When it comes to blog metrics, there is more than one solution. For most bloggers, all you really need is Google Analytics. But there are two ways to put the code into your blog template so that you can use Google Analytics and measure your stats. The first way is to use the Google Analytics plugin for WordPress.
The Google Analytics plugin is the easy way. The upside to doing it this way is all you have to do is install the plugin, activate it, and insert your Google Analytics code. When you want to see your stats for your blog you just log in to your Google Analytics account the way you normally would and you can see all the usual stats.
The second way to use Google Analytics is slightly more complex. You do need to understand a little bit about modifying your templates and it’s a little dangerous because if you do it wrong then you can break your template. Still, the upside is that you don’t have to mess with a plugin and your code is cleaner as a result. It’s cleaner and will reduce your code-to-text content because each WordPress plugin comes complete with massive code. If you use the template modification method then the only additional code you have is the Google Analytics code itself.
To insert your Google Analytics into your WordPress template, follow this guide:
- Open up your FTP client and go to your templates folder
- Find the template that you are using for your blog and open that folder
- Transfer the php file for your index file into a folder on your hard drive so you can work with it
- Open the index.php file on your hard drive
- Somewhere between the body tags, preferably near the top of your page, insert your Google Analytics code
- Save the file to your hard drive and transfer it back to your blog template folder
There. Fairly simple. But be sure you place your Google Analytics code in the right place or it won’t work properly.
