Dear Mr. Internet: Thanks to various marketing strategies, my Web site is seeing new visitors all the time. However, is there some way to track which strategies are working and which are not so I know where to concentrate my efforts in driving new traffic to my site? Pam Stearns RE/MAX Atlantic Absecon, NJ

Dear Pam:

With the right tools, you can know a lot more than just where your site traffic is coming from. For example, you can learn the kind of browser used, their screen resolution, which site page they looked at first, how long they stayed on your site, which pages were the most popular, and much, much more.

These and other statistics about your site visitors are important because they tell you how your visitors found you, how your site looks to them, their behavior when there, and what they liked, disliked, and perhaps didn't even find. All of which is important information for fine-tuning your Web site marketing for maximum bottom-line results. There are two primary ways you can compile statistics about your site visitors…

Building Your Site Statistics From Web Logs

A Web log is a data file generated and saved by your Web server that is updated every time your site delivers information (i.e. Web pages, graphics, files, etc.) to a visitor. Without special "Web Statistics" software to interpret them, the raw log files are essentially incomprehensible to the average human. Typically however, the hosting service for your site already has some sort of Web statistics package installed. If you don't know, just ask them.

Most real estate professionals don't own their Web server, so they are limited to whatever Web statistics software their hosting service choose to install (rarely are you allowed to install other software on a rented server). In most cases, it will be rudimentary at best providing only a limited menu of visitor statistics.

If you do own or "co-locate" your server, then you can install any kind of software you want. Two of the more widely used software packages for compiling Web log data in "real time" are WebTrends Live, and LiveStats from DeepMetrics (formerly Mediahouse). Instead of having to download the bulky Web logs for processing like older Web statistic packages, these two will compile readable statistics from your Web logs as they change, right on the server. This saves an enormous amount of time and hassle, and you can typically view your site statistics from any Web browser.

If you don't own your Web server and/or you want more detailed statistics than the typical Web log can provide (there are limits), then you can turn to clever online services that compile an extraordinary array of statistics every time someone visits any page of your site…

A Single Graphic Is Worth A Thousand Statistics

By simply having your Web master add a small bit of code on each page of your site you want to track, you will have access to an amazing range of statistics. Hitbox and Superstats are currently two of the best-known companies that provide this kind of site tracking service, which is completed on their servers. By just using a Web browser, you can access your site's statistics in real time (i.e. as they are happening). To give you an idea just how widely these services are being used... as of this writing, Hitbox alone is tracking nearly 500 million page views a day(!) for sites around the world. By the way, Hitbox is worth checking out just for all the incredible resources they offer Web site owners for optimizing their site business-generating performance. They will also explain in detail each statistic and what they mean to your overall performance.

This kind of service is ideal, easily implemented, and affordable for the typically small to mid-sized real estate Web site. The only downsides to using this kind of service that I'm aware of include: a) slight increase in page download times (due to the included tracking code on each page); b) any page additions to site must include code to be tracked; c) if you have over 20,000 - 25,000 page views a month it gets pricey.

Making It Happen

The ability to track the "who, what, when, and where" of your Web site visitors is important. However, if you don't bother to make a habit of studying your site statistics on a regular basis (at least once a month, ideally weekly) and then taking corrective action —it doesn't matter how fancy or extensive they are, they become useless to you.

As a busy real estate professional, you may find it difficult justifying the time and effort it will take to consistently monitor and tweak your site to maximize its performance. Well, the good news is that you don't have to be the one to do the work. This kind of task is ideal for any Virtual Assistant who is conversant with site tracking methods, analysis of what your statistics say, and has the ability to take corrective action. And there are plenty of VAs out there that can do this kind of work. Just go to my May 2001 issue of "Ask Mr. Internet" to learn how to find your site assistance from a distance.

Remember, an effective part of online marketing includes determining what works and what doesn't. Not knowing your sites vital statistics (and then not taking corrective action) is like flying in a cloud without instruments —an almost certain way to crash and burn!

Mr. Internet's Tip O' The Month

There is another way to track how visitors use your Web site and this trick doesn't cost you a cent! For this to work you need two things to be in place:

1.Your domain name is used within your e-mail address. For example: your primary e-mail account would look something like "jane@yourdomain.com" (where "yourdomain.com" would be substituted for your actual domain name);

2. Your e-mail service allows the use of "wildcard" aliases. That is, e-mail sent to any valid user name in conjunction with your domain name will automatically go to your primary e-mail address account. For example: mail sent to "123anything@yourdomain.com" will arrive at the "jane@yourdomain.com" account (most ISP automatically allow this).

Now assuming you give your visitors an opportunity to e-mail you with questions or comments from every page of your site (which you should!), you can set up your "tracking" in the following way:

For each separate section (or even page) of your site, use a different alias which visitors can e-mail to. For example, in your new listings sections you can use "newlistings@yourdomain.com", in the Buyer Tips section "buyertips@yourdomain.com" and so on. All the e-mail will be routed to your primary address so you won't miss anything. However, now you will know exactly which part of your site compelled them to contact you --which is very useful marketing information (it gives you a first hand idea as to what is moving them to action).

You can even get fancy by setting up special Rules and Folders in your Outlook e-mail program that will automatically process the incoming mail by a) alerting you that mail has arrived addressed using a specific alias; and b) automatically place the message into the appropriate "folder" within your e-mail software (see the October 2001 "Ask Mr. Internet" article for further information on this).

Tracking the "who, what, why, when, and where" of your visitors is one thing, determining which part of your site compelled them to contact you is even better especially when it doesn't cost you anything!