Tag Archives: web marketing

What’s the difference between a hit, an impression and a unique visitor? Aside from all sounding like activities that take place at a Saturday night college party, these terms explain different ways of measuring a website’s traffic and, subsequently, a website’s success. This process of formulating website tracking into quantifiable data is called ‘metrics’, and with everyone using the new Web 2.0, quantifying a website’s success is trickier than ever. How many visitors does your site have each day? Each month? How many page views? What is the average time each visitor spends per session? What’s your site’s click through rate (CTR)? Is anyone subscribing to your RSS feed? All these questions are pointing to one underlying concern: is my website doing what it is supposed to do? Obviously, website success looks much different to a blogger than it does to an industrial manufacturer. A professional blogger will put more weight in how much time each visitor spends reading content and how many RSS subscriptions she has, while a manufacturer wants to know how many online quotes are being submitted and how many unique visitors view his ‘Capabilities’ page. These qualitative methods of measurement are part of the industry’s shift towards ‘engagement metrics’. But before we get too deep into this new mind-bog of ‘squishy’ analytics, let’s iron out some definitions. Continue reading →