- Web publishing
- Web analytics
- Set up
How to set up a Google Analytics account
for your Yale site
First, check with your department or school to see if anyone else is using Google Analytics (GA), as you may be able to simply join the department GA account, or you may discover that you already have statistics on your site that are collected as part of the general department or school site. Viewing your site's analytics data within the context of your broader department or school data may actually be more useful to you than viewing just your own site data.
You will need a Google Gmail email address to sign up for Google Analytics, as will any other users whom you will share your data. If you don't already have a gMail account, sign up for one at Google Accounts.
Overview video
This video will give you an overview of the process for obtaining your Google Analytics account. If you keep it open in a separate web browser window you can use it as a guide through the sign-up process:
Signing up for an account
Go to the Google Analytics page and sign up for an account.
Pay close attention to the HTML code Google Analytics provides at the end of the sign-up process, and follow Google's instructions carefully to add the GA JavaScript code to the end of your HTML page files. It's often handy to keep a copy of the code in a separate text file for future reference.
What you do next depends on how your web site was created:
- If you are using YaleSite web content management service or a Yale SimpleSite, all you need from your Google Analytics JavaScript code is the account number within the code (example: UA-9112073-11).
See the YaleSite or SimpleSite instructions for entering your GA account number into your site. - If you are coding your own web site, or adding Google Analytics to an existing site that you maintain, follow Google's instructions for adding the Google Analytics code to the bottom of each page's HTML.
Reading your Google Analytics reports
To read your site analytics, you will need to go back to https://www.google.com/analytics/ and log in. Be sure that you have added the authorized account yale.metrics@gmail.com to your account. You will not see any data on the first day you add GA to your site, as reports are posted once a day.
The next day you will begin to see analytics data for your site. Give the site at least a week of data collection, so you can see the typical weekly rhythms of your site traffic. The more visits, the more accurate and useful your data will be.
Use the "User Manager" feature at the lower part of your of your account's "Analytics Settings" page to add the people who will view your site statistics (you'll need a Gmail address for each user). Please remember to add the generic Yale user "yale.metrics@gmail.com" so that the Yale Analytics Project Manager can view your Yale site statistics.
