In the world of Internet marketing, the word "hits" seems to mean a lot, but as far as the bottom line goes, it means nothing at all. In fact, focusing on hits can skew your marketing efforts so far in the wrong direction that you will wonder why you ever bothered to market on the Internet at all.

In the mid-90's, when the Internet was young, and lots of Realtors had hit counters on the front page of their sites, hits were the pop currency. Hits, many believed, illustrated how well a site was doing on the Internet. This misconception was fueled by the belief that hits equal the number of visitors to the site, and/or that hits equal leads.

"Don't be swayed by number of hits when analyzing publicity," warns Barbara Ling, author of the The Real Estate Pro's Internet Edge. "A hit occurs every time your web server does something like download a graphic. If your web page has 10 images, it will register as 11 hits, and all of these may be associated with just one visitor."

More significant than hits is where your traffic is coming from. Your web host can provide you with a tracking device in which you can see whether your visitors are coming from search engines, your company's site, or whether they are keying in your site to their browsers, perhaps from a business card or an ad. You can then use this knowledge to help you market more effectively.

Michael Russer, a.k.a. Mr. Internet, and author of a new Internet training manual for Realtors, e-Power:The Book, says, "The use of sophisticated server log analysis software and "cookies" is a much more accurate way of tracking site activity."

Even with those tools, you may find your visitor traffic is misleading. You may attract visitors to your site with powerful marketing tools, search engine placement, website partnering and other means, but those sources won't account for the many visitors who simply arrive by accident. Other visitors may be competitors who are visiting your site to check you out. That means that you can't even count on visitor traffic as a means of qualifying your site.

So, instead of hits and visitors, what you really want to track are leads.

Russer recommends putting features on your site with which visitors can interact, including forms. "Web forms are a powerful way to interact with visitors to your site and the only way you can obtain a visitor's email address," explains Russer. "When using Web forms to gather information about a visitor, give them something of value for their time and effort, otherwise they are not likely to bother."

Don't use forms as a gatekeeping device or lure. Remember that there is so much free content on the Web, that visitors will rarely fill out forms to view listings, community information or other content that can be found ungated on other sites.

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