TerriMorton.com

Now that I will be pushing some content to the site, I decided it would be nice to be able to keep an eye on traffic. My web host, Server Intellect, does offer Urchin to track my traffic, but getting to that data is inconvenient for me. Plus others I know are using Google Analytics and I'd prefer to be able to do comparisons using the same tracking method.

I don't know that this can be any simpler!  Here are the steps:

1. Sign up for a Google Analytics account at http://www.google.com/analytics
2. Step through the wizard process at Google Analytics.  In one of the final steps they provide a snippet of Javascript.  Save this to your clipboard.
3. Log in to your Graffiti CMS site, go to the admin screens, and navigate to Site Options - Settings.  In the Web Statistics box, paste in the Javascript snippet, the press Update Settings.

That's it!  The Javascript snippet will be injected into each of your pages, and Google Analytics will be able to use that to report on your traffic.

There are a few things that tripped me up, due mostly to my impatience:

1. It took a little while for Google Analytics to be able to verify that my site was set up correctly.  If you are feeling nervous, navigate to one of your Graffiti site pages, and take a look at the source.  If you see the Javascript snippet towards the bottom of the page you know that Graffiti is injecting the script correctly.
2. Note that it takes about 24 hours for Google Analytics to begin reporting any site traffic.  So don't be discouraged by all of the 0's at the beginning.
3. If you lose the Javascript snippet like I had, you'll need to log back in to your Google Analytics account to get it.  In the Website Profiles grid, click the Edit link in the Settings column, then click the Check Status link on the Profile Settings page.

Now I know that there have been 4 other visitors to my site besides me. :-)