Top 7 Reasons to Review your Web Traffic Analysis

By Philippa Gamse
Posted Saturday, June 19, 2004

Understanding your Website's traffic logs is a crucial
component of your online marketing mix. It tells you what
your visitors do, of their own volition, so it's "market
research that cannot lie!"

If you understand what you're seeing, you can make some
great strategic and marketing decisions, not only for your
Website, but for your business as a whole.

Here are seven key marketing elements to study in your
traffic analysis:

1. General Statistics

Remember that a "hit" is recorded every time the visitor
gets an image or some text from your site -- what you need
to know is unique user sessions, and how much time people
spend on the site -- how "sticky" and engaging it is. If you
have tons of traffic, but the average time spent on your
site is less than a minute -- you've got a problem!

2. Most and Least Requested Pages

So what's really hot, and what's not on your site? The most
popular pages give you great clues as to what to offer more
of. The least viewed pages may tell you that some of your
content isn't as fascinating as you think, or this maybe a
heads-up that your navigation isn't driving traffic as
effectively as it should.

3. Top Entry and Exit Pages

These are great reminders that not all your visitors come
through your home page, so you need complete navigation on
every entry point to your site. And if people are leaving
from pages that you don't want them to, perhaps you need
stronger calls to action in those areas.

4. Single Access Pages

These are the pages where a visitor looks at the site then
leaves immediately. Since the job of your home page is
partly to filter the traffic that's not right for you,
there'll always be some of these. But if you have a splash
page, and significant numbers of visitors don't stay through
it... perhaps it shouldn't be there?

5. Cities, States and Countries

No, your site isn't a huge hit just in Virginia -- those are
all the AOL users! Unfortunately, because this information
depends on where the ISP is based, it can be pretty
misleading. But if you are getting a lot of hits from other
countries, that might be a hint for some second language
content.

6. Referring URL's

This tells you which search engines are sending you traffic,
and which of your advertising and linking strategies are
working. It also tells you about sites that may have links
to you that you didn't know about -- check these out -- it's
a great relationship builder to send a thank you -- you
might even get some new business from it!

7. Top Search Keywords and Phrases

Once the search engines have listed your site, these tell
you what the really hot search terms are for your business.
Pay attention to these -- they may have some surprises --
one of my clients recently wrote a book on a subject that
was really sought after on her site -- until she saw the top
keywords, she had no idea it was so popular!

About the Author
Philippa Gamse, CyberSpeaker, is an internationally
recognized e-business strategist. Check out her free
tipsheet "Beyond the Search Engines" for 17 ideas to promote
your Website: (http://www.CyberSpeaker.com/tipsheet.html)
Philippa can be reached at (831) 465-0317 or
mailto:pgamse@CyberSpeaker.com