How to Set Up Custom Dimensions

If you want to collect and analyze data that Analytics doesn’t automatically track, you can create custom dimensions.

Custom dimensions are like default Analytics dimensions. They allow you to attribute additional information to hit, session, user, and product data.

Follow this guide to learn how to set up custom dimensions.

Prerequisites:

You are a Pro license user or higher.
Your ExactMetrics is installed and activated.
Google Analytics is already authenticated on your website.
You’ve already installed and activated the Custom Dimensions Addon.
You know if your property is a Google Analytics 4 (GA4) or Universal Analytics (UA) property.

Step 1: Add Custom Dimensions in ExactMetrics

Go to ExactMetrics » Settings » Conversions and find the Custom Dimensions area:

Click on + Add New Custom Dimensions, choose the dimension type from the dropdown and add all the custom dimensions you’ll need.

Note: If you’re connected to a GA4 property, there will be no ID column. The ID column only appears when ExactMetrics is connected to a UA property.

About Custom Dimensions

ExactMetrics provides several custom dimension types to choose from:

Logged in
User ID
Post Type
Author
Category
Published at
Tags
SEO Score
Focus Keyword

1. Logged In

Track whether your visitors are logged in or not.

2. User ID

Track each individual logged-in user’s activity. Recommend for eCommerce or membership sites use.

3. Post Type

Track performance of each custom post type.

4. Author

Track authors and their content performance on your blog.

If you cannot find the Author custom dimension as an option, it’s most likely because you have the EU Compliance addon installed and activated. Author tracking is automatically disabled for customers to avoid issues with GDPR while the addon is active.

5. Category

Track the performance of your categories, see which topics are the most popular amongst your visitors.

6. Published at

Track your post performance according to when your post was published on your site.

7. Tags

Tags give you more detailed metrics about what specific topics work best on your site.

8. SEO Score

Analyze the SEO score of your posts and pages if you’re using the Yoast plugin for SEO.

9. Focus Keyword

Analyze the Focus Keywords of your posts and pages if you’re using the Yoast plugin for SEO.

Create the custom dimensions you want to track and Save Changes to finish.

Step 2: Set Up Custom Dimensions in Google Analytics

Once you’ve added custom dimensions within your WordPress site, you’ll need to configure your Universal Analytics (UA) or Google Analytics 4 (GA4) in the same way.

Below are steps for users who have a GA4 property or a UA property. If you’re not sure what kind of property you have, check out our guide to understand the differences between GA4 and UA.

Google Analytics 4

Once you’ve connected ExactMetrics to your GA4 property, ExactMetrics will automatically create all of the needed custom definitions within your GA4 settings at analytics.google.com » Configure » Custom definitions.

If you are able to see a list of ExactMetrics custom dimensions, then no further steps are needed and you’ll soon begin to track data for your custom dimensions.

If the list is completely blank, you’ll need to go to ExactMetrics » Settings and reconnect ExactMetrics to your GA4 property. The custom dimensions will automatically be generated during authentication.

Universal Analytics

For UA properties, you’ll need to create a custom dimension within the property settings and make sure the Index number matches the ExactMetrics custom dimension ID.

To start, log in at analytics.google.com and make sure the correct property is selected:

Then click Admin:

Under the Property column, click Custom Definitions » Custom Dimensions:

Now you’ll be able to click + New Custom Dimension:

You will be prompted to give your custom dimension a name. During this step, you’ll need to manually type in the custom dimensions you set in within WordPress:

For example, if you set up a custom dimension of “Author” in your WordPress site, go ahead and type in “Author” as the name.

Once you’ve entered the name exactly, click Create. The next page will display code snippets, but you can ignore them and click Done.

Continue this process until you’ve added all of the custom dimensions to your UA property that were added to your WordPress site.

Important: You’ll want to create your custom dimensions in the same order as you did in ExactMetrics settings. Once custom dimensions are created in your UA property, you will not be able to delete them.

The last step is to verify that the Index number in UA matches with the custom dimension ID in the ExactMetrics settings.

See the Index column within your UA property settings:

Then within ExactMetrics » Settings » Conversions » Custom Dimensions, input the index number as the custom dimension ID in ExactMetrics. Once done, click Save Changes: