboard, I highly recommend connecting WordPress Jetpack (you can view my quick and easy tutorial on How to Connect WordPress Jetpack here). Once you have connected Jetpack, you can go in your Dashboard to Jetpack > Site Stats and view your stats directly in your WordPress dashboard anytime!
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