By Barry Craft

We have all heard how important it is to monitor and analyze your website's traffic. Unfortunately, there seems to be a lot of confusion on which stats are most important and most reliable. I will attempt to clarify some of those details while explaining the inaccuracies as well.

Probably the most popular statistical term related to website traffic is the "hit". I feel it is also the least understood. By definition, hits are all the individual requests a server must fill in order to deliver a web page in its entirety. By this I mean the basic HTML plus each individual graphic or sound file as well. You can see how this number by itself is
relatively meaningless, especially if you have several graphic or multimedia files on you pages.

Pageviews are a little more significant, but they still possess too many inherent variables to be accurate. A pageview is basically the sum total that your visitor would actually see in their browser window.

Here are two major problems of both hits and pageviews.

-- Cache
Let's say that someone views a page from your site. A short time later in that same session, they (or someone else in that house) go to view that page again. Most likely the page will be loaded from their browser's cache (temporary holding area) rather than from your site because it is faster. That person's ISP may also have a cache, particularly if it has a proxy server. These factors definitely skew the statistics.

-- Spiders or Bots
As the name suggests, these software programs are designed to crawl the web, cataloging pages, collecting email addresses or other types of information. This registers as a hit. You could build a database of these IP addresses to ignore, but that list would change daily.

Counting unique visitors is a little more reliable especially if you use a combination of IP addresses and/or cookies. This data is useful when attempting to calculate how many visitors it takes to make a sale. The drawbacks of these are that most people get a different IP address each time they log on, and some people may have the cookie feature turned off in their browser.

As you can see, no single stat by itself will tell the whole story and most are only an estimate. To better evaluate your site's performance, it is necessary to review many factors. I will point out the more important ones along with the proper tools to accomplish the task.

-- Referring URL
This information will tell you where your visitors came from, such as a link on another site or a search engine. If the visitor came from a search engine, most stats will also tell you which search term was used. An analysis of these search terms can be very valuable when creating or registering your pages.

-- Home Page Views
Although many people will enter your site through a sub page, most will usually visit your home page while they are there. This can be used to gauge overall visitors.

-- Top Entry Pages
If you know which page or pages most people enter through, you can optimize those pages for even better ranking. You can also review the meta tags and build additional similar pages which can enhance your visitor's experience and your profits.

-- Top Exit Pages
By knowing which pages most traffic leaves through, you can decide how to enhance those pages or eliminate them entirely.

-- Average Time Per Visit
After reviewing the data, you may see many people leaving after 20 or 30 seconds, which might suggest your pages take too long to load. It could also indicate lack of content or other design flaws. On the other hand, if you see a lot of time spent in one part of your site, you can use that input to improve other parts of your site.

-- Most Or Least Visited Pages
It is important to know what brings people to your site initially or keeps them there once they have arrived. These statistics can help you determine that.

-- Activity Level By The Hour of Day
All sites require maintenance or updating of pages to remain viable. These activities are best accomplished when your site traffic is the lowest.

-- Which Browser Your Visitors Use
Although most web page features are compatible with later versions of Netscape or Internet Explorer, you may find your traffic is stronger in one or the other. This fact will help you optimize design features for that browser. My own site runs about 45% for each (Netscape 4 and IE 4 or 5). The remaining 10% mostly uses AOL or earlier versions of the above. Your numbers may vary, depending on your site.

Now that we've seen which statistics are most important, let's examine some ways to monitor those. I'll begin with my favorite:

-- eXTReMe Tracking
I have used this service for over two years with no complaints. They can provide all of the above tracking stats and much more. It has an easy to use graphical interface, quick set-up and unlimited URL's tracked in real time. A fully functional free version is available that requires you to post a small logo on each page you want tracked. Anyone can click on that logo and see all your stats. I don't like that idea, so I use the paid version which is $5 per month without the logo, so your privacy is ensured. Go to http://www.extreme-dm.com

-- Web Site Traffic Report
After registering (by filling in a short application form) they mail you a block HTML code (just 2 lines) to insert into your pages. At the end of each day, they will email you a FREE traffic report for your site. The report will contain summary statistics and graphs of the traffic to your site for the day, plus an optional detailed line-by-line listing of each visitor to your site. I have not used this personally, but have heard good reviews from those who have http://www.websitetrafficreport.com/

-- The Counter
This is another free service with no visible logo. The stats are not quite as extensive as those above, but still a good deal.
http://www.thecounter.com

-- Web Stat
This very reliable service comes with a 30-day free trial or you can upgrade for $5 per month with many additional features.
http://www.web-stat.com/

-- Web Site Tracker
Web Site Tracker offers their service free with no banners on your page. It tracks unique visitors (by country), IP addresses, browser, referring URL, average hits by the hour and much more. http://www.websitetracker.com/

-- Web Trends
This software is far from free (about $350 US), but offers some very sophisticated tracking and report options. My hosting company provided me with a complimentary copy which I use for more serious analyses. This is one you may consider down the road when your business warrants it. http://www.webtrends.com

I hope by now, you have a better understanding of website tracking and the tools required to better accomplish the task. It can be a tedious process but one that is extremely vital to the success of your online business.

Barry Craft has helped thousands of entrepreneurs develop more income from their online businesses. He publishes "Cyber Marketing News" which provides the latest Internet marketing tips. Get two free e-books for subscribing at http://www.profitmatters.com/subscribe.htm, or contact him at mailto:barry@profitmatters.com