Understanding Your Webstats

by Kirk Petri and Jeryl Baker

To learn just how many people are really visiting your site is quite an art. A good web statistics program should give you access to a full spectrum of data about who is visiting, what page they are visiting most, what time of day they are browsing, what day of the week is most popular and even what page they are leaving the site from. Understanding and utilizing these statistics can get you the most effective marketing plan around. It is also critical if you are planning on selling ads on your site.

There are many terms used, like hits or visits, that can mean different things to different people. Many older web sites contain visible hit counters that only display the number of people that came to that particular page. Easy-to-understand definitions are below; however, even if you know what they really mean, you need to understand how the rest of the world uses them. If someone is selling you an ad on their site and says they get 10,000 hits a day, you need to ask for more specific data and you might even ask to see a report. This number is often inflated, as most people don't understand their own numbers or feel that other people have misconceptions so they can get away with it.

When developing a marketing plan, it is important to consider geographic segmentation, visitor trends and usage so you can track, plan and make modifications to your marketing strategy. So find out as much as you can about who is visiting and what they are doing once they find your site before you decide where to spend your marketing dollars.

Hits: This represents the total number of requests from the site. Each request is only one file, whether it is an HTML, an image file or a video clip. Example: One user visits five pages, where each page has four images, so 5 x 4 = 20 Hits

Pages: This represents the total number of pages requested. This can be any .htm, .html, or .cgi page requested. Example: One user visits five pages on the site = 5 Pages

Visits: This represents how many different sessions were recorded. Each session is determined by the first page visit until a half hour time-out has occurred. Example: One user visits the site at 9 a.m., clicks on five pages and leaves, comes back at 11 a.m., clicks on 10 pages and leaves, comes back at 5 p.m., clicks on one page and leaves = 3 Visits

Sites: This represents the number of unique IP addresses that visit the site. This is the best response for, "How many different people have been on the site?" Example: Five different people come to the site = 5 Sites

Files: This represents the total number of files actually sent, based on requests. If a page or file is temporary stored in the user's browser, then a request is made, but a file is not sent. Example: One user comes back to the site and visits five pages, three of which were visited earlier and were cached, and each page has four images = (5 x 4) - (3 x 4) = 8 Files

Here's a tip: By comparing the difference between Sites and Visits, you can get a good estimate on how many people returned to the site.

So, to get the most from your web site, you need to get the most from the usage statistics, and from that knowledge base you can begin to design the most effective marketing plan for your business.

Kirk Petri is a web designer at The Connextion and Jeryl Baker is director of Marketing and Design. They can be reached at 410-461-5430 or webdesign@ connext.net.

This article appeared in The Business Monthly in August, 2003.