Website Statistics - what does it all mean?18 May 2006
Sponsored by Bannerman Technology
Hits, Page Views, Visits, Unique Visits, Referrals, Search Strings... The terminology of web statistics can be confusing and the information they offer very often misleading.
Is there any benefit to trying to understand the information about the people visiting your website... most definitely yes.
By analysing your web server logs you will gain a clear understanding of how people use your site and understand it's effectiveness. If you are getting a lot of visits to the site, but people are not buying products from you, or are they getting to your contact details but not getting in touch? Web statistics will help you identify the possible areas of your site that you are losing potential customer. The shopping basket may be too confusing, the site may not get customers to the payment page quickly enough, clients may prefer to use an email form rather than an email link etc.
Web stats don't only identify the negatives though, they can help identify what's working well. The stats can show you where visitor have arrived from, i.e. the sites that have linked to you, helping you focus your marketing efforts reinforcing these areas.
So what do they all mean?
Hits
A hit is created when your Web server delivers a file to someone's browser. A Web page is usually made up of many files. These can include HTML files, photos, background images, Flash movies, ads, and more. So, when someone visits your homepage once, they call up many files and create many hits. How important are hits? Not very. In fact they can be downright misleading.
Page Views
Page views include all embedded images and other files in a Web page and are a much better indication of Web site traffic.
Visits
A visit includes all the pages viewed by a visitor to your site. Visits begin when a person enters the site and end when the same visitor leaves the site or remains idle for a period of time. Usually, one person visiting your site 30 times is counted the same as 30 people visiting one time each.
Unique Visitors
This is a more precise way to measure visitors to your site. Each person visiting your site is counted only once, regardless of how many times they visit. This is a way to measure how wide an audience you are reaching.
Referrals
A referral is a web page that contains a link to one of your pages that was used by a visitor to get to your site. Some referrals will be from search engines, others will be from web sites that have chosen to link to you. Understanding how people are finding your site is very important. It can help you understand your market and better budget your marketing dollars.
Search Strings
Not all stat packages will provide search strings, but if yours does, pay attention. A search string is the phrase visitors used to find your site in a search engine. Understanding these will help you focus your ads and other marketing methods. Search string reports are also useful in what they don't show. For example, keywords that you have targeted that do not show up in your stats should raise a flag and prompt investigation to determine the cause.
Understanding your statistics is certainly worth the effort. As you get more adept at deciphering Web stats, you will start to identify patterns and behaviors. Use that knowledge to fine tune your site and better understand your customers.
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