Installing Google Analytics @ WordPress

This is the second week of idaconcpts.com and I am really happy to have received comments from:

  1. Justo Ibarra from www.doctormetrics.com, to who I would like thank for his help installing the Google Analytics tool at my blog.  Doctor metrics is an Analytics Authorized Consultant and Urching Client Service & Support Partner from Google.  Check out his blog for helpful updates on the state-of-the-art of web metrics.  His blog is only available in Spanish.  The doctor is in!
  2. Avinash Kaushik, author of Web Analytics:  An Hour a Day (which I highly recommended on an earlier post).  His latest post, inspired my last post about doing web analytics of Flickr.com using Google Trends.  His summary of what is Web Analytics 2.0 all about is amazing!  It surely makes my life easier to explain what is my job!  Check out a visual summary below from Avinash’s website:

Today I have spent a decent amount of time installing the Google Analytics tool @ idaconcpts.com and I am sad to tell you that despite the help from both gentlemen mentioned above, the review of several blogs regarding this topic at WordPress and Google; I am very sad to announce that I could only install it on the “About the Author” page.

Let’s review this problem!
WordPress does not allow code in Java:  Even though Google Analytics does provide a copy/paste code for WordPress (just like Shelfari), this code is not accepted because it involves Java code, which is cancelled at WordPress.  There are two ways to get around this issue:
  1. Host your website on a private domain and then use the WordPress application to upload your blog.  (Caveat:  This solution is good for Windows users but it is a bit problematic for Mac users.  Being a recent Mac convert, I will have to keep you posted on how to tackle this issue.)
  2. You can install it the code by deleting from the code all the 4 script type lines.  However, the text will appear and then you will have to hide it using white font. I am aware that my solution is not very elegant but it appears to work.
It is very funny that I tried to discuss this topic at the WordPress Facebook page but it was considered to be inappropriate!  This is surprising because I am no the only one looking for a solution!
Since I hosted idaconcpts.com at WordPress, I don’t have access through FTP to my content, so I cannot incorporate the Google Analytics code into it.
Conclusion:  What are possible solutions?
  • Adding a widget feature to WordPress.
  • Offer the service as an upgrade.
  • Ask WordPress users to be better programmers (ha!).
What do you think?


Author: Damian Davila

Ideas and concepts from Damian Davila, Ecuatoriano thriving in Hawaii. Pro marketer and blogger. Find him at @idaconcpts on Twitter.

3 thoughts on “Installing Google Analytics @ WordPress”

  1. I’m sorry to hear about your troubles with Google Analytics and WordPress.com.

    You are right – we do block JavaScript for security purposes and this prevents things like Google Analytics from working on WordPress.com. There is also a problem with Google Analytics not running twice on one web site (we use it to monitor traffic across the WordPress.com network). I’m not aware of any successful workarounds (if there were any successful ones, we’d tell you about them), but if solution 1 works, please let us know.

    We do offer WordPress.com Stats, though. Have you tried that? It isn’t quite as in depth as Google Analytics, but it does tell you a lot about the type of traffic you’re receiving on your blog and what it all means.

    Douglas
    WordPress.com Support

  2. Hi Douglas,

    Thank you for your reply. I did notice the WordPress.com Stats, but there are some features that are missing from Google Analytics.

    Please keep me posted if WordPress.com comes up with a Google Analytics widget, that would make a lot of bloggers very, very happy!

    Cheers,

    Damian

  3. Just an update: I have successfully moved my blog from WordPress hosting to wwww.one.com hosting, so this is not an issue any longer.

    I can use any script or Java script without any limits : )

    Viva Google Analytics!

Comments are closed.