Trying to run a website without metrics is like driving at night with your lights off. Knowing what your readers like, and where your traffic is coming from is crucial to building an audience for your site.
Here are 10 factors which should guide your decision as to which counter to pick.
1. How fast does it load?
Speed is essential. You don’t want your counter holding up page loading time.
2. What metrics does it track?
Look for more than a simple counter. Take time to see what each service tracks. Managed properly, more information is always better. At this point, nothing beats Google Analytics for breadth of information.
3. What stats can you make public?
Want to show off your stats? Use a counter where you can adjust your privacy level to a level you are comfortable with.
4. Is the service reliable?
The last thing you need is your metrics tool going down and messing up your tracking. Do some research online and get something you know you can rely on.
5. How often does your stats update?
Not every counter tracks in real time. Google Analytics for example only updates every 24 hours.
6. Does it display results in a user friendly manner?
Information is only useful if you can make sense out of it. Pay close attention to the charts it offers.
7. How many visitor details does it allow you to track?
Some trackers like Statcounter and Sitemeter only allow detailed tracking of the last 100 visitors to your site (After which it still counts them, but hides their details). Is that sufficient for your needs?
8. Can I customise the design of the metrics?
Some counters are really tacky looking, so having display options is always good. Some metric tools also have options to turn off the counter display.
9. Are there widgets/feeds available for it?
Getting a feed from your desktop widget, lets you track stats directly from your desktop rather than visiting a website. Feedburner currently offers this option.
10. How easy is it to setup and install?
While some counters need you to modify HTML, if you’re using WordPress, you may be able to install them as plug-ins instead, where you don’t have to touch HTML, and is one less thing to worry about when change website themes.
- Friedbeef Tech’s recommendations:
- Sitemeter for it’s speed, and real time tracking accessible to the public
- Google Analytics for it’s sheer depth of analysis
- Feedburner for keeping track of site subscriptions, and live feed hits
Take time to consider these factors, and do the research to find something that suits your needs. From experience, I’ve experimented with a fair number of counters during lifespan of this site, and am now running a smooth combination of :
Other good counters worth a look include Statcounter, Performancing Metrics, (which tracks adsense clicks) and Crazy Egg (visual visitor navigation).
Whatever your choice of tools, remember that it’s not the information that matters… it’s what you do with it which really makes a difference.
[tags] sitemeter, metrics, counter, stats [/tags]
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Thanks! Quite helpful! =)
Glad to be of help Princess :)
Thanks for sharing tips :)
I wonder why you are not listing Extreme Tracking … using them now for years and just recently signed up for their non public tracker.. and I am loving it.
Random: THanks for the tip! I’m sure there are tons of good trackers out there. My aim here was just to help understand what to look for in a meter, not so much what to use.
XF : My pleasure
Anyone else have any meters not listed here that they like?
nice post!
i use 2 site meter. one is google analytics and the other one is statcounter. ;)
Just coming from ProBlogger … btw. I like the design of friedbeef! Back to subject …
There is one aspect which came up lately with HitTail and 103bees: The easy analysis of inbound search traffic.
Regarding counters I have written an article at performancing.com: How would you decide? Two counters have to go …
http://performancing.com/node/4368
(This article also links to HitTail and 103bees articles)
James,
Excellent post… I have used sitemeter for years… I mean, I LONNGGGG TIME! So I found it very interesting reading your article.
I use Awstats which is a program included in my cpanel hosting. I really enjoy using that program because it gets its information direct from the server logs.
It wasn’t until earlier this year when I stopped using programs like SiteMeter, Extreme Tracking…. I really enjoy Awstats, it tells me exactly what I need to know, and is very accurate.
Thanks Cypher, Markus & Garry. Interesting counter options there.
Awstats looks particulary interesting. If it gets the results directly off my server, it looks like it gives me more options without extra loading overhead.
Good post! when I hit 20 projects in Statscounter .. it was too cumbersome to login each time I wanted to see data. Then I switched to google analytics .. and it’s pretty much what you say at the end (I wasn’t doing anything with that information overload). Now – like you – I just have Sitemeter on public view at the bottom of each page for convenience. I find it works best for my needs. I switched last Nov2005 so, I’m finally a year into that. If I were to switch .. it would probably be to awstats although, then I’d have to start over.
Hart: My AWStats comes built in with cPanel so i never needed to switch over… you might want to check your server too :)
Hi James. I’ve got two servers .. my main one uses Urchin which is great! Although, it’s a mega account with tons of subdomains, domain aliases and the like. It’s great for the global picture but not for individual domains. My other server is a reseller, and I wish they had anything. They just use the raw access logs and I have to download logs and then use AlterWind Log Analyzer Lite to see. It’s quite detailed – but, using a reseller account for each blog I have .. it only works one site at a time. i.e. aggravating.
If I was more serious and ka’ching more into my pocket.. I’d be more serious. Sitemeter is good enough for the now and a snapshot for me.
I’ve seen some great Awstats graphs in sitepoint though that would be much better if planning to sell sites. Oh well .// Cya!
Great list, another solution that may help others is http://www.enquisite.com. It is a great compliment to analytics.
I use the free software phpmyvisites http://www.phpmyvisites.us/
Its fairly complete and easy to use :-)
Very nice tip NCAN! That site looks really slick
oh! thanks for the help. i’ve been considering this for my blog and your post help me commit it.
Hi this is domainregs.
Hi this is hwsite
Hi James. I’ve got two servers .. my main one uses Urchin which is great! Although, it’s a mega account with tons of subdomains,
Hi this is webdesign
They just use the raw access logs and I have to download logs and then use AlterWind Log Analyzer Lite to see. It’s quite detailed – but, using a reseller account for each blog I have .. it only works one site at a time. i.e. aggravating.