Changing your WordPress Theme
Under the appearance tab, select ‘Theme’
You can search and browse for desired themes, or upload a theme from a ZIP file
It’s a good idea to preview the theme before activating it.
On the sidebar, select ‘Appearance -> Customize’ to preview your current theme.
Select ‘Change’ in the sidebar, and then click ‘Live Preview’ to view your installed theme.
Lastly, select ‘Activate & Publish’ to update your live site with the new theme.
Adding Custom CSS
You can style your site using custom CSS by clicking ‘Appearance > Customise’ from the dashboard.
Within the ‘Customise’ menu, hit ‘Additional CSS’ and you can make changes to your site and see them update in the live preview.
Editing HTML on your Blog
To edit the HTML of a post, select ‘Edit’ on a post from your dashboard.
Type ‘/html’ to add a custom HTML block where you can add custom HTML code.
You can also edit the entire post’s HTML by selecting ‘Code Editor’ from the side toolbar.
Using HTML tags, you can organise and section content on your blog. Here are some examples:
<article> represents a self-contained composition on a page, like a blog entry, or any other type of content.
<header> represents introductory content, like navigational aids, logos and other heading elements.
<section> represents a standalone section of a document. This should contain a heading.
<footer> represents information for the nearest sectioned content, like other links, copy-write info or author information.
<aside> represents content on a page that is indirectly related to the main content, like a sidebar.
For text content, these elements can be used (as well as styled with CSS):
<div> is a generic container for content.
<p> is a paragraph, usually represented as a block of text separated from other adjacent blocks. Can also include other content like images.
<figure> is self-contained content that can include a caption if needed.
HTML Examples
To create an ordered list, use the <ol> tag. Within this element, use <li> to define the list items.
<div>
<ol>
<li>Breakfast</li>
<li>Lunch</li>
<li>Dinner</li>
</ol>
</div>To create an unordered list, use the <ul> tag. Once again, <li> is used to define the list items.
<div>
<ul>
<li>Cereal</li>
<li>Sandwich</li>
<li>Meatloaf</li>
</ul>
</div>To place emphasis on a word or sentence, use the <em> tag.
<p>You <em>have</em> to try this!</p>
<p><em>It's really tasty.</em></p>To use headings to organise content, use the tags <h1> to <h6>. Generally, <h1> is reserved for your title, with each heading number decreasing in importance. You can define custom styles for each heading, or keep them as the default display settings.
<!DOCTYPE html>
<html>
<head>
<title>Beast Meals to Eat Every Day</title>
</head>
<body>
<h1>Breakfast</h1>
<p>My favourite breakfast food is cereal.</p>
<h2>Don't Skip Breakfast</h2>
<p>You'll be hungry all day!.</p>
</body>
</html>An example of setting custom heading styles with CSS:
<h1 style="background-color:Blue;">Ocean</h1>
<h2 style="color:Red;">Fire</h2>Installing Google Analytics for WordPress
Visit the Google Analytics site and sign up with an existing gmail account, or create a new one. You will be required to fill out pertinent information regarding your business and preferences for data collection.
You will then need to create a Google Analytics Property, and fill out the relevant details to help Google understand your business.
When prompted to ‘Choose Your Business Objectives’, it’s recommended to select ‘Get Baseline Reports’ and then ‘Create’.
Now you need to select your service. Choose your platform – in this case, we are using ‘Web’. Hit ‘Create Stream’ to set up your data stream. If you are planning to use a plugin like Monster Insights (which this tutorial will use), uncheck ‘Enhanced Measurements’ before hitting ‘Create Stream’.
Keep this tab open, then log into your WordPress Dashboard. Go to the plugins section and install Monster Insights. You can set this up for free and upgrade to the paid version later if needed.
Follow the instructions in the install wizard – you will first need to connect your Google Analytics account by logging in through the plugin as prompted.
As you have your data stream already set up, select it when prompted and click ‘Complete Connection’.
You can keep the default settings for now, and change them later if needed. This is also the time to add any affiliate links if you are using them. Click ‘Save and Continue’.
Monster Insights will then ask you which tracking features you wish to enable. Click ‘Continue’ when you’ve made your selections, or ‘Skip for Now’ to leave the default settings.
Monster Insights will now have installed Google Analytics for your wordpress site. It will prompt you to enter a paid licence key if you wish to upgrade (or if you already have one), but this isn’t necessary to start using Google Analytics.
You can now view your Google Analytics within WordPress by selecting ‘Insights > Reports’ from your dashboard sidebar.
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