The Simple Steps to installing Google Analytics with Google Tag Manager
There are a few moving pieces to this, but once you are set up, it makes a tremendous difference to understand your customers and how they interact with your website. If at any point you get lost, please contact me and I’ll help you install this on any website!
Why do I need analytics on my website?
Analytics is a very important piece to a continuously improving website. It allows you to understand how users are interacting with your website and make improvements based on that understanding.
For example, if you find that people are visiting your about page more than your contact page, you might add a contact form right to the about page to increase conversion. Figuring out which pages are popular is powerful information.
More than just page views, with Google Analytics, you can track a variety of events, such as button clicks, link clicks, video plays, or form submissions. All of this data combined paints a picture of your website and your customers.
One of the best use cases for analytics is to track the interactions before and after a marketing effort. If you launch a new ad campaign, you can collect data to see if website page views and conversions increase. Use this information to measure the effectiveness of your ad, and make adjustments for your next campaign!
Pro Tip: ALWAYS use Google Tag Manager to include Google Analytics!
GTM allows you to customize triggers and events without writing a single line of code.
Google Tag Manager is an incredibly powerful tool in its own right that does much more than help install Google Analytics. It can be used to include many different marketing, advertising, and conversion tracking tools on your site. It allows you to integrate other services into your site without involving a developer. Take a look at some cool things you can do with GTM.
How to put Google Analytics on my website?
1. Create a Google Analytics account, and fill out the necessary information about your website.
2. Once complete, copy your “Tracking ID”
Something like UA-XXXXXXX-1
3. Create a Google Tag Manager account, and fill out the necessary information about your website.
4. Add a “User-Defined Variable” for “Google Analytics Settings” and use your “Tracking ID” from Step 2
5. Add a “Google Analytics Tag” that fires on “Page View”
6. Install the code snippets on your site.
Find your code snippets in the Admin tab under “Install Google Tag Manager”. One block goes in the <head> and another goes in the <body>