# Getting started > Create an account, add your first site, paste one script tag and see your first visit in Datacenter. Then make your first short link. Source: https://datacenter.so/docs/getting-started Section: Start here Datacenter counts visits to your website and clicks on your short links. It shows both in one dashboard, so you can follow a click from Instagram to the visit, then to the signup or sale. This page takes you from a new account to your first visit. It takes about five minutes. ## 1. Create an account Go to [Sign up](https://app.datacenter.so/signup) and enter your email and a password. We send you a link to confirm your email. You can look around before you confirm, but you need a confirmed email to make short links. ## 2. Add a site Right after you sign up, **Set up your site** asks for your website address. Type it the way you would in a browser: `https://www.shop.example.com/shop` works as well as `shop.example.com`, and Datacenter keeps only the domain. Subdomains of it are counted too. To add more sites later, choose **Add site** on the Sites page. If the address is already on another Datacenter account, you get a one-time code to put on the site; once Datacenter sees it, the site comes to you, or, when an agency runs it for you, you get its dashboard read only. The Free plan has 1 site. Solo has 3, Studio has 15 and Agency has 50. See [Billing and limits](https://datacenter.so/docs/billing-and-limits). ## 3. Add the script Paste this tag into the `` of every page. Use your own domain in `data-site`. ```html ``` Most site builders have a box for code in the head. [Add the script](https://datacenter.so/docs/add-the-script) has steps for common ones. ### Or let us do it On step 2 of [Set up your site](https://app.datacenter.so/start), press **Set it up for me**. It shows the clicks to invite setup@datacenter.so to your site builder, with the role that can add code (on Shopify, you send us your 4-digit collaborator request code instead). Press **I invited you**. We put the tag on, check that your home page has it, and email you when it works. If we need something from you, we email you one plain step. Remove us from your site builder once it works. ### Or let your AI tool do it If your site is code you or an AI tool work on (Claude Code, Cursor, Copilot, Lovable, Bolt, v0 or Replit), use **Set it up with AI** on step 2 of [Set up your site](https://app.datacenter.so/start). It copies one prompt written for your site: the tag and where it goes, how to count signups and sales (from your server on paid plans), and how to check it. The prompt holds no key. When your plan sends events from your server, the AI asks you to make the key on the site's **Integrations** page and to store it as a secret. Then press **Then watch it go live**. Connected through the [MCP server](https://datacenter.so/docs/mcp), an AI coding tool can also read the steps and check the result itself. On Shopify, once Datacenter's Shopify app is out, **Connect Shopify** on the same step adds the tag and checkout sales with no code (when shipped). ## 4. Check that it works Step 3 of setup checks for you, live, with no reload: the tag on your home page (looked for every minute while the page is open), your first visit, then your first signup or sale. Under it, **Done for you** lists what Datacenter already set up from your site: your time zone (from your browser), a dashboard for your kind of site, goals added after the first day, email alerts, the Monday plan, automatic events and, on paid plans, people from forms. Each has one tap to change. If your home page has a Meta Pixel, a Google Ads tag or another ad tag, it offers to connect that ad account. You can also check by hand: Open your site in a normal browser tab and stay on the page for a few seconds. The script waits until the tab has been visible for 1.5 seconds before it counts a visit. That keeps out tabs that open in the background and close again. Then open the site in your dashboard. The **Live** count shows visitors from the last five minutes. The dashboard is built for your kind of site and fills in as you connect ads or a store. Click any number to see what makes it. See [Dashboards](https://datacenter.so/docs/dashboards). > If nothing shows up, check that the domain in `data-site` matches the site you added, and that an ad blocker is not stopping the script. A [script proxy](https://datacenter.so/docs/script-proxy), on paid plans, gets past most blockers. ### Pick the dates The button over the dashboard holds the period and what it is compared with. Every card follows it. **Previous period** compares like for like: this month so far, October 1 to 23, against September 1 to 23. **Same period last year** uses the same dates a year back. Turn on **Match weekdays** to go back 364 days instead, so a Monday lines up with a Monday. **No comparison** hides every change. Keys: **T** today, **W** last 7 days, **M** last 30 days, **X** comparison on or off, **Left** and **Right** step back and forward one period. The address keeps the period and the comparison, so a copied link or a dashboard's share link opens the same view. ## 5. Make a short link Open **Links** and choose **New link**. Paste a long address, pick where you will share it, such as SMS or Instagram bio, and choose **Make link**. You get a link like `go.datacenter.so/a8Kd2Q`, ready to copy. If the link points to a site you track, Datacenter ties the click to the visit that follows. See [Short links](https://datacenter.so/docs/short-links). ## 6. Use your own domain On a paid plan, put your links on `go.yourdomain.com` instead. People, Meta, Instagram and email filters trust your own name more. It takes one DNS record. See [Custom short domains](https://datacenter.so/docs/custom-short-domains). ## Next steps The Events API, the Meta Conversions API, the script proxy and attribution are on paid plans: Solo, Studio, Agency and Custom. - Count signups and sales with [custom events and goals](https://datacenter.so/docs/custom-events-and-goals). - Send sales from your server with the [Events API](https://datacenter.so/docs/events-api). - Send conversions to Meta with the [Meta Conversions API](https://datacenter.so/docs/meta-conversions-api). - Pick a [tracking mode](https://datacenter.so/docs/tracking-modes) for each site.