Most hosting solutions will provide a certain amount of site statistics. These typically include the number of hits, unique visitors, browser used, country of origin, server accessed from, keywords used in search engines, the busiest time of day, busiest month, referral pages (from other sites), page of entry and exit pages.
Knowing what information you need, will depend on what your goal is. If you sell products, the key measurement is ultimately in the number of sales. If you want subscribers, it will be in the number of visitors who subscribe. The key to success is in knowing how to get visitors to transact and the cost per transaction.
Statistics help you understand what happens on your site and how visitors arrive at the point of fulfilment. Not having all the right information will blind you to what is really happening.
Looking at the number of people who exit your site from different pages for example, can be confusing, especially if it is your home page. You cannot draw the conclusion that visitors arrive and leave from the home page. How many of them arrived at the home page, visited other pages and then left after returning to the home page?
You need to be able to see the wood for the trees. Identifying the path the visitor takes will help you understand how they interpret your site. By being able to track the visitor through the site you can see where and how many exit before transacting.
Now you can follow the same paths, assess the reason and make constructive changes. Relevant information might be on your site, but in the wrong place. The navigation might be confusing, or the method of fulfilment too complicated. Statistics are able to provide a good place to start looking for reasons.
If the information is not enough, you can consider making use of a survey of your site. Ask your customers and staff to answer specific questions related to those areas you want to improve. The difference between conducting a survey and viewing statistics is that statistics are good at telling you what people do on your site, but often fall short in providing reasons.
Once this information has been collected and analysed you can make meaningful changes and once again assess the results.
