Google's "Analytics" service will give you plenty of useful information about your website traffic and can be scheduled to send you customized reports via email.  

Activation is as simple as:

1. sign up for a free account
   
2. add your domain name (to the account)
   
3. copy an ID (given to you) into your website
   

Now here's the detailed step by step instructions:

Getting the Analytics 'ID' for your website

1. You must first have, or sign up for, a (free) account with the Google Analytics website.
   

   If you already have an Adwords account you can activate Analytics from within it (see their site for details).

2. Add your domain name to the account (called: 'Add Website Profile').
   

   You can have several domains on the same account and each domain will be assigned its own ID. Register either www.yourdomain.com or yourdomain.com. You do not need both.
   

3. For each domain (profile) Analytics will generate some text that they will tell you to paste into your site.
   
   • DO NOT paste it into your pages
     

     (unless you are using the DIY WebSpace service)

   • DO make note of the Analytics ID
     in the following example: the ID is UA-9999999-9 (without the quotes)
     
     <script src="http://www.google-analytics.com/urchin.js" type="text/javascript"> </script> <script type="text/javascript">
_uacct = "UA-9999999-9";
urchinTracker(); </script>

Entering the Analytics 'ID' into your website

1. Log-in to your website
   
2. Open "Site Setup"
   

   (in the user menu at the top right)

3. Open "Analytics For Plone"
   

   (scroll down to find it in the 'Add-on Products Configuration' section)
   

   If "Analytics For Plone" is not present:
   

   1. Open "Add or Remove Products"
   2. Select "Analytics For Plone"
      
   3. Install it
4. Enter your account ID
   

   The default 'filters' are already configured to ignore activities that occur while you are logged in, so your stats will represent actual visitors.

5. Save it
   

   ('submit query' button)

To Confirm The Setup and View Your Activity Reports

You will probably need to generate some activity by visiting your own website anonymously if you want to see an immediate confirmation that data is being received.

hint: log out of your site and close the browser window to end your work session - then browse your site (without logging in)

The home page inside your  Analytics account shows a (real time) confirmation if Analytics is receiving data for your website(s).

From here you can also 'View Reports' for your domain(s), but you should be aware that Google updates your activity reports just once per day (usually overnight) so it might take up to 24 hours before you see the latest activity data.

Analytics reports provide an impressive amount of information and we highly recommend that you take some time to explore what is actually available, especially as your site gathers real data.  You may find much more than you expected to.

To Schedule Report Deliveries via Email

This is not immediately obvious, but you can schedule the Analytics site to automatically email you with the reports of your choice, on a regular interval of your choice.  You can even choose from several file formats such as Adobe Reader files (.pdf) or standard data formats that can be imported into spreadsheets or other applications.

While viewing any report that you want emailed, simply click on the 'email' button (see the button bar directly under the report title).  From here you can specify the delivery details, send the report immediately or set up the delivery schedule.

Using The Dashboard To Get The "Big Picture"

Another feature that may not be immediately obvious is the first report page, called the 'Dashboard',  which is actually a collection of 'overviews' of other (selected) reports.

You can customize the dashboard by adding, removing or rearranging overviews from the report pages that are the most important to you and then schedule the dashboard for regular email delivery.    

The other report pages provide an 'Add To Dashboard' button for this purpose.  On the dashboard itself you can drag-and-drop the overviews to rearrange them (drag each item by its title bar) or you can remove an item using the [X] in its title bar.

Final Notes

This how-to is just an introduction to Analytics.  There are many other features and capabilities that we have not touched upon.  We hope that you will find the service useful, the features satisfying and the data meaningful.