Web Traffic

Web traffic is analogous to road traffic. Just as the popular roads have more vehicular traffic, so the more popular Web sites have larger numbers of visitors viewing their pages. Web traffic indicates the volume of data sent and received by visitors to the website.

One of the best ways to improve Web site marketing is by analyzing the existing Web traffic. Traffic is measured either for the entire site or for particular sections to show where most site visitors spend their time. As a result, site developers can decide how to improve or adjust the site. Web traffic is an important factor to marketers because the greater the number of visitors to a site that displays advertisements translates into more advertising revenue to be generated.

A basic method of analyzing Web site traffic is the use of a counter that tallies the number of Web site visitors. The Web designer can decide whether to display the counter to visitors (e.g., to highlight its popularity) or keep it hidden.

Many tools and firms specialize in measuring Web traffic, such as the following:

• Visitor Ville 
• Blizzard Tracker 
• Web Site Hit Counters 

Important information that can be collected from Web Traffic includes:

• Average number of visitors per day.
• The referrer site (e.g. search sites) that led to the page.
• The sections of the site that are most visited.
• How long visitors spend on the site and its sections.