Every once in a while, I look through my Google Analytics data to find new topics to write about.

1. Log into Google Analytics and choose a site.
2. Click on “Traffic Sources” on the left-hand menu.
3. Click on “Keywords” in the new sub-menu.
4. Browse through the hundreds of phrases that people used to find your site.

Here’s the key. Look for search phrases that are questions about things related to your site, but that you haven’t really answered directly. On my photography site, someone searched for “What is black clipping.” I had mentioned the term black clipping in an unrelated post, but this seemed like a good time to write a post explaining exactly what the term means.

Here’s another example, from the same digital photography site. One keyword that a few people used was “canon compatible zoom lenses.” I previously wrote an article about a collection of canon compatible lenses that I had owned. Apparently this isn’t a topic a lot of people wrote about, because that post ranks #1 in Google for the phrase “canon compatible lenses.” That article didn’t really focus on zoom lenses, though, so this coming week I plan on writing up a list of canon compatible zoom lenses.

And, to make it even more sweet, this is a great opportunity to write up a post with lots of links to Amazon… which has the potential to generate some referral income.

So go check out your Google Analytics data and see what people are searching for. They’re practically asking you questions and just waiting for the answers. Give it to them, and you’ll end up with content that people want and more visitors.

You know how finicky these filters can be. I was a tad frustrated earlier in the year when I noticed that CNN was blocked – streaming video is no good. For a while I was able to access Q1043 and stream the radio station, but that’s now been blocked.

Oddly enough, the Daily Show and the Colbert Report are both available – but the actual flash movies in the pages are prevented from loading. /sigh.

All in the name of safety, though, right?

Today I came upon a new frustration. I was grading some papers in the library, and I read a take home test that a student had typed up. I noticed some weird formatting – a tell tale sign that something has been copied and pasted – so I went over to the computers to check it out.

When I typed in a phrase from the paper, the phrase appeared on a page from Example Essays. I tried to click through to see how much was plagiarized and bam! Blocked page.

I can see the point in blocking this type of page from students. But, as usual, I’m a bit curious as to the effectiveness.

In this case, the student could easily have accessed this page at home and plagiarized the information. While I, the teacher, am trying to grade papers at school during my prep, I am prevented from accessing the information necessary to know whether the student is cheating or not.

This wouldn’t be half as frustrating if teachers had override accounts so that they could bypass the filter altogether. Who are we trying to cage in, anyway? The students or the staff?

There are a number of things I like, but there is one thing that everyone can use: Google’s hosted Javascript libraries.

Last year, Google launched a project to host a handful of popular Javascript libraries. Among the initial offerings is jQuery – the Javascript library that I use on this site. They also have some other widely used options – like prototype and MooTools.

Basically, Google hosts the most recent (and some legacy versions) of the library on its server. You can then link the remote copy of the JS library to your site instead of hosting it yourself.

Why Should I Use Google Hosted Javascript Libraries?

Because it could be faster.

If two sites use the same Javascript library but host it locally, the user has to reload and recache the library for each site. jQuery.js on life-of-brian.com is different from jQuery.js on css-tricks.com – even if the file is exactly the same.

By pointing the user’s browser to the Google server, it will recognize that .js file in the cache and not download it a second time. So if life-of-brian.com and css-tricks.com both used the jQuery library on Google’s servers, the user would have to cache it once – and it would be preloaded when he or she visited the second site.

A secondary benefit (of concern only to large sites) is that it doesn’t put a strain on your bandwidth. This shouldn’t be a big deal for most people, but some high volume sites may find this comforting.

How Do I Load Google’s Hosted Javascript Libraries?

You could use the fancy load() function of Google’s AJAX API, or you could simply add a <script> element using the remote address on Google’s server.

I chose to go the second route with this site. I wanted to load both the jquery library and the jquery ui library (mainly for the tabs in the sidebar), so I included the following two lines in my header:

<script src="http://ajax.googleapis.com/ajax/libs/jquery/1.2.6/jquery.min.js" type="text/javascript"></script>
<script src="http://ajax.googleapis.com/ajax/libs/jqueryui/1.5.3/jquery-ui.min.js" type="text/javascript"></script>

You can find a list of all the URLs on the AJAX API documentation page.

Why Not Do This?

I don’t see a lot of potential for harm, but there could be some drawbacks.

No version control. Presumably Google is going to keep hosting important legacy versions of each library, but this takes version control somewhat out of your hands. It also means you can’t use the development releases – only the stable releases are hosted on Google’s server.

No hacking the library. You won’t be able to introduce custom hacks into the library if its hosted on Google’s server. I don’t know how many people do that anyway. I’ve never jumped into to hack a compressed library file – I just use it as is and add any custom code to another .js file.

Google could sabotage your site. Unlikely, but I suppose it’s possible. If you’re paranoid, steer clear.

Check It Out

I’ve been using it for a week or so, and I haven’t noticed any problems. In theory, it’s a great idea, but it’ll only work if a large number of sites (especially highly trafficked sites in a variety of niches) opt to use it.

I’m going to do my part and point my users to Google’s servers. Why don’t you?

I first noticed it when Chris Hope posted some screenshots of it on his blog. I then realized that I saw the same little icons that morning, but I just didn’t realize what they were for.

Over the next few days, Google made the feature live for all users with a Google Account, and there’s been a lot of complaining since. Mike at Tech Crunch complained that it was a new outlet for porn spam and ripe for abuse. Ben at Tech Savvy Educator just noticed it a couple days ago, and he doesn’t want “other people’s opinions affecting my search results.” It’s a common fear repeated elsewhere.

Straight from the Horses’s Mouth

Well, the good news from my perspective is that most of the complainig about SearchWiki is off-base and due to misconceptions. Before anything else, watch Google’ official video about SearchWiki (posted on the official Google blog).

One important thing to keep in mind: the promotion/demotion only affects your search results. When someone else hits the big up arrow, it has nothing to do with your search results. You can only impact your search results.

Nobody is messing with your search results, and there is no gaming the system here. In this respect it’s a personal tool much more than a collaborative search tool.

Second, the commenting is unobtrusive. Extremely unobtrusive. When I read Tech Crunch’s article about spam, I thought this would be bad. But then I wondered why I hadn’t seen any comments at all in my Google searches.

That’s because you won’t see any comments in your search results. In order to see other people’s comments, you need to scroll to the bottom and click on “See all notes for this SearchWiki” link. Then you’ll see other people’s comments, and you’ll see sites in the order that they were preferred by other users.

I don’t know if I buy the need for this part of SearchWiki, but it’s easy enough to not see it. Just don’t click the link. If you don’t want to read someone else’s comments about a site, no one is forcing you to.

But Is This a Good Idea?

I’d say it’s pretty clear that the original mass hysteria about SearchWiki was overstated. People can’t use it to game the system and affect real Google search results. Nor will your Google searches be muddied with spam comments.

But is it a good idea?

I think the personal aspect of it is quite useful. Sure, you can tag pages in delicious to make your bookmarks available at multiple computers. But to me, that’s a hassle.

When I sit down at the computer in the school library, I don’t have the delicious bookmarklets on the toolbar, and I often don’t go and sign in to my account. To bookmark a random page in delicious takes more steps than I’m willing to take.

I do however almost always log into my Google account. That’s because I use it for everything. Usually I check my e-mail and my reader, and sometimes I’ll use Google Notebooks to take notes about research I’m doing.

More often than not I try to find a page that I’ve visited before by repeating the Google search. Not necessarily the most effective or efficient method for re-finding a site, but SearchWiki certainly makes that easier.

If I want to catalog the sites I found interesting about Jackson State, I can just promote them all in my SearchWiki. Then I can  use the “See all my Searchwiki notes” to review what I’ve tagged as useful.

Since it’s rolled into an account that I use regularly (unlike delicious), I’m more likely to use it on a regular basis and it’s much more convenient.

As for the comments, useless in my opinion. I doubt I’ll ever use that part of SearchWiki.

Bottom line… don’t over-react. It’s not as obtrusive as people have made it out to be, nor is it a threat to the integrity of the almighty Google.

To use Google Analytics, you need to place some javascript on your website. A commonly asked question in forums is, “How do I add Google Analytics to my WordPress template?”

Where the Analytics Code Goes

When you sign up for Google Analytics, Google provides you with a short piece of javascript to place on your site. The code should look like this.

><script type="text/javascript">
var gaJsHost = (("https:" == document.location.protocol) ? "https://ssl." : "http://www.");
document.write(unescape("%3Cscript src='" + gaJsHost + "google-analytics.com/ga.js' type='text/javascript'%3E%3C/script%3E"));
</script>
<script type="text/javascript">
var pageTracker = _gat._getTracker("UA-2894597-3");
pageTracker._initData();
pageTracker._trackPageview();
</script>

According to Google’s instructions, this needs to be placed at the very end of your site – just before the closing body tag. To do this, we need to find the closing body tag on the WordPress template.

Look In Footer.php

As we previously discovered, a WordPress template is made up of a series of files. Three basic files – header.php, sidebar.php, and footer.php – help build the components of the page.

If your WordPress template follows normal conventions, the closing body tag should be in the footer.php file.

Go to your themes directory of the WordPress installation, navigate to your current theme, and open footer.php. You should see something like this at the end.

<?php wp_footer(); ?>
</body>
</html>

Add a blank line before the closing body tag. Simply copy and paste the javascript code that Google provides on that blank line, save the file, and you’re good to go.