All bloggers know that without website traffic you are not in business. But in order to make the most of your website traffic generation efforts, you must put a process in place to measure and track the visitors to your website, where they are coming from, what they do when they land on your site, how long they stay and how many of them make a purchase. In this article we are going to look at how to use Google Analytics on your Wordpress blog to track your website’s traffic and create reports.

What is Google Analytics?
Google Analytics for Wordpress is a free plugin that, “. . .automatically tracks and segments all outbound links from within posts, comment author links, links within comments, blogroll links and downloads.” It also allows you to track AdSense clicks, add extra search engines, track image search queries and it will even work together with Urchin.” It was developed by Joost de Valk of http://yoast.com, a Dutch WP developer who has authored countless other WP plugins and tools.

First, if you do not already have one, establish a Google account.

Go to: http://www.google.com/analytics and sign in using your Google account username and password.

Enter your website address and fill out the contact information to create your Google Analytics account. You will see a new screen telling you that you need to add a snippet of code to the footer of your website pages. Using a new browser window, log in to your WP dashboard, click on Presentation, then Theme Editor, footer.php.

Paste that snippet of Google Analytics code into the footer.php file on your WordPress blog before the closing body tag that looks like this: “” Finally, hit the ‘Update File’ button and you’re good to go.

Back at the Google analytics page, you will find a button that says, “Check Status.” Click on that so that GA will start talking to your WP blog.

Google Analytics Reports
Now let’s use Google Analytics to generate a report. You might want to create such a report for your advertising clients so that they can see how effectively their advertising dollars are being spent on ads at your site.

After you have set up your GA account and you have given it a few weeks to track your website’s traffic you can go in and generate reports.

Once again, go to: http://www.google.com/analytics and sign in using your Google account username and password. If you have more than one website in your account, choose the one you want to create a report for from the drop-down menu to the right of the ‘View Reports’ tab at the top of the window.

The dashboard will show you at a glance the number of visitors to your site by day, week or month, your visitor’s site usage stats, traffic sources, and a content view of the most popular pages on your site in order of page views. You can click on any of these dashboard items to view a more in-depth report of that item.

You can export a copy of the standard report by using the ‘Export’ tab near the top of the page. You can export in a .PDF format, email or XML.

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I was on youtube the other day when I saw this video. I’m all about product creation these days, and I like what this man has to say. So, take a look and see if you’re not inspired as I was.

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Using creative writing prompts can be a fun way to flex your creative muscles and break out of any writing ruts that you might have found yourself mired in recently. As a website content writer, I find that I need to occasionally focus on my creative writing skills in order to feed that part of my brain that loves to work with the written word as a sculptor works with clay.

I poked around in my bookmarks and did a bit of research to come up with a few sites where you can find some really fun writing prompts to try. Take a look at these and get your creative juices flowing. It will be fun but it will also help you freshen up your professional writing style.

This site provides a new prompt each week to inspire you to write a short piece in response.
http://weeklywritingassignment.com

This website has been around for almost ten years providing daily writing prompts. While it is geared to school aged writers, the prompts are still very good and an adult can easily find some that spark their interests.

http://writingfix.com/classroom_tools/dailypromptgenerator.htm

Writer’s Digest provides several pages of prompts to inspire writers.
http://www.writersdigest.com/WritingPrompts/

This fun website provides just one word prompts and gives you 60 seconds to write a response.
http://www.oneword.com/

Here are a few writing contests if you are interested in trying your hand at submitting your work. I will give the caveat that I have not investigated these contests in advance, so each writer is advised to do her due diligence before spending time or money pursuing these contests.

Here you’ll find a huge list of writing contests with information about the various deadlines and how to submit your work.
http://www.freelancewriting.com/writing-contests.php

Writer’s Digest also has a list of their own contests that writers can participate in.
http://www.writersdigest.com/competitions

More writing contests can be found here.
http://www.manuscriptediting.com/contests.htm

When you have a down moment, take a look at these sites and get out your journal and your favorite pen. You never know what is lurking in your subconscious mind waiting for you to bring it to life on paper.

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As a busy online entrepreneur, your time is your most valuable asset. You understand how important it is to have a steady flow of fresh, relevant content to your website. But there are so many other pressing issues vying for your attention. You know that eventually you will have to hire someone so that you can offload some of the content development tasks so that you can focus on running your business. But you are also leery about taking the time to weed through and interview writers in order to find one that will produce quality writing at a price that you can afford.

Here are five steps that you can follow to find a good ghostwriter:

1. Get a recommendation
Ask around within your business network for recommendations for good writers. Be prepared for the fact that some people aren’t always willing to share when they have found a good, dependable writer, so you may have to be persistent.

Visit online forums such as the warrior forum, sitepoint and digital point forums to find ghostwriters who are offering their services. Look for positive feedback from other forum members about the quality of work and responsiveness.

2. Review their web site and writing samples
Follow the link to each writer’s website and look at their samples and testimonials from satisfied customers. You will be able to quickly get a feel for the writer’s style and if it might suit your needs.

3. Communicate with them
Contact the writer and set up a consultation. It’s great if you can actually speak to the writer on the phone. You can learn a lot about a person by the way that they speak and the vocabulary they use. If they don’t speak clear, standard English, chances are they can’t write it much better.

Find out about the writer’s turnaround time, ask about their policy for rush projects, and their payment policies.

If you require a confidentiality or Non-disclosure agreement, this is the time to discuss it.

4. Clearly articulate the scope of your project
Most writers lament the fact that their clients aren’t always as clear as they would like about their projects. The more explicit you are about your requirements for the project, the less opportunity for confusion. This saves time on your part and the writer wastes less time doing re-writes.

5. Have them complete a sample project
If you want to go ahead with a particular writer, request that they do a sample project. This way you can get a feel for how it will be to work with you and the writer can assess what kind of a client you will be to work for. Clearly establish the price, your specifications and a deadline for this sample project. When the project is complete you can make a clear decision on whether or not you want to move forward with this writer.

If you follow these simple steps you can get through the process of hiring a ghostwriter to create fresh content for your website quickly and efficiently.

When you are ready to hire a ghostwriter who will save you time and money while providing high-quality, engaging content that will keep your visitors coming back, please feel free to contact Evelyn Bourne, Freelance writer, and request a consultation today.

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