Do you test and track?
Logically you may know you need to, but you may be a bit like I used to be where testing and tracking was the absolute last thing on my mind. I put it to you that if you don’t test and track then you don’t really have any basis on which to make decisions.
I’ll give you some examples.
#1 – If I didn’t know how many visitors I get to this blog, I would have given up a long time ago.
#2 – If I didn’t know what keywords people were finding my various sites with, I wouldn’t know what to change the words to, so that I could increase the amount of traffic to those sites.
#3 – If I didn’t try different things and then look at the resulting data a few weeks afterwards, I wouldn’t know if what I was doing was right or wrong.
More recently if you’re a regular reader, you’ll know I’ve been putting up sites to promote and sell physical goods on Amazon and the like.
Every single site gets tracked completely.
- When I get a visitor, I know how they found the site.
- I know what keywords they used and I know what search engine they came from, or even if they’ve bookmarked the site and are returning via that bookmark.
- I know what pages they looked at while they were visiting and the path they took.
- I know what link they clicked on to leave the site, or if they left by closing their browser.
- I know overall how my sites are growing (or not) and as a result I can see if I picked a good product and keywords to promote, and I know if I should give the site any more attention.
I wouldn’t know any of that if I didn’t track all the traffic on my sites.
My question to you is…
Do you test and track?
-Frank Haywood
The short answer to your question Frank is, no, or at least not as much as I should be! Really the only thing I use is Google Analytics, and I’m still learning how to understand it fully, even after having it activated on my blog ages ago.
It’s ont of those fields, where I’e not really read into. Everything I use needs to be simple and easy, OK it’s not because I couldn’t handle anything that might seem complicated, I just like having it like that! 😉
Now you mention the topic, I haven’t seen (At least I don’t think so!), a really good report on the subject. There could be a good chance I’ve missed one, or just forgotten about it, but at the moment there looks like here is a big gap in the market.
(I would say that also goes for test/tracking software that you can install on your own site! If I’m not mistaken is there many, if any, producs out there on the net? – A good chance if I searched hard enough, I might just find something but you neer know!) LOL
Talk later Frank!
Thanks
Mark
That’s a great point Frank.
I may be wrong, but it seems like most marketers today try to get a site online as fast as they can without any meta tags other than a title.
Choosing keywords to go with the right domain could be the difference from being on page 1 instead of 100 in the SERPS.
I use two programs for finding where, when and how someone gets to my sites. One of them is no longer sold but it does a great job. It is Lightning Track. The other one is Adtracks, and it gives me everything I need.
This is my first visit to your blog, but it won’t be the last.
Thanks for the info.
Neil Adams
Hi frank-
Can you let us in on the software you use to get the stats for:
When I get a visitor, I know how they found the site.
I know what keywords they used and I know what search engine they came from, or even if they’ve bookmarked the site and are returning via that bookmark.
I know what pages they looked at while they were visiting and the path they took.
I know what link they clicked on to leave the site, or if they left by closing their browser.
I know overall how my sites are growing (or not) and as a result I can see if I picked a good product and keywords to promote, and I know if I should give the site any more attention.
What software do you use to gather the data you mention Frank? I’m so dang busy maintaining three sites I need something automated like that. Thanks,
warren
Hi Warren,
It’s the excellent StatCounter service. There’s a free version for which you get a tracking log of 500 per site, which is quite a lot unless you have very busy sites. You have to display one of their buttons on your site.
Or there’s $20 / month which gives you the ability to remove the StatCounter button and link and gives you a log of 10,000 which you can divide up amongst your sites. You still get the basic log of 500 per site too.
StatCounter is very good and does all the hard work for you. Well worth $20 / month.
-Frank