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University of Texas at Austin

, Filed Under: Did You Know, Plugin Documentation

Wave of the Future: Google Analytics

First published on January 28, 2015. Updated on November 29, 2018.

This post will walk you through getting your site up with Google Analytics and properly configured. Let’s get started!

Before beginning, please be sure to review the best practices policy for the use of analytics on campus. Ensure that you have the following before beginning to configure your blog site:

• Site administrator credentials for a University Blog Service blog
• An email address that is not hosted on UTMail

First, create a Google Account. This can be your own personal Gmail/Google account if you have one. For departmental blogs or sites with multiple administrators, we do strongly recommend that a new Google Account be created for the group and that the credentials be shared in Stache with fellow administrators.

Next, log into the Google Analytics page, http://www.google.com/analytics/web, using the blog’s Google Account.

• Click “Sign Up”

• Fill out the New Account details using your blog information

• And select “Get tracking ID”

screen-shot-2017-02-09-at-3-23-32-pm

Next log into the Dashboard for your WordPress blog site, then:

• Click on “Plugins” in the left hand menu.
• Look for a plugin named “Google Analytics for WordPress by MonsterInsights.”
• Click on the “Activate” link under it.

The Dashboard will refresh once the plugin had been successfully activated. At this point the plugin will need to be configured to follow the best practices for Google Analytics use on campus.

• While still in Plugins, find the Google Analytics for WordPress by MonsterInsights you just activated and click on Settings.

settings
• Click “Authenticate with your Google account” and provide the email used to create your google analytics profile, then click “Allow” to allow the plugin to access your Google account.

• Select your site from the “Pick a Profile” dropdown and click “Complete Connection”.

 

complete connection

• You will get a message that it is finishing up and you will be taken back to your site. You will be on a page called Insights.

• Scroll down and click “Save Changes”.

Insights

That’s it! You’re done! After a short period of time Google Analytics will begin to collect information and you can view your Analytics from your Google Account. If you should have any questions, please send an email to help@sites.utexas.edu

NOTE: On August 9, 2018 Google Analytics for WordPress changed ownership from Yoast to MonsterInsights. This article has been updated to reflect this change.

If you already had Google Analytics activated on your site, please follow these instructions to re-authenticate:

  • Log in to your site dashboard
  • Open the left hand menu item, “Insights” (formerly called “Analytics”)
  • Follow the instructions to re-authenticate with Google Analytics

Resources from the plugin Developer:

, Filed Under: maintenance, News, Plugin Documentation

Google Analytics for WordPress

The Google Analytics for WordPress plugin has changed ownership from Yoast to MonsterInsights and UBS stewards will be updating to the current iteration on August 9th, 2018.  This change will require that users re-authenticate with Google Analytics in order to continue tracking analytics data on your UBS site.

The updated version of this plugin has been made available in the QUAL environment (https://qual.sites.utexas.edu) for testing.

Instructions to re-authenticate

  • Log in to your site dashboard
  • Open the left hand menu item, “Insights” (formerly called “Analytics”)
  • Follow the instructions to re-authenticate with Google Analytics

NOTE: If you are looking for instructions for setting up Google Analytics for the first time, please visit this post for more information.

Resources from the plugin Developer:

, Filed Under: News, Plugin Documentation

University Brand Bar Plugin – New Feature Introduced

You can now add your Parent College/School Link in the top left-hand corner of the University Brand Bar.  Visit our example site to see how this looks.

Here’s how:

  1. Activate the University Brand Bar plugin from your site Dashboard
  2. Go to Settings > University Brand Bar
  3. Parent College/School Name: Enter your Parent College/School name as you want it to appear
  4. URL for Parent College/School: Enter the URL of your Parent College/School

The University Brand Bar can be used with any theme supported on UBS.

Please note: Since this plugin was customized for the UT Responsive Theme, you may need to make some minor adjustments in your site’s Additional CSS settings to ensure best viewing.

, Filed Under: Did You Know, Plugin Documentation

How to use Simple Calendar Plugin

The Simple Calendar Plugin is an easy way to add Google Calendar events to your WordPress site. This plugin is available to your site by default.

There are a few steps you must follow before embedding your Google Calendar onto your site page.

  • Create a Google API Key
  • Activate Simple Calendar from your plugin dashboard.
    • Login to your site. From the Dashboard, click Plugins and activate Simple Calendar.
  • Enter the Google API Key from your clipboard into the activated plugin:
    • Calendar > Settings

screen-shot-2017-04-26-at-3-22-34-pm

For the full listing of help topics for the Google Calendar plugin, please go to – https://simplecalendar.io/

 

, Filed Under: Did You Know, News, Plugin Documentation

New UT Branding Bar Plugin

The UBS stewardship team is happy to announce a new plugin called: UT Branding Bar. This plugin is optimized for sites using the UT Responsive Theme.

Activating this plugin will place the University Brand Bar bar across the top of your site.

The University Brand Bar provides visitors to UT websites with a quick identifier of the UT brand and a consistently implemented route back to the UT Austin homepage. – UT Brand Guidelines

Here is what it looks like –

UT Branding Bar Example

That’s GREAT – but can I hide the existing UT Branding logo built into the theme header?

YES! Simply add custom CSS code following  these steps:

  1. Go to Appearance > Customize
  2. Click the “CSS Styles” tab in the left-hand menu
  3. Paste this CSS code into the box “Custom CSS Styles”
#UTbranding {
    padding-top: 40px;
    -moz-box-shadow: 0px 1px 2px #707070;
    -webkit-box-shadow: 0px 1px 2px #707070;
    box-shadow: 0px 1px 2px #707070;
    background: none repeat scroll 0 0 #FFFFFF;
    height: 50px;
    width: 100%;
    display: none;
    }

       4. Click Save & Publish

5. Now your site will look like this –

UT Branding Bar Plugin Example

ADDITIONAL INFORMATION:

If you activate this plugin and would like to remove the Black bar at the top of your site, do this:

  1. Go to Plugins
  2. Search for or find: MU Admin Bar
  3. Click Deactivate

We have added a Log In link in the footer of the UT Responsive Theme that will allow users to log in to their sites.

Please Note:

This plugin was developed for the UT Responsive Themes. It is recommend that site administrators use the UT Branding plugin with the UT Responsive theme. Your results may vary if using a different theme.

, Filed Under: Plugin Documentation

Facebook Page Plugin

To use the Facebook Page Plugin (https://wordpress.org/plugins/facebook-page-feed-graph-api/):

  1. Request the plugin be added to your site (help@sites.utexas.edu)
  2. Activate the plugin
  3. Place a shortcode where you would like to display a FB status feed
[facebook-page-plugin href=”<name_of_public_facebook_page>” tabs=”timeline” adapt=”true” height=”600″ width=”800″]

If the url for the page you want to display is, http://www.facebook.com/facebook, then the href value for your short code will be “facebook”.

ex:

[facebook-page-plugin href=”facebook” tabs=”timeline” adapt=”true” height=”600″ width=”800″]
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