Are you wondering how many people come to your website on a daily basis?
It’s important to know who’s coming to your website (and how). The number of site visitors that click on your website equals the number of opportunities you have to increase your form conversions, build a bigger email list, or sell more products and services.
So in this post, we’ll show you exactly how to track website traffic to your WordPress website so you can see how well your business is growing and whether your form conversion rates are keeping up.
We’ll be covering 2 of the easiest ways you can track your site traffic:
Method 1: Using the MonsterInsights Plugin
- Set Up a Google Analytics Account
- Install and Activate MonsterInsights
- Connect Your Website to Google Analytics
- View MonsterInsights Reports
Method 2: Using the WPForms Plugin
Why Is Website Traffic Important?
Website traffic is important for establishing yourself as a trusted brand.
In fact, if you don’t have site visitors coming to your website, it will be super hard to have people join your email list, engage with your content, or buy your products and services.
And having more site traffic can help you:
- Build better relationships with a broader audience
- Get your site’s content shared across more social media platforms
- Generate more high-quality leads
- Identify, nurture, and solve more pain points that’ll help you build your business
- Expand your business in terms of employees, products/services, physical locations, and revenue.
So, now you know why website traffic is important. But do you know how to track whether your traffic numbers are going up?
This part is important. Because if you don’t, you’ll never know whether your efforts are working or not. Not to mention, having numbers to look at can be a motivator to work harder to generate more leads and get more conversions.
So, let’s go ahead and take a look at how to track the number of site visitors coming to your WordPress site.
How to Track Website Traffic
Below are 2 easy methods you can use on their own or together to track your website visitors so you can make informed decisions about your small business website.
Method 1: Use the MonsterInsights Plugin
The MonsterInsights WordPress plugin is by far the most popular way to track how many people are coming to your website (and to see where they’re coming from). We’ll show you how to set it up below.
Step 1: Set Up a Google Analytics Account
To start to track website traffic in WordPress, the first thing you’ll need to do is sign up for a Google Analytics account.
So to do this, go to the Google Analytics website and click the Start for free button in the top right-hand corner.
Sign in to your Google account.
Then, click on Sign up.
Choose the Website option near the top to make sure you’re tracking the right thing.
Then, scroll down and enter your website’s information:
- Name your Google Analytics account
- Enter a website name
- Add your website’s URL
- Choose an Industry Category
- Select your time zone
Lastly, click on Get Tracking ID.
When the popup appears, review and accept the terms of service.
Great job. Now your Google Analytics account is all set up!
Step 2: Install and Activate MonsterInsights
The next step is to set up the best Google Analytics plugin for WordPress on the market, MonsterInsights.
Of course, you can use Google Analytics alone to track the number of site visitors that come to your website. The problem with that is, in order to accurately track the number of site visitors, you’ll have to deal with tracking code on your site, which can be tricky.
However, if you’re an advanced user and you want to see what that might look like, take a look:
Here you can see the following data:
- Users
- New Users
- Number of Sessions
- Sessions per User
- Pageviews
- Number of Pages/Session
- Average Session Duration
- Bounce Rate
You’ll also see how many site visitors are returning and how many are new.
That said, with MonsterInsights, you don’t have to deal with any code, and connecting your WordPress website to your Google Analytics is so easy.
You also have access to exclusive reports right in your WordPress dashboard that can give you more insight into your site’s traffic, lead generation efforts, and form conversions.
So, let’s get started.
After purchasing the MonsterInsights Pro plugin, log into your MonsterInsights account by clicking on the Login link at the top of the page.
Next, go to the Downloads tab on your account page. You’ll see a link where you can download the MonsterInsights Pro plugin.
Before moving on to the next step, make sure you deactivate and remove any other Google Analytics plugin or tracking code you have on your website.
Now that you’ve downloaded the plugin, go to your WordPress dashboard to install and activate it on your site.
Go to Plugins » Add New and click on Upload Plugin at the top of the screen.
On the next screen, select Choose File to select the zip file you just downloaded from your MonsterInsights account.
Click Install Now to upload the file and install it on your website.
Once uploaded, click the Activate Plugin to activate it on your site.
Lastly, go to your My Account page in your MonsterInsights account to get your license key.
Copy your license key and go to Insights » Settings in your WordPress dashboard. Click on Verify Key, paste your license key, and click Activate Key.
MonsterInsights is now activated.
Step 3: Connect Your Website to Google Analytics
To use MonsterInsights, you’ll need to connect your WordPress website to your Google Analytics account. Again, this is very easy to do with MonsterInsights because you don’t have to mess with any tracking code.
To start, go to Insights » Settings in your WordPress dashboard. Click on the Authenticate with your Google account button.
On the next screen, select your profile.
When prompted, click the Allow button to give MonsterInsights access to your Google Analytics data.
Next, select the website profile you want to authenticate and click Complete Authentication.
Nice. Now your WordPress website is connected to your Google Analytics account.
Step 4: View MonsterInsights Reports
Let’s take a look at the reports MonsterInsights offers to help you track your website’s traffic, among other things.
To get to the reports, go to Insights » Reports.
Overview Report
Under the Overview Report tab, you can see a lot of info about the site traffic coming to your WordPress website.
You can see a visual graph of the number of sessions and pageviews your site has gotten over a certain period of time. And, you can set this time range to be 7 days, 30 days, or a custom time range.
Next, you’ll see a quick view of key metrics such as the number of sessions and page views, the average session duration, and your site’s bounce rate.
This helps you determine whether the traffic that is coming to your website is sticking around and engaging with your content or not.
Lastly, you’ll see New vs. Returning Visitors and the Device Breakdown in pie charts. And if you keep scrolling, you can check out the top 10 countries where you’re site visitors are located, as well as your top referral sources.
Publishers Report
Under the Publishers Report tab, you’ll find other metrics that can help you learn more about the people that are coming to your website:
- Landing pages
- Exit pages
- Outbound links
- Affiliate links
- Download links
- Demographics and Interest categories
It’s an in-depth way to track website traffic to WordPress. Find out how many visitors are going to your various webpages, track outbound and affiliate links, and how many people have clicked a download link on your website.
In addition, see the age ranges, gender, and interests of all site visitors coming to your website.
eCommerce Report
Under the eCommerce Report tab, you’ll see the number of people coming to your online shop, along with specific details related to onsite transactions:
- Conversion rate
- Number of transactions
- Revenue generated
- Average order value
- Top products
With this information, again you can track how many people are coming to your online shop. But you can also identify which products in your online shop are the most popular, so you can continue to promote them and get more sales.
Search Console Report
Under the Search Console Report tab, you’ll see the top 50 Google search terms your site ranks for.
This is great for understanding which keywords are driving the most traffic to your website and how effective your SEO efforts are. And helps you go even deeper into tracking website traffic to your WordPress site
If you want to make improvements, ramp up your keyword research using this data. If you are happy because the trend is moving upwards when it comes to site traffic, keep promoting your top keywords.
For help with Google Search Console, make sure to check out this helpful tutorial for configuring your website with Google Search Console.
Custom Dimensions Report
Under the Custom Dimensions Report tab, you can track custom data such as the most popular:
- Authors
- Post Types
- Categories
- Tags
- SEO Scores
Though this doesn’t track how much site traffic is coming to your website, it’s still helpful. For instance, now you can see what current site visitors find the most interesting on your site, so you can continue to develop strategies to drive more traffic to your site.
Forms Report
Under the Forms Report tab, you can see some of the most exciting information as it relates to both site traffic and your website’s forms.
Check out how many people view and submit your website’s forms.
In addition, get a conversion rate for each so you can see which forms are converting the highest on your site, and which ones might need adjustments.
And if you’re offering site visitors content upgrades in exchange for their email addresses, be sure to read our article on how to track file downloads using MonsterInsights.
Get started with MonsterInsights now!
Now, let’s take a look at how you can track website visitors using WPForms.
We suggest you use both methods for an incredibly powerful visitor tracking setup.
Method 2: Use the WPForms Plugin
Want to quickly see what people do on your website before they submit a form?
It’s easy. Next, we’ll show you how you can use the WPForms plugin’s powerful User Journey addon to track website visitors on your site.
Here’s an idea of what a User Journey report looks like:
There are lots of great details that this addon shows you with just a few clicks. Let’s get started.
Step 1: Install and Activate the WPForms Plugin
Before getting started, you’ll first need to make sure that the WPForms plugin is installed and activated on your WordPress site.
For more details, see this step-by-step guide on how to install a plugin in WordPress.
Step 2. Enable the User Journey Addon
Once you’ve got WPForms installed and your license is verified, you’ll be able to quickly install and activate the User Journey addon.
Keep in mind, you’ll need the Pro level or higher to access this addon.
So, simply head to your WordPress dashboard and click on WPForms » Addons. Then, you can search for the User Journey addon and click on it to Activate.
For more help with this step, check out our guide on how to install and activate the User Journey addon.
Step 3. View User Journey Details
Now, once WPForms is installed, you’ll be able to use the User Journey addon easily.
All of your form submissions moving forward will include these User Journey details within the entry. So, after some time passes and people have filled out your forms, you’ll be ready to go track these visitor details.
To see this info, go to WPForms » Entries and then click on the name of your form.
Next, you’ll see a list of all the entries for that form.
So to see an entry’s User Journey details, click the View button toward the right side to open the full entry details.
Then, once you’ve opened the details of the entry, scroll down until you see the section titled User Journey.
By the way, if you notice that some info is now available, it’s most likely because a user has come from a non-SSL site and your site runs on SSL. Or, someone might have an extension or specific privacy setting.
So, this shows each step a user took while on your site, including the page the user was referred from.
You’ll get to see the date, time, and duration of the time spent on each page of your website that they went to.
Not only that, but you’ll be able to view the URL parameters by clicking the little Info icon as shown below.
Once you click on that icon, you’ll see the specific URL parameters for that page, including search queries.
And if you’d like, you can also view a visited page in a new tab by clicking the Open Window in a New Tab icon.
Great job! This is all that’s needed to track your site visitors using the User Journey addon.
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