There are many free resources out there that will allow you to easily track your visitors and display information about them in a visual (usually graphs) manner.
WHAT ARE THEY?
Below, I've listed some of the best "free" tracking solutions available. Some (not all) may require an ad on your site, so if that is not acceptable for your site you may wish to see the Server Side Tracking section below).
FREE TRACKING SERVICES:
WebTrends Live -- detailed, visible, multi-page
HitBox -- detailed, visible, multi-page
Extreme-dm -- detailed, visible, single page
SiteStatz -- visible, single page
SERVER SIDE TRACKING:
For those with bigger fish to fry (or perhaps just a terrible fear of
extra ad buttons on your site) you may wish to try a server side
tracking solution. There are several options:
1) CGI Based
Install a specialized CGI script on your server which will automatically
run in the background and collect the necessary data invisibly from your
visitors. Many of these scripts can be found for free or inexpensivly at
CGI Resources.
2) Logfile Based
This option will usually require support from your web-host. On most servers,
every action that occurs on your site is collected in something called a
logfile. This file can be processed through a special program into a
more "readable" format. A few good programs to use in this case
include:
Wusage
HTTP-Analyze
WebTrends
FastStats
Now you have the information and resources to allow you to track your
visitors and traffic - use it to your advantage!
Success is yours if you reach out and take it!
