Please note: This article is still a work in progress.

This article is intended to give you a crash course on setting up and using Google Analytics - an extremely powerful site statistics and tracking program, formerly known as Urchin (and extremely expensive), but now offered for free by our friends(?) at Google.

Getting Started

The first thing you’ll have to do is set up a profile with Google analytics.
As of the time of this writing, Google is not accepting new profiles due to an overwhelming response to the Analytics launch. However, I’m told you can be added to a waiting list. To visit the main Analytics page, go here: http://www.google.com/analytics

Once you have a profile, follow Google’s instructions to add a site to your list.

Note: This has been “frozen” also, but you can get around that if you already have a profile. Read about it here

Once the URL has been added, you will be presented with a code snippet. You’ll need to place this on every page of your site. The best way to do that with most sites these days (especially PHP sites) is inside of a global header (one that stays the same for all pages). Google recommends you add the code snippet between the “head” tags. However, it is possible to add the code into the footer instead.

If you don’t have a global header or footer, you’ll need to post the code into every page of your site- or at least, every page that you want tracked.

This is an excerpt from the Analytics Guide Articles section, where you can find (and contribute) more in-depth information about Google Analytics, AWStats and more.

Next: An intro to the Google Analytics Dashboard