Learning From Your Statistics - Part One
May 30th, 2007 by CourtHow often do you check your stats? I hope that you’ve been checking them often or you could be missing some really valuable bits of information! Learning how people find you can really help you to increase your traffic.
This three-part series will help you to:
- Install a real-time stat counter. (Part One)
- Learn how to check your stats and what you should be looking for when you analyze your stats. (Part Two)
- Learn how to improve your site’s performance using statistical data. (Part Three - the most important part of the lesson)
Today, of course is part one of the series, let’s get a free, real-time statcounter installed for you! Here are the steps:
1. Go to Statcounter.com.
2. Click the link that says ‘Register’. It looks like this, in the upper left hand corner:
3. Fill out the information form. You have to fill out both the account details and personal details. All they’re asking for is your name, country, and email - no biggie.
4. Accept the terms and conditions.
5. Click ‘Register My Account’, it looks like this:
6. Select your time zone. This step simply will allow Statcounter to show you your stats with the correct times.
7. Click ‘Proceed And Add A Project’, it looks like this:
8. Select ‘Standard Statcounter Project’ and the click next:
9. Type in the title and URL of your site, and choose the most appropriate category. The category actually doesn’t really matter, I choose business every time I do this. 
10. Leave ‘Maximum Visit Length’ on 30 minutes, and leave ‘Log Size’ on 500.
11. Type your IP address into the ‘IP Blocking’ box. If you look closely, you can find your IP address on the Statcounter screen here:
12. Click ‘Next’, it’s in the lower, right-hand corner.
13. Click ‘Configure And Install Code’:
14. Choose the type of counter you want to use and click ‘Next’. I use the invisible counter. If you want to go with the invisible one, select it and click ‘Next’.
15. Statcounter will then ask you a few more details about your website. I would use the following options, if you’re using a WordPress blog:
15. Statcounter will then ask you if you use a web page editor. You are going to select ‘No, I want the default install guide’ and the click ‘Next’.
16. Statcounter will then give you some code on your screen. Copy the entire piece of code:
17. We’re now going to paste that code into the footer file of your WordPress theme. Log in to your WordPress admin. Go to ‘Presentation’, and then ‘Theme Editor’. On the right side of the screen that comes up, click ‘Footer’. If you use Blogger, you can still paste the code into your template.
18. Paste the code you copied directly to the left of the </body> tag:
19. Click ‘Update File’ in the lower, right-hand corner and you’re all set!
20. Watch for Part Two of the lesson tomorrow. I will show you how to check your stats and go over what you should be looking for when you check them.
Did anyone run into problems anywhere? If you did, let me know! I can help you to figure out where it went wrong if you give me enough details.
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May 30th, 2007 at 7:21 am
I used this on one of my sites a while back, the feature i got the most information out of was visit time and working out which post people actually read or just skimmed past. Is this completely free now?
Andy
May 30th, 2007 at 12:13 pm
It is 100% free!
May 30th, 2007 at 11:26 am
I read on another blog that you can’t completely trust these stat counter programs. This blogger said the only program he completely trusts is Omniture. You have any opinion on the accuracy of the different programs?
May 30th, 2007 at 12:37 pm
Omniture is definitely a good analytics company. The technology they use to deliver the statistics is very similar to Statcounter’s - they both use Javascript.
Javascript is the best way to deliver the stats, but is also the flaw that causes inaccuracies. If people don’t have Java enabled on their computers the stats won’t be counted.
Since they both use similar technology one isn’t at all more accurate than the other.
With Omniture you get software that will help you to analyze the data, but you also get a really hefty price tag. I bet that blogger would love for you to buy it through his Omniture partner link.
Using Omniture on a blog with less than 100,000 page views per month would kind of be like using a nuclear weapon to kill a rat in the cellar.
You can expect both Omniture and Statcounter to be accurate within 10%, which is accurate enough to know what’s going on with your site! Statcounter is free and you can learn a ton from the statistics they provide.
I’m running Statcounter and Google analytics right now so that I can do a comparison here in a few weeks. As of right now, Statcounter is my preferred option.
May 30th, 2007 at 1:05 pm
Hey Court,
I’m doing the same thing (comparing StatCounter and Analytics). I’ve been using StatCounter for years and although it may not be a perfect system like Mark said, at least it gives me a really good idea of what’s going on. Either way, you need to have some type of stats or you’re running blind. StatCounter is a great way to go in my opinion!
May 30th, 2007 at 3:46 pm
I kind of wish that I could have them both - in one service! I hate that you can’t view your stats until the next day with GA. I don’t think that either system is perfect, but a lot can be learned from both of them.
May 30th, 2007 at 2:44 pm
I’m using Statcounter and Analytics too. I have both scripts in my footer but the reports are very different.
May 30th, 2007 at 3:52 pm
I have noticed a slight variation - maybe 5%. I had a really big variation until I figured out that I had filtered myself from StatCounter, but hadn’t with GA.
May 30th, 2007 at 9:05 pm
i like google analytics
May 31st, 2007 at 4:51 pm
I really like it too - have you tried any other tracking programs?
May 31st, 2007 at 2:22 am
hi,
I used Analitycs from the beginning and I like it a lot
Is easy to setup, use and read the data
I recommand it
May 31st, 2007 at 4:51 pm
Do you use Google’s?
May 31st, 2007 at 12:05 pm
I’m using both GA and Wordpress Stats on my site. I also find a discrepancy between the two. For folks who are running a Wordpress blog, I recommend checking out their stats plugin. The one drawback is that you must create a Wordpress account (free) to use their stats package.
May 31st, 2007 at 4:52 pm
I tried that one too! I must say that I like GA better than the WordPress stats provided by the plugin.
July 22nd, 2007 at 3:25 am
Baird
I do think you right on the spot with this post, i could use a lot a struff for my new study thank you very much.
Greets
August 6th, 2007 at 8:41 am
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October 23rd, 2007 at 1:05 pm
[…] could really benefit by watching their stats more closely. Back in May I wrote a series about learning from statistics, and most of you have found my blog since then so if you missed the original lessons I would have a […]
October 23rd, 2007 at 4:42 pm
This is a GREAT step by step article on installing Stat Counter. Thank you so much - I had no problems getting this done.