Hits, Visits, Conversions and other Stuff!

Guest post by: Mandie Crawford
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Communicating Your Message - Your Info-mercial - By Mandie Crawford

Recently someone was telling me that they had 500 hits per day on their web site - and they were so excited! Unfortunately it was their understanding that HITS were visits. Many people have trouble understanding the difference - or the explanation they get is as 'clear as mud'! This is important information to know if you have a web site so let me explain what each of these really are!

Hits:

When we 'go to' a website - we really do not go anywhere - but your browser (internet explorer, firefox and others) sends a request to the internet - finds the page - and it is actually downloaded to your computer to view.

If the page is only text - it would show 1 hit. If the page has a picture on it - it would also be a 'hit'. So technically if you had 24 pictures and text on the page - when someone requested it and it was downloaded to their computer - it would be 25 hits. If a person then linked through to another page with five pictures and text another 6 'hits' would be recorded. So their visit may represent (at this point) 125 hits.

Additionally - everytime GOOGLE or other search engines crawls your site - it also registers 'hits'. So one person's visit to your web site could register as many as a 100 hits. This means that 500 hits may mean only 5 visits. (which is still better than only one!)

Visits

A visit is a visit! And this is good news! When you check your web stats - you get to decide how many 'visits' are good. For some people 10 visits a day is good - especially if they get several orders from those visits. For others 100 visits a day is normal - it all depends on your type of business and your marketing efforts. You can use your visits to measure your ROI for your marketing.

Conversion

This is the MAGIC word! Conversion is all about converting visitors into purchasers! If you take your sales and divide it into your visits you will see what your conversion rate is. A web site whose 'copy' is written well - will convert more often than a site whose copy does not have the elements needed to get people to buy!

The question is....

How many hits are a good number? We had several months of 1.5 million hits - but the visitor rate was 12,000 per month. So really hits say less about traffic than the visitors. When looking at your web stats - check to see how many people are visiting a day.

Other measurements

There are other measurements that are also important. Number of pages viewed or average page views per visitor, average time spent on the site per visit, top exit pages and referring pages or sites. Most of them are self explanatory - but many business owners NEVER check their web stats. This is unfortunate because sometimes a few small changes can increase your conversion rate or help you to see where and when visitors are leaving.

Understanding web jargon is an art in itself. (Get more info on web jargon here) But when you do learn a new term it can clear up some of the confusion about your site and how it operates - and what changes might be needed.

Wouldn't it be nice to say to a potential advertiser, "We get 12,000 visits a month, mostly from North America. The average stay on the site is 5 minutes and the most visited page is xxxxxx page. Knowing and understanding how to read these kind of statistics can actually earn you income!

For many of us understanding web jargon is not tops on our list of things to do - mostly because very few people who understand the jargon ever explain it in terms the regular Joe can understand. Because of this - we recommend you download this free report to have on hand to help you understand the thing you may need to know now or in the future - explained in a way that you can understand!

Aligning and Optimizing Sales & Marketing to Increase Conversions

Website Statistics: Facts and Fallacies

Chasing your Longtail

Hold On To Your Plan -- “Loosely”

Google Analytics - How Accurate is it?

The Best Keywords Ever for Your SEO Campaign

Analyzing Your Website Traffic – Visitors v. Hits

Increasing the Effectiveness of PSD to HTML Conversions

Techniques to Increase Conversions

Ways of Increasing Conversions

Conversions, Part One

Search Engine Optimization is not always the answer

How to Interpret and Improve your Traffic and Conversion Data

A Jolt Of Sales Productivity

Can Your Web Site Pass The Ecommerce Test?

Internet Marketing Promotion

Who Cares More-Sales or Marketing?

How Successful Sales Conversions and Article Writing Share One Common and Critical Characteristic

How To Increase Your Internet Marketing Lead Conversion

Aaahhh! So THIS is what's NICKING 80% of your ad money

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Communicating Your Message - Your Info-mercial - By Mandie Crawford

About the Author: Mandie Crawford

RSS for Mandie's articles - Visit Mandie's website
Mandie Crawford is a marketing expert, business coach, trainer and motivational speaker who was recently awarded Calgary Business Woman of the Year for her contributions to the business community.
Mandie also has skills and expertise in providing high quality guidance in time management and system implementation for small a medium sized businesses. Her passion as a business and professional development coach is to helps women recognize their value and self worth.

She is the President of Roaring Women Ltd which is Canada's premier national business support group for women in business that focuses on connecting, promoting and educating women in business. In her goal to encourage and educate women in building business across the country, she launched and completed a 6 week coaching tour in partnership with Staple Business Depot in 2008 where she coached over 600 women in business.

Mandie is mother to four children and 3 stepchildren and one highly energetic chocolate lab! Ms Crawford is also a former award winning police officer with Halton Regional Police.

Click here to visit Mandie's website.

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