10 Ways How To Track Site Traffic, Popularity, Statistics
Dainis Graveris
I know from myself people are obsessed with traffic, statistics, looking at other sites – tracking their stats and so on. And if there is enough demand, of course there are sites to satisfy You. I wanted to put those sites and tools in one list together, because at least for me this field was really unclear – I didn’t know what means Google Pagerank, Alexa, Compete, Technorati rankings and I could continue so on. I must say not always these stats are precise, but however they give at least overview, how popular the certain page is, how many visitors that sites gets – and if You compare those stats with Your site statistics, You can get pretty precise results then.
I also use several FireFox add-ons, so I don’t have to type and go to statistic related webpage to get the results, results actually came to me in this way, allowing me comfortably browse, explore and compare sites I visit. Now I am so used to live with these toolbars, I can’t imagine my browsing life without them. And just a thought – can You imagine how useful in marketing is information about Your competitors?? I just love Internet world :). Okay, now let’s get to the actual article.
I will start with actual FireFox plugins I use and later in order to the most popular and know traffic tracking sites. If You want to get a full list of SEO related Firefox plugins check out my other article – Popular Firefox Extensions for SEO masters.
I couldn’t live without this useful plugin, which tracks Alexa, Compete ranking and Google LivePageRank. If You didn’t know Alexa and Compete sites are the most popular and trustworthy sites letting You track statistic about sites worldwide, compare them and so on. And who aren’t heard about popular Google ranking system, however if You don’t, check out Google official blog to find out more.
And yes, Alexa and Compete has it’s own Top and rating system, so that’s the number meaning, maybe I was silly, but I didn’t realize that at first, so I am pointing it out for You too.
You can download this add-on here.
2. Compete Toolbar + Compete Site
This site is very similar to Alexa, offering alternative or even better some really good site to compare ratings so You have more objective information. I use Compete always together with Alexa, however in compete my site is ranked much higher, so I think Alexa rating is more objective..or I don’t know, I am just critical against myself.
And they offer also toolbar, it is second add-on I use regularly, it’s official Compete.com site toolbar, tracking also average people count visiting site. Maybe this information is not so precise, but when I compare those stats with my site, I can get actual overview, how many people are visiting other sites too – pretty great. There are many other features in this toolbar however, but I am not using them in my workflow however, but You can do Your own research, maybe some feature is useful for You.
You can download this add-on here.
Yes, this is the best statistic site available I think and the most popular one too. Google Analytics tracks information from Your site so detailed, You can spend hours comparing and analyzing Your website stats. I am sure everybody are using Analytics service by now, however if You don’t use it – You should go to their site and take video tour, explaining You everything much better than I could.
I mentioned this site before, but now detailed overview Alexa provides a wide range of statistics based on popularity rank, reach, speed and in-links. You can compare site statistics also up to 3 sites. And information is precise, because everybody participate in it with help of Alexa Toolbar. When You install Alexa toolbar You get very useful tool and also give Alexa back just by visiting pages and using toolbar. I really like this system, check out maybe You’ll find it useful too.
Get Alexa Toolbar here / Visit Homepage
I heard from this site at the first from Nick from ResourcePile, and since then I always been using it.
Quarkbase is a free tool to find complete information about a website. It is a mashup of over 30 data sources and many algorithms gathering information from Internet on various topics like social popularity, traffic, associated people, etc. – and yes, really complete starting from digg, delicious, reddit links, technorati ratings until RSS readers, traffic stats. Just type in – website url and enjoy huge information amount in seconds!
QuantCast is powerful statistic gathering website with information to help web publishers understand clearly their audience, what sites they like after visiting Yours, very powerful. Also if you want to get precise information about Your site, You can become QuantCast Publisher and add simple code snippet in Your website, to let quantcast track and show You detailed statistics.
If You are looking for simple and fast statistic, You should visit Statsaholic site, where fellows over there offer data and graphs, which are generously provided by Compete and Quantcast. Enter up to 3 domain names and compare.
Also one simple and great site, just type in website address and get Google pagerank, alexa, compete, quantcast rank, technorati links, yahoo backlinks and more.
“Website Grader is a free seo tool that measures the marketing effectiveness of a website. It provides a score that incorporates things like website traffic, SEO, social popularity and other technical factors. It also provides some basic advice on how the website can be improved from a marketing perspective.”
Every information piece about site is very useful giving You several SEO related advices, domain age, expiration, Google indexed pages, traffic rank, last google crawl date, also You can compare Your site with others and so on. Very useful, must know site.
Maybe some people will laugh, I added this site too, since it’s not generally related to statistic information gathering, but I see from my site details Est.Impressions are very precise there. And now many people use this service, so You can just click to Advertise Here button and see precise results of that site monthly unique visitors and also alexa, compete rank, Google pagerank, delicious bookmarks and so on. I just love that little thing about unique visitors.
You can see my account details by clicking on the link as an example.
I could continue, but I thought for statistics with these sites should be already more than enough. Enjoy the list to help You in marketing, SEO or just to satisfy Your curiosity about other site statistics.
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shah
Posted 311 days ago 50good list of options. as alexa plug in cant effectively apply at all site.
QualityArticleWriters
Posted 350 days ago 49Just the link we need! We’ve wanted to use more tracking tools especially those that can help us compare our site with other sites that provide article writing services :) Thanks for this!
rohit
Posted 368 days ago 48Very good article. Thanks a lot. Till now I have used only alexa and google analytics. Will use these tools too
Teo
Posted 490 days ago 47Nice list. I want also to suggest opensiteexplorer.org. This is a powerful backlink watch tool. First you must register for an account. Then you will gain free access to backlink reports Up to 1,000 links. It’s a useful site with lot of interesting metrics.
stilgar
Posted 579 days ago 46great article. thanks for the tips:)
David
Posted 602 days ago 45thanks…that was quite a handful of good websites :)
Thomas
Posted 611 days ago 44Very informative and nice post. I think google analytics is the best in all these sites. I look forward to see some more posts like this in future from you.
Nina Shylon
Posted 614 days ago 43Nice Collection
michael
Posted 630 days ago 42Great article! I’ve been looking for tools to track web traffic other than google analytics
Vinay Menon
Posted 650 days ago 41Excellent post, very helpful…
rupika
Posted 710 days ago 40Nice Share….awesome post…I like your excellent articles……this is very helpful for us….. I m sharing this post in my group……
Calvin Doyle
Posted 739 days ago 39I like this friend. So cool
.-= Calvin Doyle´s last blog ..Zucchini Benefits =-.
Josh
Posted 766 days ago 38I’m looking for a good solution for comparing the pageviews for multiple websites on 1 page.
Do you know of any widgets or sites that allow you to embed pageview info in a blog and then update that info in realtime?
Thanks for your post and for your help.
Josh
.-= Josh´s last blog ..Penny Auction Mistakes – Part 1 =-.
Rooney
Posted 809 days ago 37Anyone tried http://www.urbandata.com ? It’s really cool.
Sandra
Posted 810 days ago 36Thanks so much for a great list. I love the Alexa feature and will use it to promote my http://www.needawriter.us
Please keep these useful resources, links and help coming.
Thanks again
Joanna
Posted 812 days ago 35Nice article. By the way I will add to this list one of my favorite site – http://www.surcentro.com – It will provide Alexa, Compete ranks and graph, unique visitors per day and other extra information about keyword.
Wayne
Posted 812 days ago 34Good tools-
Best-
Wayne
bill
Posted 823 days ago 33One always wants to drive traffic to their website or blog on a daily basis. This is normally achieved by performing various SEO traffic techniques that help in driving traffic by either doing it yourself or hiring an expert. In the former case, you will end up spending too much time doing it yourself as the processes are time consuming and cumbersome while in the latter case you will save on time but end up spending a lot of money to the provider.
Want Web Traffic Click Here
Vladi
Posted 843 days ago 32BSA is really nice way to get it to work.
I use http://www.doloop.com to valuate it more.
Richard
Posted 847 days ago 31I personaly use some of those methods.Quant cast is my favorite as I can use it to determine the demographic of my market at a glance. I also use GetClicky which is very user friendly. But whats the use of tracking traffic if you don’t have any. Go to Web Traffic Genius to get access to one of the most powerful tool for generating pure targeted traffic.
.-= Richard´s last blog ..Magnify Website Traffic =-.
Brian H.
Posted 855 days ago 30Hi Dainis,
Just discovered your site. I love it and could read all night but have to get to bed. Saw you were from Riga Latvia. I had friends in Klaipeda, Lithuania and I’ve always wanted to visit the Baltic states. I’ll be back often to read your great posts. Loved quarkbase.com.
Thanks,
Brian
.-= Brian H.´s last blog ..Curt Schilling is a Yankees Fan? (Take the poll) =-.
m4stono
Posted 865 days ago 29I using statcounter for invisible counter
.-= m4stono´s last blog ..Get Paid to Review Software =-.
Ben Huebner
Posted 919 days ago 28Thanks for these list of services! I use google adwords for quite some time, but does it make sense to use an other service in addition? If yes, which one?
Aline S
Posted 952 days ago 27Hi! a great site valuation tool is http://www.estimix.com . It provides competitive analysis for free and it seems to use the Alexa traffic information quite well.
Aline S
Posted 986 days ago 26Another useful estimator for the value of each website is http://www.estimix.com . The estimation provided is the result of a complex analysis based on factors like: the age of the website, the demographic structure of the traffic, the countries where the website is popular and sources of the traffic. It provides trusted information, helpful for an objective human analysis.