Google Analytics gets an upgrade

If you have a blog or website you should definitely check out Google Analytics, if you haven't already. The user interface just got a whole lot better, too. But I'm having a hard time figuring something out.

I also use StatCounter and the two systems are giving me different info. For example, on last Friday, May 18, StatCounter tells me I had 110 pageloads and 68 unique visitors. Google Analytics says I had 75 pageviews and 36 unique visits. Somehow they are calculating this different. Does anyone understand this?

Comments

[Richard from GoStats]

There are a couple possible reasons for the stats discrepancy.
1) under counting could be a sign of a slow service (missed hits)
2) over counting could be a sign of a service that is unable to determine a unique visitor with certaintly. (Stat-counter is known to have issues with that)
3) some services have technical limitations: google only works if eveyone trusts and loads it's javascript.
4) some people filter out popular tracking tools. (google has become quite popular and so is on many people's radar.)
5) is the code for each tracker on every page? (usually yes, but sometimes no)

That said, the key is understanding how a page view or unique visitor is calculated.

Anyway, If you have further questions, don't be shy, drop me a line. You may also consider seeing if GoStats can help you make sense of your web stats. ;)

[Johnny A. Ramirez]

I've been using mint which I like because it does a good job of only reporting authentic visits and is just cool. http://www.haveamint.com/

Image based trackers count hits when the image is retrieved. Like statcounter.

Javascript based trackers count hits when the javascript is loaded. like google analytics.

database based trackers count hits when content is pulled from the database. like mint (my favorite).

and server based trackers count hits whenever a file is retrieved from the server.

Obviously server based trackers give far higher visit counts. just visit my about page to see how huge the gulf is.

http://www.johram.com/about/

for me it is a ratio of 10/1 where 10 unique visitors pull something from my server and only one actually pulls something from the database. or, only 1 out of 10 IP's that visit johram.com are live persons.

[Johnny A. Ramirez]

correction.
mint is javascript also. and not all database calls are real persons.

i like how mint tracks feeds on my blog. it does it better than feed burner imho.

[Ryan Bell]

Johnny, thanks for the tip. It looks like one major difference is the $30, but that's pretty affordable for a one time fee. The counter and stats that I'm using now I have set to count only unique visits. I think the definition of a unique visit is one hour between visits. I'm not sure how the others define "unique."

Also, I don't think Google Analytics accounts for feeds at all.

[Victoria Bresee]

Hi there, I can't answer any of the questions. Just a comment that I miss seeing the individual hits from around the world. I know that you still can do it, but the scrolling takes a lot longer.

Wish one of you could give me a tutoring session!