“With Google Site Kit, which is pre-installed on your InstaBlog, setting up Google Analytics is incredibly straightforward. It’s so simple that it almost doesn’t require a video, but I’ll make one anyway just to cover the topic. So, you click on Site Kit in the left-hand menu, then connect as part of your setup and activate it. You’ll be prompted to help improve Site Kit by sharing anonymous usage data, which you can agree to if you wish, and then sign in with your Google account. You’ll want to use the account that’s associated with your Analytics for these sites and hit continue to grant additional access.
Next, you’ll need to verify your site, and Site Kit will handle that for you automatically. Back in the old days, you had to manually copy and upload a file with a strange name to your server, but that’s no longer necessary. You’ll also want to turn on metrics in your dashboard and set up Search Console, which is essential.
Once you’ve done that, you’ll be asked to select a profile. I’ll select my RF dog fooding profile. For those who aren’t familiar, “dog fooding” is a term used to describe a company using its own products, as in “eating your own dog food.”
You’ll notice that in the property section, I already have a GA4 profile set up. Interestingly, it’s no longer showing any Universal Analytics profiles, just GA4, which simplifies things. If you had a Universal Analytics profile before, it won’t even show up now, and the data stream is automatically configured for you.
All you need to do is hit “Complete Setup,” and that’s it. There are other things you might want to do later on, such as running ads, but we’ll talk about that another time. After setup, you’ll see the beginning of the screens, and although there won’t be data displayed immediately, it will start to populate after some time. That’s all there is to it. With Google Site Kit, setting up GA4 is a breeze.”
