There are free ways to track your website statistics
Monday July 21, 2008
Web analytics and log analysis tools are a great way to track what's happening on your website. And as my MBA professors were always saying, "you get what you measure." So, hopefully you are already using one of these free toosl or perhaps an even better paid or homemade analytics tool of your own. It's important to know what's happening on your site so that you can improve things. And before you ask, yes, Google Analytics is on the list, but no, it's not number 1. (I was as surprised as you are.)
Comments
There is a free one I like alot, and is not on that list. TraceWatch Web Stats: http://www.tracewatch.com/
Give it a try. I always offer a free installation for my clients to look at some stats, they like to see simple data in one page.
Deep Log Analyzer looks great but it only works on PCs. I know . Who cares. I’m probably the only guy doing web design on a Mac!
Most servers have some way of retriving the information that you need, like ‘Urchin’ without having to paste any coding on each page.
Once a month, I compile the information on a spreadsheet and give it to my supervisors. I can control (be truthful) the information that they look at, especially when they think a ‘hit’ is only a page when I want them to really see the sessions numbers to give them the correct statics.
Generally it takes only a few minutes to get the numbers that you need.
I am using Google Analytics, but don’t like having to paste code to each page that I want to track.