onceinaweb

Blog

  • Logfile Analysis

    A lot of folks dread reviewing log files.  Log file analysis need not be such a horrible task with the right tools.  Find dozens of log file analysis tools (including some useful tools for the web analyst and web developer) at LogAnalysis.org. 

    Now more than ever it is important to monitor web server activity by reviewing http access files and event logs. Take a moment and review the various logfiles in your environment as soon as possible.  Recently I reviewed a site’s logs and realized that one page of the site was under constant attack from overseas. It wasn’t long before this constant traffic turned into a DDoS attack which was easily stopped by blocking the origin IPs. What started out as casual, routine log review became a task with a serious outcome.  Let me know your thoughts and experiences!

  • Speaking the language

    or… Translating Webtrends-speak to Omniture-speak.

    June Dershewitz provided this excellent short post at her web analytics blog to help those who know Omniture and need to learn Webtrends, and vice-versa.  Specifically, she’s writing about migrating between the two packages, but there’s great info for anyone who ‘grew up’ using one package before learning the other.

  • What’ll they think of next?

    Tagless web analytics has recently been a popular topic on the Yahoo! Groups Web Analytics discussion. One of the vendors, AtomicLabs, offers its Pion solution. I’m interested in the concept. More to come…

  • A new decade in web analytics

    Happy 2010! With the new decade upon us, it is time to review your web analytics practices and to get the house in order.  Whatever toolset you’re using, take a look at how you’ve been doing things, make sure you’re getting what you want. Evaluate new features in your toolset, review any licensing agreements, take backups, document, and explore new options.

  • Search Ranking Factors

    The holy grail of search engine optimization is to master the factors affecting page rank. SEOmoz.org has a beautiful and highly detailed (forensic!?) explanation of the elements of a web page which influence page rank. I wouldn’t try to print it, though – the solid backgrounds used would run through three ink cartridges in moments.  Enjoy!

    …

    Update: (2/2010) – evidently someone at SEOmz read my ink cartridge remark, because they’ve reworked their content to by much more friendly. Cheers!

  • Welcome, Bing!

    MSN has converted itself into Bing.com.  Now all web analytics packages are momentarily obsolete – until the next upgrade, code release, or until you take matters into your own hands and update the product you use.

    First, let’s see how Bing identifies itself as a referring site in your logfiles:

    http://www.bing.com/search?q=querystring_here&FORM=MSNH11

    Nothing too fancy here.   The fully specified domain name and query string value is here. I’m not yet too sure about the ‘FORM=MSNH11’ value – I am sure it is a useful item yet to be discovered.

    Google Analytics
    I know that Google Analytics (GA) will allow users to add new search engines with a special API call that you need to add after the first pageTracker() call:

    pageTracker._addOrganic("bing.com","q");

    What is not clear is if this call should be made only once, or if it should remain part of your tagging at least until GA reports Bing data on its own. More on this later.  Somehow I suspect Google will be a bit lackadasical about adding a competing search engine to is reports.

    Omniture
    SiteCatalyst appears to report on Bing referrals just fine. It nicely displays as ‘Microsoft Bing’ instead of just ‘Bing’. This will help SiteCatalyst users make the transition visually.

    Webtrends
    The WebtrendsOutsider blog has documented how to update self-hosted Webtrends installations to report Bing data properly. For users running a custom keywords.ini file, this post explains how to make the update.  For users running the ‘factory’ keywords.ini and browser.ini files, just hop over to Webtrends and pick up new versioned copies of both files and place them on your WT server.

  • Validating your Google Analytics installation made easier

    Lots of sites use Google Analytics and that is good news.  The next question becomes: ‘is it installed correctly’?  Here’s one tool which can help answer the question: SiteScan™ by EpikOne. It will check up to 1000 pages on your site and report the results via email. Pretty nice for a great price: free.

  • Consistent Social Networking ‘Handles’ Made Easy

    Social Networking (SN) is rapidly becoming an accepted practice in the business world. Branding and brand protection are some of the main reasons businesses are using SN sites. A great way to find a name or ‘handle’ for your business which can be the same across all or many SN sites is to use namechk in much the same way as finding a valid domain name to register.

  • Google Analytics API listing found

    I finally found in one place the Google Analytics API documented in one place, all on one page. This page lists the myriad functions which can be called from the pageTracker object.

  • Logfile Analysis – no way around it

    It’s true – the best way to understand and be sure what activity happens on your website is to open the logfiles. You’ll find a lot of activity which is good for your cause, such as search engine spiders and real human visitor activity, and you’ll find abuse such as hacker attacks and content theft. Blogger Eric Lander wrote this thorough post which introduces log file analysis to webmasters and SEOs.

    This Wikipedia entry provides a most complete list of server log analysis tools, but remember, to get started looking at logs, all you really need is a good text editor. Even Notepad works in a pinch.