If you want to improve your site’s performance on Google’s SERP (search engine results page), you need some scary-good SEO insights to make that happen.
Fortunately, with MonsterInsights, you’ll have access to powerful analytics reports and enhanced eCommerce and affiliate link tracking features. This way, you can turn your site into an SEO monster!
In this MonsterInsights review, we’ll cover what MonsterInsights is, how to set it up, why you should invest in the tool and its pricing structure. We’ll also highlight a few drawbacks and two alternative tools.
This Article Contains:
(Click on the links below to jump to a specific section):
- What is MonsterInsights?
- How to Set Up MonsterInsights?
- 5 Reasons You Should Use MonsterInsights
- How Much Does MonsterInsights Cost?
- 2 Limitations of Using MonsterInsights
- 2 MonsterInsights Alternatives
- Is MonsterInsights The Best Google Analytics Plugin?
Let’s get some insights!
What is MonsterInsights?
MonsterInsights is considered the best Google Analytics plugin for WordPress sites. It’s even used by big-timers like Bloomberg, PlayStation, and Microsoft.
What exactly is a WordPress Google Analytics plugin?
If you’re new to GA Google Analytics or have limited SEO experience, you might find it challenging to interpret the data from Google Analytics reports.
But with a Google Analytics plugin like MonsterInsights, you’ll see all your site’s crucial data points in your WordPress dashboard. This way, you can start using the Google Analytics data to improve your site instead of spending hours figuring out where to start.
Additionally, this WordPress Analytics plugin gives you detailed insights into your site’s visitors and helps you determine what strategies are proving successful for your WordPress site so that you don’t end up making any monstrous mistakes!
Not to mention, you can use Monsterinsights with Universal Analytics and Google Analytics 4 (GA4). This way, you can use the version of your choice.
What’s the Difference Between MonsterInsights and Google Analytics?
One of the main differences between the two tools is the fact that MonsterInsights doesn’t require you to modify any tracking codes in your Google Analytics account.
Additionally, by default, you don’t get the following Google Analytics data:
- ECommerce conversion rates
- Affiliate link clicks
- File downloads
- Keywords that generate the most traffic
- WordPress categories, tags, or authors
- And more
If you want to track the above web analytics, you’ll need to modify tracking codes in your Google Analytics account, which can be a hassle.
Fortunately, with MonsterInsights, you can connect your GA Google Analytics account using its setup wizard and avoid changing any tracking codes.
How to Set Up MonsterInsights?
Before you can connect Monsterinsights to your WordPress site, you need to create a Google Analytics account if you don’t have one already.
Once you’ve set up Google Analytics, you can install the plugin:
- Download and install the MonsterInsights plugin from the WordPress plugin repository.
- Go to the Settings section in your WordPress admin and click Authenticate with your Google account.
- Log into your Google account and select the site or property that you want to link to your WordPress website.
If you run into trouble with the setup, you can check out MonsterInsights’ tutorials or log a support ticket.
Now that you know how to set up the Google Analytics dashboard plugin, let’s look at five reasons why you should connect Monsterinsights to your site in the first place.
5 Reasons You Should Use MonsterInsights
Here are five ways the Monsterinsights Google Analytics plugin can bring out your site’s beast-mode:
1. Advanced Affiliate Link Tracking
Affiliate links are unique URLs that contain the affiliate’s ID or username. This way, the affiliate will get credit for the traffic sent to the advertiser’s website.
The affiliate will get paid every time a user clicks on the affiliate link and performs the action that the advertiser is paying for.
The MonsterInsights plugin has an Affiliate Link Tracking feature that lets users monitor the performance of every affiliate link on their site and the number of clicks each link gets.
Why’s the Top Affiliate Links report useful?
Using this advanced tracking report, you can see how many clicks each affiliate link is getting. This way, you can identify your best-performing links and promote them effectively.
For example, let’s imagine you’re promoting five competing tools in a listicle, and the tool you’ve placed in the 5th position is receiving more clicks than the tool in the number one spot.
This data shows that you should probably move the 5th tool to the 1st position since readers are engaging with that product more.
Now, you can send more traffic to the most effective tool and generate even more revenue.
Note: you can also track your top outbound links and find link-building opportunities using this Google Analytics plugin for WordPress.
2. User-Friendly WordPress Dashboard Reports
This Google Analytics Plugin offers WPbeginners easy-to-interpret Google Analytics reports and metrics without having to leave your WordPress dashboard and, in turn, your site.
Here are some of the useful SEO analytics you’ll get:
- Overview report: This report shows you the number of sessions, new and returning visitors, and pageviews for your site. You’ll also see your top exit pages, top outbound links, and top affiliate links.
- Publishers report: This report shows you metrics like demographics and downloaded links. This information can help website owners who focus on blog content.
- Search Console report: This shows your top 50 Google search terms in your WordPress dashboard. You’ll also see the number of clicks, impressions, click-through rate, and average position of each term. This Search Console report can show you how successful your keyword research and SEO strategy are.
- E-Commerce report: Here, you can monitor your online store’s performance. You’ll even get a list of your top products. This way, you can ensure you promote your best-performing products via Google Ads or Google Adsense.
- Custom Dimensions report: This report lets you track custom data points. You can add author tracking, find your most popular post types, and check SEO scores.
- Forms Tracking report: See the number of form views and conversions your website forms are getting. MonsterInsights offers integrations with many popular contact form plugins. You can use this report to generate more signups and sales.
- Real-Time report: Monitor your visitors’ activity in real-time. This report is useful if you want to monitor the performance of any SEO campaign in real-time.
Note: You can add additional metrics to your WordPress dashboard by selecting the gear icon.
3. Automated Form Conversion Tracking
The Forms Addon lets you monitor how many visitors complete the desired action on your website. In this case, form submissions.
But desired actions can also be a product purchase, email list signups, eBook downloads, or spending time on a popular post.
And don’t worry, the tool integrates with popular form building tools like WPForms, Formidable Forms, Gravity Forms, and more. This way, you can track conversions on your tool of choice.
The Form Conversion Tracking feature lets you monitor which types of forms (newsletters, jobs, contact) are generating the most submissions. This way, you’ll see what type of forms are making your website visitors feel like this:
You can also use this forms tracking feature to record email addresses for lead generation and monitor the top conversion sources of these conversions.
For example, if your main source is referral sites, you can use this data to find similar sources and create partnerships.
Note: MonsterInsights also lets you connect Google Optimize to your website so that you can conduct A/B tests with ease. A/B tests compare two versions of your website or webpage to determine which one performs better.
4. Enhanced eCommerce Tracking And Google Ads Monitoring
This Google Analytics plugin also lets you do advanced eCommerce tracking to monitor your online store’s performance. Additionally, the tool connects seamlessly with WooCommerce, Easy Digital Downloads, MemberPress, and LifterLMS.
- eCommerce tracking: Monitor your online store’s conversion rate, transactions, revenue, and average order value. You can also use eCommerce tracking to see what types of sites send customers to your store. This way, you can promote your products on similar sites.
- Google Ads tracking: See how your Google Ads are performing, how many visitors interact with your ads, and the number of conversions you’re getting. To access this report, you’ll need to set up Google Ads conversion tracking on WordPress.
5. Smart Scroll Tracking
The Scroll Tracking feature has to be one of the most unique functionalities in the Monsterinsights Google Analytics plugin.
With this Pro plan feature, you can monitor user engagement on your site in real-time, and you’ll get notified of WP Google Analytics events while users are on your page.
Additionally, you’ll be able to see how far users scroll down on a particular page – 25%, 50%, 75%, or 100%.
On top of that, you’ll get an average Scroll Depth metric for your entire website.
Why’s it important to monitor users’ scroll behavior?
This scroll tracking data can help you determine how engaging your WordPress website is. Additionally, you can use this data to determine where you should add calls to actions (CTA), ads, and signup buttons on your website.
Another feature you can use alongside this one is the Enhanced Link Attribution report. Here, you can optimize the position of the buttons and CTAs on your WordPress website and determine what position secures the most clicks and sales.
Note: This Google Analytics plugin also offers Google AMP Tracking. With this Google AMP tool, you track and get accurate SEO analytics about mobile visitors. Additionally, you can track the amount of traffic your Facebook Instant Article is getting.
Next, in this MonsterInsights review, we’ll explore Monsterinsights pricing structure and see if the above features come at a scary price.
How Much Does MonsterInsights Cost?
Here’s a breakdown of Monsterinsights pricing structure:
- MonsterInsights Lite (free):
- Automatically track phone number clicks
- Better understand your audience with demographics data
- Easily manage user role permissions
- Stop logged-in users from tracking
- And more
- MonsterInsights Plus ($99.50/year):
- Use on one site
- Real-time analytics dashboard
- Full date range history
- Website speed report
- And more
- MonsterInsights Pro ($199.50/year):
- Use on five sites
- Enhanced eCommerce tracking
- Form conversion tracking
- Custom dimensions report
- And more
- MonsterInsights Agency ($399.50/year):
- Use on 25 sites
- Four add-on options, including the GDPR and EU compliance addon
- Unlimited users
- Premium support
- And more
Next, in this MonsterInsights review, we’ll find out if the MonsterInsights plugin has any colossal drawbacks.
2 Limitations of Using MonsterInsights
Here are two significant drawbacks of using this Google Analytics plugin:
1. Limited Free Version
MonsterInsights’ free plan is considered a free trial that beginners can use to get limited SEO data.
What’s missing in the MonsterInsights Lite plan?
With the Lite plan, you won’t be able to view your top landing pages, track your affiliate links, or monitor your online store.
As a result, if you want access to more important data, it might be worth it to upgrade to the Plus or Pro version.
On the bright side, the Lite plan still offers a wide range of useful features, including website file downloads and demographic tracking, that small business owners can use to optimize their sites.
2. Expensive Pricing Structure
If you decide to upgrade to a paid plan, you’ll find that the tool’s pricing structure is on the steep side.
The most affordable paid plan starts at $99.50, which is a bit pricey for startups and small business owners.
Fortunately, you can rely on MonsterInsights’ forever free plan until you’re ready to upgrade to the Pro or Plus plan when you’re ready.
Next up in this MonsterInsights review, we’ll cover two MonsterInsight alternatives.
2 MonsterInsights Alternatives
Here are the best WordPress plugins you can use if you find that MonsterInsights isn’t the right fit for you and your business:
1. Google Site Kit
Google Site Kit is a Google Analytics dashboard plugin that’s owned by Google.
This WordPress plugin gives you official stats from multiple Google tools, including Google Search Console, Google Adsense, and Google Tag Manager.
When compared to the Monster Insight tool, Google Site Kite’s reports only offer quick summaries, whereas MonsterInsights offers actionable data.
But this WordPress Analytics plugin still offers a sense of convenience that can’t be mimicked by other tools – up-to-date insights from multiple Google products without having to install or connect them.
2. Yoast SEO
Yoast SEO is a powerful WordPress Google Analytics plugin that offers users an easy way to view Google Analytic data.
With this WordPress plugin, you’ll get tips on:
- How to optimize any popular post with the desired key phrases.
- How to improve your site’s internal linking structure.
- How to fix broken links to reduce bounce rates.
- And more
This Google Analytics Plugin also integrates with powerful SEO tools like SEMrush and Wincher.
However, one of the major drawbacks of using Yoast is that the free version often displays ads, which can frustrate any user.
Is MonsterInsights The Best Google Analytics Plugin?
MonsterInsights is a must-have WordPress Analytics plugin that can help you view and work with your Google Analytics data in a simplified way. It’s basically like having your Google Analytics dashboard inside WordPress.
However, not only does the tool simplify Google Analytic data for you, but also offers users a whole host of powerful SEO features, including enhanced eCommerce tracking and web analytics.
But before you can use this Google Analytics plugin to track your site’s performance, you need to develop a conversion-based content and SEO strategy.
If you’re unsure of how to do this or need some help interpreting the data that this churns out, connect with the SEO experts at Startup Voyager!