How can you compare your company’s web performance
to that of your rivals?

Sorting through web statistics in search of something you can use.

Most companies keep a keen eye on what's happening with their website nowadays. You can pretty much guarantee that the IT department will regularly get a bit giddy and announce something like page visits are up ten per cent. Funny how the news is almost always positive. But what do web statistics really mean? And how can you compare your company’s performance to that of others?

Most likely, you’ll look at net ratings and web statistics. There are two principle ways to measure third party internet usage. Some firms use sample data from groups of internet users in much the same way that TV ratings are measured – usually referred to as ‘user-centric monitoring’. The problem with this method is that the internet has such a fragmented audience, it’s hard to establish what’s a true and reliable representation.

Alternatively, you can collect data directly from ISP's (network-centric). This is the most efficient way of monitoring how many more people visit one particular website over another. Phoenix uses data provided by Hitwise, who collect network-centric data from over 25 million internet users daily.

This includes a range of measurements like page requests, visits, and average visit length. Because of the extensive sample size of network data, we can also gain detailed insights into the search terms used to find thousands of sites.

It’s probably not surprising that the most visited UK property website is rightmove.co.uk, but how about the most used search terms? In May, people typed ‘rightmove’ into Google, MSN and the likes 31 times more than they did the word ‘property’. Brand awareness within the property market is so strong that only eight search terms in the top 50 are generic, whilst the rest are brand names. This may be greeted with concern by those investing heavily in search engine optimisation for generics like ‘estate agent’ and ‘houses’, but today's web users are more brand savvy than you may have thought.

If you’d like to have a chat about web statistics and internet search intelligence in more detail, feel free to drop me an email at danielh@phoenixplc.com.