Is anybody there?
Went and saw the movie "Julia and Julie" yesterday. Julie starts up a blog (my daughter noticed she used Blogspot like me) about cooking her way through Julia Childs cookbook (see earlier post about why I blog). She jumps right in with enthusiasm, but eventually (despite all the positive effects the process has on her) she wonders - "Is anybody there?"
Same for me. After I set up my Google Site I was a happy camper, for a while. While I was pleased with my accomplishment, I was curious to see if anyone had noticed. I had been taking courses in web design (you can teach an old dog new tricks - if they want to learn) and had heard about the concept of "analytics", or getting statistics and feedback on who (no big brother specifics here) is looking at your site, where they are located (relatively), and various particulars about their usage.
Enter Google Analytics. I should point out here that I did not find this Google tool at the product offering link (upper left - "More..", then "Even More") from the main Google search page. I had to "google" it.
This area is not for the faint of heart (requires coffee and patience). But it is free, and interesting if you are game. The home page provides links to tons of resources, and (remember one of my first tips) you can "google" your way through if you have patience.
I am not a statistics junkie (baseball is not my favorite sport), but Analytics provides all kinds of tools, and help to figure out what the tools are telling you. Because of my love of geography, I like the map view that lets you see where everybody lives that stops at your website. Other tools indicate how much time they spend (read fast), whether they come back (your choice), what pages they visit, etc. If you have several sites you can have them all organized in one spot. Tip - the "add account" button just adds another website to your existing Analytics account - process is a bit confusing but trust me it will work out that way in the end.
This morning I went to my analytics account, hit the "add account" button (if your new - just create an account), and added this blog. Because I wanted to find out if there were any nuances in this process for Blogspot, I googled "How to set up Google Analytics on Blogspot".
It takes about 24 hours to kick in - will keep you posted.
Is anybody there?
Make it a good day.
Hi Ron! I predicted some loneliness would be involved, that's why I just went ahead and called my blog an island :) Analytics is a good way to see who's stopping by.
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