subject: How To Analyze Website Traffic [print this page] Analyzing website traffic will show you how visitors find your website, how they move around and use your website, and where they go when they leave. It helps you understand what parts of your site are working, where visitors may be having problems, and what you can do to increase traffic to your website.
Traffic monitor programs collect the information that is generated when a visitor clicks on a link in the search engine results to go to a website. This information includes data about the computer being used such as the type and version of the operating system & browser software, the approximate location of the visitor, as well as the query the visitor types into the search engine.
How your visitors find you - Traffic monitor software will show you what page visitors enter your site, what search engines they came from, and the search keywords they typed into the search engine.
Who your visitors are - Traffic monitors also record the operating system type, web browser type, and the (approximate) location of your visitors. You can view your website visitors plotted as points on a map.
Page views is the number of individual pages viewed by all visitors combined and are often described by the term "page hits".
Unique Visitors is actually the number of different locations your traffic comes from and is determined by looking at the internet addresses of the visitors. Unique visitors is usually the most reliable indicator statistic for the popularity of a website.
Page paths shows the pages visited in order, starting with the page where the visitors entered the site, and also shows the time spent on each page, plus any file downloads or link clicks where visitors leave the website.
Summary information sorts & sifts specific data and can show, for example, the most common browser that was used to access the site or the page that is bringing in the most traffic.
Some traffic monitors can also be integrated with a shopping cart to help evaluate the effectiveness of advertising campaigns.
Knowing who your visitors are as well as how they find and use your site will help you build a website that meets the needs of your visitors, and can attract an ever increasing amount of website traffic.
