Web Analytics
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"Reporting web site metrics is just the first step in the process toward acquiring, converting and retaining more customers." - NetIQ
You've built your site. You've submitted it to search engines. You're getting traffic. Now you need to know how your visitors are using your site. Without log and visitor behavior analyzers the only way you know something is happening on your site is if you have a sale or someone contacts you. Evaluating your web logs with simple site log analyzers and web metrics tools can help you understand how your visitors use your web site.
Web analytic software packages
There are three types of web analytic software packages:
- Visitor counters
- Log analyzers
- Web metrics packages
Visitor Counters
Ever since the first web site was published in 1993 web site owners have wanted to know how many people visited their web site. Although logs were available they were not available to every web site owner. Therefore, programs called visitor counters were developed.
Some visitor counters used JavaScript and others used Perl. Regardless of the language being used visitor counters were very limited in what they could tell you. Sure, you had some idea of how many people visited your web page. Unfortunately, that's all you were empowered to know.
Visitor counters did have flaws. Some counted the same visitor multiple times. Some showed the visitor count for the entire site and not for the page. Then, worse yet, some required you visit your own pages to discover the visitor counts.
Visitor counters can break. They can give negative impressions about your site or business. Instead of giving the impression that you're a small business, you should practice the same principles used by large businesses like Amazon, IBM and Microsoft.
Log Analyzers
Log analyzers can examine your web server logs or create their own logs. They allow you to understand how many times pages are viewed. Where the visitor came from. The keywords your visitor used to find your site.
Log files also show the IP address of the visitor. With this information log analyzers can indicate how long a visit spends on a page and how long the visitor stayed on your site.
This information can help you gain some minor understanding of how your visitors use your web site. While the information is better than a visitor counter, log analyzers have short-comings as well.
Some log analyzers will show you the keywords used to find your site but not show which search engine brought the visitor. Some will show this information and even provide links to the search results.
Search engines bring visitors to your sites. Links from other sites, also, bring visitors to your site. Knowing how your visitors find your helps you with your online marketing campaigns.
Web Metrics Packages
There's nothing like spending money on advertising campaigns and not knowing whether your money is being spent wisely. You need stronger tools with more advanced capabilities. Web analytic and metrics packages pick up where visitor counters and log analyzers fail to meet the requirements of benchmarking and measuring returns on investment for marketing campaigns.
Web analytic software can aid in tracking your PPC campaigns, search engine performance, customer acquisition and retention and conversion rates. You'll be able to perform A/B split testing which takes a control group versus a testing group. Essentially you'll be testing the performance of two web pages with little difference to determine how visitors respond to different stimuli.
The four top web analytic software packages are WebTrends, Urchin, ClickTracks and CoreMetrics. Each has their own capabilities and usefulness. Which package meets your needs depends upon your needs and the operating system you use.
These web analytic packages cost more than the smaller packages. WebTrends, for example, costs as much as $10,000. However, it is available in a hosted Small Business version for $35 per month. The returns on investment can increase if the information learned is used properly.
Web Analytics Summary
Marketing companies use surveys to determine how marketing efforts affect or drive traffic to a client's business. Additionally, visual surveys performed by trained marketing analyst can help change the shape and merchandising of client stores and product displays. Unfortunately, web sites typically can't meet the needs of traditional marketing surveys.
As a result, web sites need analytic software that can tell them how people get to the web site and behave on the site. Web analytic software can help you understand where the obstacles to conversion exist. When obstacles are removed returns on investment can be increased.
Additionally, through web analytics you can learn which advertising campaigns work and which need to be ceased. Money spent on useless advertising campaigns can be shifted to campaigns that perform better. Increased spending on strong campaigns can bring stronger returns.
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