Web site tracking software helps you determine whether your Web presence is doing the job you intended.
by Vicki Brightbill
Your agency has a Web site, but is anyone visiting it? More importantly, are the ones who visit your site really the people you hope to attract? Web traffic reporting software can track your Web site's visitors to determine whether you are reaching your target audience. It can also tell you in very specific terms which pages visitors accessed, the path a user took through your site, and even the geographic area from which your visitors are coming. If your Web site isn't tracking visitor activity, you're not collecting important data that could indicate where adjustments to your Web strategy might be needed.
Depending on the features and capability, tracking software may tell you which keywords visitors searched to find your site and which search engines brought them there. This information could be valuable in helping you decide which search engines to register your site with and may also give you ideas for additional keywords to add to your meta tags.
There are a wide variety of features and approaches in Web site tracking software, and, naturally, a wide range of prices. Some are free, if you are willing to display their logo on your site. Some charge a monthly or yearly fee that is dependent on the level of detail you'd like to see in your statistics as well as on the number of pages in your site. Installation varies from inserting code into each of the pages you want tracked to programs that run on the host's server.
What to expect
Tracking programs typically follow one of two approaches: 1) you receive reports at specified intervals (daily, weekly, monthly), or 2) you can look at "live" statistics; that is, you access your statistics via the Web and see what is happening in real time as well as check cumulative statistics for a variety of time periods. Additional features may show the browser used by your visitors and even show statistics for users who access your site via passwords (if you have private content or ask visitors to log in).
Many programs offer charts and graphs in addition to raw data. Some programs offer an analysis of the data on a regular basis, including suggestions for improvement.
All programs track similar data, which is typically broken down by hits (total, daily, hourly, etc.) and visitors (i.e., unique visitors to the site versus only those pages that have been accessed). Since graphics uploaded with your Web page may count as a "hit," some programs can filter out the loads of graphics on your pages so that you get a true picture of how many pages were accessed. Many programs also can report where visitors are coming from by continent, country, and state, and language. Some tracking software can also report visitors' monitor resolutions and colors, operating systems, and even determine whether visitors have cookies enabled and are using browsers that support Java and Javascript.
A sampling of providers
Website Report (www.websitereporter.com) says it distinguishes itself by providing customized rather than canned statistics and has export features to allow the webmaster to clear out server space periodically by saving older statistics somewhere else. Cost is $75 for one year, which includes the software for your server and free updates. If you are willing to display their logo on your site, the cost is $50.
Sitetracker (www.sitetracker.com) offers four levels of service. Their free service lets you look at a history of statistics for the previous seven days and reports on the number of pages viewed, number of unique visitors, your most popular pages and raw logs. It also provides marketing reports on the top referrers to your site. The Advantage plan ($9.95/month) shows 15 days of history and adds marketing reports for the top search engines and keywords. This plan also includes Path Reports for the top paths. Professional ($19.95/month) and Premier ($29.95/month) levels take the length of reporting to "forever." Each offers additional traffic and marketing reports, plus more site path reports. Premier adds visitor profile reports (window size, browser, monitor resolution and colors, and operating system. Each of these plans covers a maximum of 40,000 page views per month. Higher fees are charged for more traffic.
FreeStats (www.freestats.com), claims to be the best site tracking service on the Web. You can check statistics at any time using a Web browser. After you sign up, you insert additional code into your Web pages and are provided with a link to a statistical reports page. FreeStats includes traffic, marketing, path, and visitor profile reports plus charts and graphs as well as raw data. You must, however, place a banner advertisement on your site to use this product. They offer bannerless upgrade packages starting at $8.33 per month.
LiveStats (www.statisticsserver.com) generates 49 detailed site usage and marketing reports, queried by day, week, month, or user-defined date ranges, including a breakdown of hits by state, country, continent, a Top Ten Errors feature, visitor entry and exit points, pages which were the only page viewed during a session, and most and least commonly accessed pages. It displays over 200 graphs, tables, and summaries, and also analyzes trends on 365 days of historical data. You can put a "watch" on IP, URL, and click-thrus, and use "include" and "exclude" filters to fine-tune the data you receive. You can have reports e-mailed to you regularly (daily, weekly, monthly). Prices start at $395. This program runs as a service on Windows NT/2000 servers. This is a "heavy duty" program that may be included on your Web host's server (something many hosts add to their system), so you might want to first check if site tracking capability is available from your Web host.
Index Tools (www.indextools.com/statistics.html) is Web-based, so you can access your reports from anywhere. There is no software to download - you simply "paste" code in your pages. Index Tools tracks session activity and analyzes visitor behavior and traffic patterns to help you evaluate your content and navigation. You can manage multiple Web sites and specifically exclude your own visits from the statistics gathered. There are three levels of service: free, $9.95/month, and $24.95/month. You can also pay on an annual basis.
SuperStats (www.web-site-tools.com/superst.htm) starts at $9.95 per month for their Standard service, which includes monitoring up to 10,000 pages, four reports, basic page view, and visitor reporting. The Professional level, for $29.95 per month, covers 20,000 pages and includes over 100 reports that track, among other things, visitor profiles and site paths. The Premium level costs $99.95 per month and includes over 500 reports and adds e-commerce, HTML analysis, and server monitoring.
So many choices
Where do you start? Before you start shopping for Web site tracking capability, ask your Web host about tracking programs that may be offered and already reside on the host's system. Some hosts include the capability as part of the hosting agreement, while others may charge an additional fee for it. If you prefer to look further, a Web search will yield more than a hundred options. Also, try one of the free services that don't require that you display their logo (unless you don't mind). Another option is to check into those services that allow you to download a demo copy to evaluate. But before you buy, check out as many as you can and match the tracking service's features and capabilities to your site's size, complexity, and needs.
In the end, keep in mind why you built your agency's Web site and what you hope to accomplish. Your Web presence is (or should be) part of your agency's overall business strategy. Don't assume that your Web site will produce results automatically. Web site traffic tracking and reporting is a valuable tool for making sure your Web site is doing its job.
Vicki Brightbill is an IT specialist and co-owner of Betagraph Integrated Information Solutions, a company that provides creative and technical services for marketing communication and publishing. She can be contacted at vicki@betagraph.com or at 720-283-2660.
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