2011/Web Analytics

=Session Notes=

Open Source Analytics
Packages you can install on your site to self-host your own analytics (rather than depending on Google analytics).


 * Matomo - https://matomo.org (formerly Piwik)
 * Awstats - http://awstats.sourceforge.net
 * OWA - http://openwebanalytics.com

Google Analytics
http://google.com/analytics

Use https://www.google.com/support/googleanalytics/bin/answer.py?hl=en&answer=55578 to create custom URLs per downstream syndicated service, e.g. Twitter, FB, etc.

FAQ:
 * Q: What about page speed delays due to loading Google Analytics external javascript?
 * A: Google tracks in Google Webmaster tools.
 * A: If you download Google Analytics to your site and use the current version, it's Google Analytics Async (been around for a while). The old versions aren't supported any more. However, old sites/plugins may be using the older synchronous versions, and thus their speeds may be unnecessarily slowed down.

Get Clicky
http://getclicky.com

What are the goals?
What are the goals of analytics on your own indieweb site?


 * SEO - better search engine ranking
 * more traffic
 * ... for a key phrase
 * ... for a group of key phrases
 * Which syndicated sites are sending me the most ...
 * ... traffic
 * ... visitors
 * Problems with Twitter referrers
 * Twitter clients, e.g. Twitterific sends Twitterific.com

Boomerang
From Yahoo.

Login framework from dedicated to page speed.
 * actual load speed
 * benchmark the speed
 * generates server-side logs that you can drop into other things

Twitter Tweet Button
Embeds in general (like a Tweet button) you can test with implementations of sites like: which have a ton of 3rd party javascripts etc.
 * mashable.com
 * techcrunch.com