11 {{ upvoteCount | shortNum }}
11 {{ upvoteCount | shortNum }}

First Client. Major Error with Stats. Please Assist.

by hype
9 replies
Hello fellow marketers,

I am currently doing marketing for a health blog Healing Talks and am having issues with our statistics. It appears that Google Analytics, Quantcast, Alexa, and CyStats are showing a huge gap in site visits per day. One site may cite our visitor count to be at around 50 while CyStats claims a 500 visitor per day data.

Would you please advise on this as I am unsure what to do and am working with my very first client.

Thanks for all your advice.
#assist #client #error #major #stats
  • Profile picture of the author Rich Struck
    Why not use the stats feature which is surely provided by your host?
    Signature

    {{ DiscussionBoard.errors[2152524].message }}
  • Profile picture of the author Peter Gregory
    Out of the choices you mentioned above I would go with what Google Analytics is telling you. They may not be perfect (nothing ever is) but it will be the best indicator as to your actual traffic.
    {{ DiscussionBoard.errors[2152555].message }}
  • Profile picture of the author Trivum
    I use Google Analytics and Sitemeter for the most part - they come out about exactly the same, so I trust them (as opposed to AW Stats, which is what I used to have to look at - can't trust that at all, at least you couldn't in the past).

    By the way, you can't trust anything that isn't directly installed on your site. ... I see people all the time, even seasoned SEOs, point to stuff like Compete.com. When I put my sites into Compete, which I know the exact numbers to of course, it so off base it's laughable.
    {{ DiscussionBoard.errors[2152557].message }}
    • Profile picture of the author hype
      The standard software that came with the hosting is cystats.

      I installed Google Analytics plugin for Wordpress (our CMS) but analytics stats are extremely low not sure how accurate as well.

      I also have quantcast plugin installed as well.

      Both are showing low stats.

      The Cystats is showing the highest visit rank and Alexa ranking is getting better every few days as our rank increases.

      Not sure what to trust or if there may be errors with the scripts / software / blog.

      Thanks in advanced for your help.
      {{ DiscussionBoard.errors[2152652].message }}
  • Profile picture of the author Trivum
    I would install Google manually (never used the plugin, so I don't know how it works really). Then, as I mentioned, I use sitemeter to double check. I would put these two on the site and then wait a few days. See if they are pretty much exactly the same. If so, I would say you can trust them. It's hard for two different stats programs to be exactly the same unless they're reading the data correctly. If they were reading it incorrectly, they would do it in different ways and the numbers would most likely be pretty different.
    {{ DiscussionBoard.errors[2152691].message }}
  • Profile picture of the author Dietriffic
    Go with Google Analytics for accuracy. I'm not saying it's definitely the most accurate, but some get skewed results with bots it seems, and I doubt that's an issue for GA.

    I use GA and reinvigorate exclusively.
    Signature

    — Melanie (RD)

    Weight loss/fitness marketers earn 75% per sale with... The Fat Reversal Formula
    Join me: Twitter and Facebook

    {{ DiscussionBoard.errors[2152751].message }}
    • Profile picture of the author rosetrees
      This may be rubbish - but have you checked where you have installed the Google Analytics (and other) codes.

      If you have installed them within a page (for example) they may only be tracking visitors to a single page of your site, whereas the cystats will be monitoring the whole site.

      Just a thought.

      Edit: Does cystats tell you which search phrases visitors used to find the site, or which links they followed to reach it? That would give you an idea of its accuracy.

      Also check that it is showing page views not hit - which is something different.
      {{ DiscussionBoard.errors[2152785].message }}
      • Profile picture of the author Lloyd Buchinski
        Originally Posted by rosetrees View Post

        This may be rubbish - but have you checked where you have installed the Google Analytics (and other) codes.
        That reminded me, I screwed up GA one time. I would sometimes use a page from one site as a template for a page on another site. It didn't dawn on me in the early days that GA has a different identifier for each site and I didn't change that.

        It didn't cause problems as large as the ones you mention, but it was just interesting that I could accidentally throw it off manually. (sigh)
        Signature

        Do something spectacular; be fulfilled. Then you can be your own hero. Prem Rawat

        The KimW WSO

        {{ DiscussionBoard.errors[2153331].message }}
  • Profile picture of the author Davioli
    Quantcast, Alexa And Cystats do not have access to your web traffic. they simply predict visitors based on outside factors.

    The most reliable is your own webhost Awstats or Google Analytics.
    Signature

    {{ DiscussionBoard.errors[2152850].message }}

Trending Topics