Yesterday we debuted our brand new webinar that delves into Google Analytics and hopefully makes blog metrics a bit easier to comprehend and more useful for you.

We were joined by our own “numbers guy” Andrew Hopper who shared a ton of insight with our featured Health Activist for the MS and UC communities, Jackie Zimmerman. Jackie bravely volunteered her blog TheMSBlog to undergo some analysis by Andrew so we all could learn a bit about the behind-the-scenes stats of health blogs.

Here are some takeaways from Health Activist How To: Analytics Part 1:

• First – look at the analytics that come with blog platforms.
• Typically, the platform analytics don’t offer you a lot of insight into your blogging. Health Activists probably want more in-depth data especially as they continue to build their blog audience over time.
• Google Analytics offers people the chance to pay attention to pretty much any metric they want and it also has the bonus of being attached to the URL of the blog rather than the platform. If you use GA, but want to switch blogging platforms – those analytics will transfer with the blog when you switch.
• Another bonus with GA is you have the chance to really customize your own reports and get exactly the information you want in whatever format you want.
• Even if you’re not looking to track something specific, you can also use Google Analytics for very basic metrics that are still good to know.
• Pick the platform that works for you! Try a few if you need – there are pros and cons to each:

• First you’ve got to set up Google Analytics (if you haven’t yet). Go to: http://google.com/analytics Add your blog domain. If you’re installing on WordPress:

• If you’re installing on Blogger:

• Check out the ABCs of Analytics:

• Once you’ve set up your Analytics – pick a goal that’s most important to you going forward. Do you want more page views? More unique visitors? More new visitors or return visitors? Once you decide on a goal you’ll be able to track your progress in GA and see exactly how well each of your posts does.
• It can also be helpful to take a look at the keywords section under traffic sources.  This will tell you what people are typing into a search engine that brings them back to your site.
• If your keywords seem a little odd – you may want to do a quick SEO tutorial to better optimize your blog. Both SEOmoz.org and  Hubspot are great SEO resources.
• For more resources check out:

Jackie and Andrew talk about a whole lot more – and delve into the Google Analytics Dashboard and talk weird inconsistencies in the recorded webinar so feel free to check it out here:

Watch Health Activist How To: Analytics Webinar »

Feel free to ask any questions you may have here in the blog or in a comment on the video and we’ll be sure to incorporate them into our Analytics Webinar Part 2!