Who Wants to Know?

Have you ever wondered who’s been on your site?  Well, I suppose it would be nice to know names and addresses of people who browse your site, but that’s not possible – yet.  I’m talking more general terms, specifically, how often your site gets visited.

Many business owners have no idea how much traffic their website gets.  Is that important?  Does it matter?  It does if you are using your site as a marketing tool and attempting to drive the bulk of your traffic there.  If all of your web marketing (see Web Marketing 101) is driving people to your website, it’s critical that you be able to quantify those numbers. 

Let’s say you purchased an ad in an online directory.  At the end of the year you’re reviewing your ad budget to see where to expand and where to cut.  Without statistics, you’ll have no idea how many people clicked the ad to get to your site.  And no way to know whether it’s worth renewing the ad or not. 

Since online advertising is really the only quantifiable form of media, it is critical that you have some sort of tracking tool on your website.  Here at Sitepro we consider tracking so important that we provide dual tracking programs; Live Stats and Google Analytics.  Each has their strengths and they each complement the other. 

With analytics you can learn things like:
 

·         How are visitors finding your site?

·         Which search engine did they use?

·         Which keywords did they use on which search engine?

·         How many pages did they visit?

·         How long did they spend per page?

·         Where in the world are they located?

By browsing your web statistics, you can get a really good idea of what’s working and what’s not.  For example, if you find several pages on your site with visits lasting 15 seconds or less, that’s a pretty good indication that your page is either uninteresting, unimportant, or actively turning people away.  Look at your content – is it relevant?  Are visitors to the page getting what they expect?  Did you create the proverbial “Great Wall of Text,” sure to repel even the most hardened web visitor?  I once found a web page with so much text, that when I copied it into Microsoft Word, it took up 12 pages.  Ouch!

So if your current web company doesn’t provide statistics, please give us a call.  With Sitepro, not only do you get a fantastic website, but we also equip you with the tracking tools you need to be successful.  Contact us today for more information.