Understanding your visitors’ behavior is key to knowing how to market and even revamp your website.

With an analytics plugin for WordPress, you’re able to learn where your visitors originate from, how long they’re on your site, which pages perform best and much more.

You can use all of this data to improve your content, see which calls-to-action buttons work best and where to concentrate your marketing efforts. If you want to get the most from WordPress, try one of these analytics plugins.

Piwik

For those who prefer open source software, Piwik might be the perfect analytics plugin for you. It’s open source and self-hosted, just like WordPress. It’s similar to Google Analytics, but all data is stored by you versus being stored on a third party server. Piwik also offers a cloud hosted solution for a monthly fee if you don’t want to have to host it yourself. It’s highly customisable and ideal for sites of all sizes.

Google Analytics By Yoast

If you already use Yoast, you might want to consider Google Analytics by Yoast. As the name implies, the plugin integrates with Google Analytics. Yoast provides both a free and premium version based upon your needs. The built in dashboard makes it easy to see what your visitors are doing and where they’re coming from. You’re able to set up specific reports to quickly see just the data you need most.

Google Analyticator

Google Analyticator is another way to integrate Google Analytics with your site. It supports advanced code tracking to track everything from page interactions to Google offers. You can choose to show your visitors some of your page stats or you can choose to hide all data. Either way, you have access to an easy to use dashboard for tracking data on every page of your site.

WP Statistics

If you’d prefer not to use Google Analytics at all, WP Statistics has you covered. It’s an ideal way to track data without relying upon a third party. All data comes from WordPress and the plugin provides a detailed dashboard for you to view all data. It’s easy to export data to create your own custom reports and even email the data to yourself or others. It offers just as much data without needing to connect to Google Analytics like many other plugins.

Jetpack

Jetpack isn’t just an analytics plugin, but that is one of the features the plugin offers. If you’re trying to minimise the number of plugins you use, Jetpack might be a good choice. It may not be quite as detailed as some of the other analytics options on this list, but it provides concise stats without adding any extra load burden on your servers. It’s the combination of analytics with numerous other tools such as visitor engagement, security and site customisation that make this plugin stand out.

Clicky Analytics

Clicky Analytics is another major alternative to Google Analytics. The plugin automatically installs the Clicky Web Analytics code on to your site’s pages. The dashboard widget displays detailed statistics and information to help you understand where visitors are coming from, how long they’re spending on your site and much more. Some features of the plugin, such as video analytics, do require a premium account with Clicky. The best part of this plugin is all data is in real time so you can quickly tell if any changes or marketing efforts are paying off immediately.

Conclusion

No WordPress site is complete without an analytics plugin. The one you choose mainly depends on your needs and preferences. Different dashboards, available statistics, reporting tools and even cost are all things to consider when choosing the right one for you.

Need an analytics plugin for your site, but aren’t sure where to start? Contact StuartMedia for help with your choice and installation. 

Image: Blue Mountain Media