A key component to every web site is traffic analysis. When analyzing traffic, it is important to understand the difference between hits and visitors…and why both are important.

Be One With The Log

To analyze traffic to a site, you should be looking at your server logs. Server logs come in very raw data, but most hosting companies have interpreting programs that summarize the information into readable form. From these programs, you should be able to analyze who is sending you traffic, the number of hits and visitors among other information.

Hits v. Visitors – The Game Is On…

Many people, myself included, are lazy when it comes to discussing traffic results. We tend to use “hits” as a catch phrase for traffic hitting a web site. This isn’t entirely true. Traffic should always be analyzed in two categories, hits and visitors.

A “visitor” is a click from someplace on the net to your site. In your server logs, a visitor will be credited with visiting the site one time regardless of the number of pages the visitor views. For example, a person entering a brick n’ mortar bookstore is only one potential customer regardless of the number of books the person looks at.

A “hit” is a click on any page of the site and represents a multiple of the visitors. When you review server logs, the hits represent how many times visitors clicked site pages. Going back to our bookstore example, every book viewed by the person in the bookstore would be a hit. So, which information is more important?

Hits v. Visitors – An The Winner Is…

The simple fact is both visitors and hits are important statistics to analyze in your server logs. Obviously, the information on the number of visitors is important because you want to know how many potential customers are coming to your site. That being said, you should never focus on visitors without contemplating hits as well.

Hits are important because the number of hits tells you very important information about your site. Since hits represent the total number of pages viewed by all visitors, you can use the information to determine the effectiveness of your site. I call this by the very original and sophisticated name “hits to visitors ratio.” Let’s go back to our bookstore example.

Assume a person walks into a bookstore and only looks at one book. This may mean the person knew what they wanted, found it and bought it. Obviously, this is an ideal result. But what if a thousand people walk into the bookstore and only look at one

book each? The bookstore would have a problem and start trying to figure out what it is. The hits statistics on your server tell you the same thing.

If your site has multiple pages, you need to find out if visitors are clicking into the internal pages. This is generally known as determining the depth of your site. The simplest way to do this is to divide the number of hits by the number of visitors for a particular time period. This figure will tell you if people are seeing one “book” or taking a look around.

Analyzing your server stats can be a real eye-opening experience. The information can be good or bad, but at minimum you will know if any corrective steps need to be taken.

With an increase in consumers using the internet to shop and perform business transactions, ecommerce has become the future of the online community. It is estimated that shoppers are spending billions of dollars online each year, with a few stores even outselling their offline parallels. Benefitting completely from the ecommerce boom can be achievable. To keep consumers coming back, you need to create a unique ecommerce site, one that reaches beyond all levels of excellence.

When designing your ecommerce website, you should have a welcome or introduction on your home page. This statement should establish the advantages of your site, and assure those visiting that they should be comfortable doing business with you. State your purpose, express your beliefs, and let the consumer know why business done at your ecommmerce outlet is always secure.

A quality website has smooth navigation. Categories to scan through and obvious search boxes on the site are a must. Design a simple site with large, easy to read fonts and images that will load quickly. Be sure to have a page with specific questions regarding some of your common business policies such as shipping and returns. You may also want to have a link on your home page that leads visitors to a privacy policy. This policy will ensure customers that you will never supply a third party with information they have entrusted with you. It is nearly essential for all ecommerce shops to display this declaration somewhere on their site.

Just as when shopping offline, customers want checkout to be as fast and easy as possible when visiting your online store. If your online store is equipped with a secure server, make your customers aware. This will put them at ease and keep them coming back. Your checkout or Òshopping cartÓ needs to be just one click away so the customer can be in and out in a minimal amount of steps. In this day and age, it is advisable to offer a variety of payment selections such as PayPal and other online payment sources, credit and debit cards, online checks, and money orders. Include a contact telephone number for customer support so the customer has assurance that they will have assistance if there is a problem with the order.

Organize a special section of your ecommerce website dedicated completely to special discounts and current sales. If you have an extraordinary amount of sales items, create a separate webpage devoted to the ones that are most preferred, and have another page with a complete listing of all discounts. During the holiday season, have a certain portion of our website set aside for customers to purchase gift certificates.

Producing a profitable, reputable ecommerce website can be a simple task with a well constructed site plan, some time and patience. Taking full advantage of the ecommerce phenomenon, you can succeed in your business marketing dream.

You probably have heard all these terms an awful lot lately. You wonder about what these technologies do? What value to they provide? If you aren’t up to speed on these new applications and how they are impacting retail online interaction then read this brief further.

Will these technologies impact you? To be honest, it’s too early to tell – but awareness drives innovation and maybe your team will develop an idea/application that truly changes a portion of your eCommerce business.

Here’s the rundown:

Blogs

What it is:

Probably the most well known of the three, blogs allow everyday people to quickly develop a website and distribute any type of content that they desire. Many web entrepreneurs use this functionality to develop online stores within niche markets, while using search popularity to beat out larger retailers on the specific terms within the market.

Where Blogs make make sense is within targeted online communities. Certain blog authors develop a large base of specific visitors, hence the site becomes a target market for viral marketing. By integrating your brand image within the site experience at that SPECIFIC blog, you as an online marketer are able to truly segment your marketing PRIOR to converting someone as a customer.

Should you care:

If you have a very unique value proposition, or sell to a very specific or high-value customer segment, blogs can be a great way to increase overall brand awareness. You can better connect with your customers and provide detail into the current sales/promotions that you are providing.

Podcasting

What it is:

Pocasting should be just called mobile video broadcasting – Apple’s marketing/development team did a great job with branding their device to a type of emerging media! Similar to traditional radio and television, mobile video broadcasting delivers branded content in either a paid/free environment, on someone’s mobile MP3 player (Apple only does video currently, but that will change shortly). Retailers can use this communication channel to further connect to their customers with promotional events, while transmitting specialty programming to meet an interest need.

Should you care:

Not really. Until video podcasting penetration increases, it’s still a limited channel for advertising. The best application available right now would be an online content segment that is digitally delivered to an opt-in list. As technology advances, you can potentially do this from your current opt-in page from your website and not from Apple’s iTunes platform.

RSS

RSS stands for Real Simple Syndication and is a method for electronic content distribution. RSS is transmitted via the internet, but what makes it unique is that no downloading efforts are needed by the end receiver of the content. It streams instateneously. Consumers can have news readers on their computers, either integrated into an emal client, or an aggregated web application such as News Gator, and are able to get information relating to their interests.

Already gaining steam in the travel industry and within comparison shopping engines, RSS seems to be a valuable way to push news, offers, and infomrmation to customers. Travel companies are able to provide a streaming supply of last minute airfare offers to their customer segments, without that customer having to open an email or visit a webpage.

Should you care:

Depends on the nature of your business. Do you consistently offer new prices? Do you get new pieces to your assortment consistently? Do you have a customer base that is extremely loyal that you want to reach out to with messaging? If so, RSS may another channel to help build your brand.

Craig Smith

Trinity Insight LLC

http://www.trinityinsight.com