Kevin Muldoon October 5th, 2011

Web Analytics – 45+ Scripts & Services To Analyse Your Website Traffic

One of the most important tasks for any online business is the thorough analysis of their traffic. It helps them understand why they have or hadn't had success within a given period and helps them plan for the future. It's not just a matter of counting how many page impressions or unique visitors your business has had in the last month (though these are important metrics). Web Analytics, as it is known, is the measurement and analysis of every factor that contributes to your websites success. It allows you to track your visitor activity and show where visitors are coming from, what keywords and search terms they used to find your website, how long they stayed on your website, what page they exited your website from, what links they clicked, what pages are getting the most traffic and much more. It also shows where they come from, what browser or device they used to visit your website and what language they speak. Other sources such as leads, email campaign responses, heat maps etc can be tracked too. All of this data can be used to analyse where your sign ups, sales and affiliate conversions are coming from. It helps expose areas of your website that need addressed and plays a major part in planning future projects and strategies. Today we will be showing you a large collection of free and premium web analytics scripts and services that you can use to track your traffic, monitor your goals and plan your next move. Before we do so, let's look at how web analytics software works.

How Web Analytics Work

There are two main methods of collecting data on a websites traffic. The first method is called 'Logfile Analysis'. This is when software such as Webalizer is installed on your server to analyse your servers log files. Most starter to medium sized hosting packages usually have Webalizer, AWStats and/or Analog installed, all of which can be viewed via your hosting admin area (usually cPanel). The second method of tracking involves placing a piece of Javascript code on each page. When a page is viewed on someones browser the inserted tracking code sends data to another server to analyse the collected data. This is known as 'Page Tagging'. Page tagging is one of the most popular ways of tracking data on the internet. The service is usually hosted by a third party so all you have to do is add the tracking to your site (usually into the header or footer). There are self-hosted page tagging scripts available too. Page Tagging Vs Logfile Analysis As logfile analysis takes place on your own server, it is the cheapest and most convenient way of tracking traffic for many businesses. It is apparently more reliable for tracking search engine traffic too as many Javascript based trackers don't load when a search engine spider loads a page. One of the major drawbacks of using logfile based analytical data is caching. On average caching is responsible for around one third of page impressions. If a visitor loads a page from their cache then it is not recorded by the server in the log files. This is one reason why page tagging has become more popular over the last 10 years. With page tagging, a visitor is counted every time the tracking code is loaded, therefore traffic should be more accurate. There are some metrics that page tagging can track too that logfile analysis can't do (visitors screen sizes etc). Confusing Traffic Reports Due to the different ways that different scripts and services analyse traffic, there can be discrepancies when the statistics from 2 or more web analytics programs are compared for the same website, particularly the number of page impressions and page visits. Another confusing web analytics problem when tracking unique visitors is referred to as 'The Hotel Problem'; a term that was coined by Rufus Evison to refer to the issue of monthly unique visitors not equalling the sum of unique visitors for each day of that month. The problem is explained by considering a hotel with 2 rooms:
Day 1 Day 2 Day 3 Total
Room A John John Jane 2 Unique Users
Room B Mark Jane Mark 2 Unique Users
Total 2 2 2 ?
In the example above, there was only 3 unique visitors over the course of 3 days however the stats show 2 unique visitors for Room A and two unique visitors for Room B. If you count the number of visits per day, the total number of visits is shown as 6. Web analytics report this problem correctly which is why the sum of daily unique visitors for a given month does not match the total. More confusion arises because stats show that new visitors and repeat visitors does not equal the total visitors. The confusion comes around because of how the visitor is tracked. For example, consider a person who visits your website and then returns on the same day. Are they a new visitor or a repeat visitor? They're both; however for that day the web analytics software would correctly track one unique visitor. You shouldn't concern yourself too much about these issues though you should have a brief understanding of how web analytics software services work as it will help you when you start planning ahead. Let's move forward and look at the most popular web analytics scripts and services on the web :)

Free Web Analytics Scripts & Services

The list of web analytics programs has been split into two main categories: Free and Premium. Programs are then categorised again according to the type of program they are such as log analysers and hosted services. Below you will find a list of useful web analytics that won't cost a penny! Log Analysers The following scripts analyse data by analysing the data collected on your server. As such, they need to be installed directly on your server. 1. Webalizer A fast, free log analyser that produces reports in HTML format. Arguably the most popular log analyser available for website owners. Webalizer 2. AWStats A useful log analyser that can analyse log files from all major servers. Collects a lot of data that similar scripts don't such as visitor location and search engine robots. AWStats 3. JAWStats Works in conjunction with AWStats to provide an enhanced interface when viewing stats. JAWStats 4. Analog A basic log analsyer that hasn't been updated in several years. It provides some useful traffic data but seems very outdated and isn't very user friendly. Some of you may prefer this simple approach to data reporting. Analog 5. W3Perl A perl based log analyser that can be accessed via a command line or via the web. Reports can be produced in HTML or PDF format. W3Perl Self Hosted Page Tracking Scripts The following scripts have to be installed on your website in order to collect data about your traffic. 6. Grape A basic program that shows visits, referrers and the operating system of your visitors. Grape 7. SlimStat A simple stats program that is optimised for viewing on iPhones. SlimStat 8. FireStats A basic stats program that is free for non-commercial usage. FireStats 9. Open Web Analytics A beautiful stats program that collects data on geo-location, page details and visitors actions. It also shows a heatmap for your site. Open Web Analytics 10. Piwik A program that aims to be an open source alternative to Google Analytics. Collects a lot of useful data which is displayed in a user-friendly interface. Piwik 11. TraceWatch A realtime web stats program that is fast loading and multi-language friendly. One of its best features is Path Analysis; an interesting report that shows you exactly what pages each visitor viewed on your site and in what order. This allows you to analyse how visitors are navigating around your website. TraceWatch 12. CrawlTrack A stats program that collects a lot of data about your search engine presence. CrawlTrack Hosted Page Tracking Services The following services are free. To start collecting data all you need to do is sign up and insert the appropriate tracking code into the header or footer of your website. Many services also have a premium version if you want additional features. 13. Google Analytics The industry standard for web analytics. It boasts a lot of great features such as alerts, goal tracking and integration with Google Adwords. The services 50 website limit should be sufficient for most website owners. Google Analytics 14. Yahoo Web Analaytics A customisable web analytics service that features advanced PPC management, click path analysis, custom reports and more. Yahoo Web Analaytics 15. Site Meter One of the oldest hosted web analytics services online, SiteMeter looks a little dated compared to alternatives that are available though it does show interesting stats such as who's online right now and traffic prediction. SiteMeter 16. GoStats A basic web analytics service that shows the number of visits over set periods. GoStats 17. W3Counter A great looking service that provides over 30 free web analytical reports such as visitor locations, screen resolutions and click overlay. W3Counter 18. StatCounter A simple stats service that features keyword analysis, returning visit information and the ability to magnify users to find out more about them. StatCounter 19. Clicky Web Analytics Produces easy to read reports online. The service is also optimised for use on iPhone and other mobile devices. Clicky Web Analytics 20. Woopra A stats service that has gained popularity for it's easy to use interface and unique features such as a live map of your online visitors. Woopra 21. ShinyStat A basic stats service that shows you information about your website visitors. ShinyStat 22. Blog Tracker A simple stats service that was designed specifically for blogs. There is no reason why you couldn't use the service on other types of websites though. Blog Tracker 23. Koego Targeted towards blogs, Koego provides over 40 free reports. It also tracks activity of your Twitter and FriendFeed accounts. Koego 24. TraceMyIp Don't be put off by the outdated grey design, TraceMyIp is actually a pretty useful stats service that provides a lot of useful stats. TraceMyIp 25. HiStats A free service that provides lots of interesting reports such as users online, referring websites, geo-location and much more. HiStats Checking Your Competition 26. Alexa Whilst not always the most reliable way of monitoring traffic on smaller websites, it's still a useful way of comparing your own website to your competition. Alexa Click Tracking 27. MouseFlow A great free service that shows click heatmaps, movement heatmaps and link analytics. Mouseflow

Premium Web Analytics Scripts & Services

All of the scripts and services listed in this section charge on a monthly basis to use their service or a large fee upfront to download and use their script. Many services, particularly those who offer packages under one hundred dollars, offer a free trial for up to 30 days before you commit to a recurring payment. Log Analysers 28. Deep Log Analyzer - $199.95 An advanced logfile analyser that provides over 40 reports. The program costs $199.95 and allows you to use the script on an unlimited number of domains. Deep Log Analyzer 29. WebLog Expert - $99+ A premium logfile analyser that produces traffic statistics and click overlay reports. A standard license retails for $99 however a lite version exists with a reduced number of features. WebLog Expert Self Hosted Page Tracking Scripts 30. Urchin - $9,995 The feature rich software that Google Analytics is based on. A standard license retails for a whopping $9,995 and is valid for 1,000 domains. Urchin Hosted Page Tracking Services 31. Sawmill - $99+ per month A powerful analytical application for serious businesses. For one website (profile), the lite version retails for $99, the professional version for $199 and the enterprise edition for $699. Sawmill 32. NextStat - $9.95+ per month A professional real time analytics service. Prices start from $9.95 per month for 20,000 page views with additional website programs costing an additional $5 per month. NextStat 33. OpenTracker - €19.95+ per month Advanced real time visitor monitoring and search term analysis. Prices start at €19.95 per month for up to 100,000 page views. OpenTracker 34. HitsLink - $9.95+ per month A professional web analytics service that is used by many large internet companies. The professional account retails for $9.95 per month and the enterprise account costs $14.95 per month. The platinum account costs $499.95 per month and includes one million page views. Each additional one million page views costs another $100 per month. HitsLink 35. ReInvgorate - $10+ per month A professional web analytics service that allows you to stream traffic information on your desktop. It also shows heatmaps so you can see where users clicked are clicking on your website. Up to 500,000 page views for $10 per month. ReInvgorate 36. Extreme Tracking - €5+ per month A basic stats service that has a bafflig pricing plan. A free tracker is available but it's only allowed on one page. For up to 100,000 page impressions per month they charge 5 euros every month. For over 900,000 impressions per month they charge around 150 eurors per month (the prices depend on whether you pay monthly, quarterly or yearly). Extreme Tracking 37. VisiStat - $49.95+ per month A professional web analytics service that can track your email, PPC and other marketing campaigns. Prices start from $49.95 per month. VisiStat 38. FoxMetrics - $9.95+ per month An event driven analytical service that has a lot of great features such as conversion funnels and grouping website visitors into logical groups. Plans start from $9.95 per month. FoxMetrics 39. KissMetrics - $29+ per month Their bootstrap starter package costs $29 per month for up to 100,000 events. Up to 500,000 events costs $79 per month with more expensive packages available for bigger businesses. KissMetrics 40. LuckyOrange - $7+ per month A professional service that offers a live dashboard, heat mapping, online polls and much more. Packages start at the very affordable $7 per month for up to 1 million page impressions. LuckyOrange 41. OneStat - $125+ per year (just over $10 per month) A professional service that is used by a lot of major companies throughout the world. Their entry 'OneStat Pro' package starts at $125 per year though more expensive packages are available that offer more features. A free stats service is also available. OneStat 42. Mint - $30 per website An extensive web analytics program that has a user friendly interface. The service costs $30 per website. Mint 43. ChartBeat - $9.95+ per month A premium service that shows real time data. Alerts can be sent to your mobile or email inbox and the service is optimised for use on the iPhone. Plans start at $9.95 per month for 5 websites and 1,000 concurrents (1,000 concurrents means 1,000 people are viewing your website at a given time). ChartBeat 44. Performancing Metrics - $FREE+ per month A premium blog analytics service with unique features such as Feedburner integration and stats via RSS feeds. The service is free up to 3,000 page views per day with 10,000 page views and 30,000 page views costing $6.99 and $9.99 respectively. A super pro and custom packages are also available. Performancing 45. RealtimeStats - $9.95 per month Realtime analytics for web, social media, mobile and eCommerce traffic. It costs $9.95 per month for traffic reporting and an additional $10 per month for eCommerce tracking. RealTimeStats 46. GoSquared - $9.95+ per month A useful service that shows what is being viewed on your website right now. Whilst the first 10,000 page impressions are free, the standard package is $9.95 per month and allows up to 150,000 page impressions over 3 websites. 500,000 page impressions costs $24.95 per month and 1,000,000 page impressions costs $49.95 per month. An extreme package is available which allows up to 2,500,000 page impressions. GoSquared 47. Bango Mobile Analytics - $49 per month A premium solution that tracks mobile traffic and mobile marketing campaigns. The standard package retails for $49 per month though an advanced package exists for $499 per month. Bango Mobile Analytics Checking Your Competition 48. Compete - $199+ per month The leading service for monitoring your own website against the competition. The starter package costs $199 per month. More expensive packages show more data such as demographic metrics and incoming and outgoing traffic. Compete

Overview

Tracking your websites performance is one of the most important aspects of running a successful website. Granted, checking your stats too much can be counter productive if that means spending less time working on other aspects of your business. Though there is no denying that the more information you have at your disposal, the better position you will be in to analyse your success and move forward. What services you use depends on what type of business you run and what you are looking to achieve in the future. If a free stats service does everything you need then there is no need to pay for analytics. However, don't be afraid to spend money on a good service if it means getting the edge over your competitors. Bear in mind though, a company that charges for their analtics service doesn't guarantee that their service is any better than free alternatives are available so make sure you take advantage of 14 day and 30 day trials before entering your credit card details. We hope you have found this brief explanation of web analytics and collection of great free and premium traffic services useful. If you know of any other great services that haven't been covered in this article, please feel free to share them in the comment area. (rb)

Kevin Muldoon

Kevin Muldoon is a professional blogger with a love of travel. He writes regularly about topics such as WordPress, Blogging, Productivity, Smartphone and Gears and Social Media on his personal blog. He is also contributor at award winning VPN blog He can also be found on Twitter: @KevinMuldoon.

20 comments

  1. nice collection. i think i’ll give one of these a besides the regular google analytics. what is the most powerful of the ones listed compared to google analytics?

    1. It really depends what you need for your website. Some of the solutions with very little features might have something that helps you analyse something in a way others don’t.

      The one thing that Google Analytics doesn’t have is heatmaps. That’s a useful feature that I think everyone would find useful, particularly if you sell your own advertising.

      1. Thanks for your reply, kevin! So which tool would you recommend to complement Google Analytics with the aspect of heatmaps?

  2. Very great list of services for website traffic. I’m using Piwik to my site, very cool aplication and the best thing is open source.

  3. You are missing New Relic which takes everything these have and actually extends them and adds additional stuff as well.

  4. OMG! I never even thought of having 50 analytics services on this planet. I just knew Google and Alexa and Yahoo. Now you introduced not 10, not 20, not 30, but 50 analytics services.

    This is the true meaning of competition. I’m gonna try at least 10 of them to see which one suites my needs.

    Thank you very much for providing this comprehensive list.

  5. Hi Kevin, great article and it’s amazing to see how thoroughly you’ve researched the web analytics market.

    Thank you for mentioning GoSquared, and if anyone has any questions about us then please don’t hesitate to ask me.

  6. Hi Kevin, this is a really great overview of web analytic tools. Thx.
    One important free tool is missing: the open source product eAnalytics. eAnalytics is made especially for companies which wants an integrated web analytic tool into existing BI, DWH or other systems. Use web analytic data for web and data mining or the way around: use offline data for web analytics gets more and more important. You can do it with eAnalytics.

  7. Glad to see that Kevin’s post has made such a splash! The follow-ups and shared thoughts are always welcomed. Thanks, everyone!

    Noupe Editorial Team

  8. Thanks for the great apps mention. Very worthy for internet marketers or small business owners needing to track where most of their traffic comes from.

  9. Cool list Kevin.

    There’s a handful of major players missing from the Premium list including Webtrends, Omniture (Adobe) and Coremetrics…

    :)

  10. A mind-boggling collection of analytics tools – thanks. Useful overview of different methods of analysing visitors as well. Will consider using Mouseflow for heatmap data.

  11. Wow:) I haven’t even heard about some of the tools mentioned above. Thanks a bunch, it will be great to discover some of them.

  12. I used to deploy Google Analytics for all my website. But recently I started worry about that google knowing too much about me, from my personal life to my business online. I changed to OWA, it also has a plugin fro wordpress, highly recommended. And thank Kevin for mentioning so many services, well, much more than I know.

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