|
Home / Business / E-Commerce
10 things you should be monitoring on your website
By:amabaie
10 things you should be monitoring on your website
By David Leonhardt
Every business needs to know how it is doing. That's the idea behind exit surveys, customer feedback forms, suggestion boxes and other devices. Without feedback from the customer, monitoring inventory, expenses, revenue and other benchmarks, a business can take a quick slide down a slippery slope, without the owner ever seeing it coming – or being able to stop the slide.
Webmasters also have things they should be monitoring on their websites. Most of these can be classified as traffic related or server performance related. Here is my top ten list.
Monitoring website traffic
Traffic totals. You want to know how much traffic you are generating. If the line on the graph is heading down, you know you have to find out why.
Referrers. It's not enough just to know how many visitors you are getting. You need to know where they are coming from. I discovered I was getting a lot of visitors from a Thanksgiving site. They were all being funneled into my Thanksgiving Happiness article. Suddenly I knew I should get more links from other Thanksgiving sites. Valuable information.
Searches. Much to my surprise, my happiness site started getting a ridiculous number of hits from the search for "hairdressers". It just so happens I wrote a humor column on a hairdresser experience. I was surprised to see it getting so much traffic for such a generic, competitive search term. If that had been a term of a little more relevance for me, this information would have lead me to properly optimize the page and get even more traffic.
Pages viewed per visit. If people visit only one page per visit, you have some work to convince them to visit more pages, like those that make you money.
Pages visited. So you threw up on your site something cool as an add-on. How were you to know that other webmasters would link to it and send a whole bunch of traffic your way? Well, now you know, so add some copy to the page to pull visitors into the rest of your site.
Monitoring website performance
Forms. Are they all functioning? A good website monitoring service can keep tabs on them for you. The last thing you want is to have lost hundreds or thousands of subscribers because a sign-up form stopped functioning
Shopping carts. Slow and complicated shopping carts are responsible for an estimated $25 billion in lost sales. Make sure yours is functioning properly. A good website monitoring service can watch this for you, too.
Download speed. Clear your cache and test your pages. Hmm. Maybe those images are a bit large. Time to compress them, or even remove some. Remember that some people are on a much slower connection than you are. I use a satellite connection sometimes, but when I don't, my connection speed is 28K.
Server speed. re there problems with server speed? Maybe not where you are, but on the other side of the world. Global website monitoring can alert you to a transatlantic connection problem, so you can take it up with your web hosting service.
Server accessibility. All the web hosts promise 99% accessibility. But is that for real? Who monitors them? By one estimate, 75% of inaccessibility is not on the hosting server, but rather on the Internet's backbone network and in global routing. A global website monitoring service can help identify the problem, so that you can work with your web hosting company to resolve it before too many sales are lost.
Fun. If you are not having fun, audition for that drummer position in the local band. There is no point spending your life doing something that bores you. Webmastering should be fun.
Digg
del.icio.us
Blink
Stumble
Spurl
Reddit
Netscape
Furl
Article Source: http://www.articles2k.com
David Leonhardt is a freelance writer and website marketing consultant. He wrote this article for Dotcom-Monitor Website and Network Monitoring. Read more on network monitoring or on website monitoring.
|
|
| Top E-Commerce Articles |
- 1). The e-Commerce Revolution By : Michael Hehn
The Growth of E-Commerce
It's amazing all the changes in the way people do business in the short time since the beginning of the e-commerce revolution. The e-commerce revolution was predicted in the early stages of the internet. Those who predicted the sweeping business changes brought about by the world wide web knew what they were talking about.
In the early days of the e-commerce revolution customers were reluctant to give their credit card information to somebody on the internet.
|
|
|
- 3). Chain Emails, Hate’em! By : Ricardo d Argence
E-mail is one of the most used Internet tools, and it’s a real shame to fill it with trash that only wastes people’s time. This is one of the main reasons why some companies limit internet access to employees, because instead of raising productivity, web hosting servers get loaded with trash.
|
|
|
- 5). Protect Your Auction Business By : V. Raposo
One thing about eBay that a lot of people don't know is that you can have multiple user id's. Which means you can have more than 1 eBay account.
Here is why I feel it's important to have more than one user id. When you're selling on eBay with a certain id, you can focus it to a specific niche. You can keep it to the same products you use on your website.
|
- 6). More heads are better that one By : Dijana Dimitrovska
No matter how you are looking at things, if another person looks - he will see them differently. So, to be sure you are doing the right things on the right way, you should not only think systematically yourself, but also provide channels to get feedback and other opinions.
"The manager of one car-service company phoned all his daily customers after the working time to make sure they were satisfied with the service and to ask them if they could have done something better.
|
- 7). Merchant Accounts 101 By : Dwayne Garrett
For all of the new webmasters out there that have recently established a business and are looking to accept credit card payments online, here’s a little Merchant Accounts 101 course for you! In understanding how merchant accounts work, you will be better able to operate your online business smoothly and effectively.
|
- 8). Credit Card Processors By : R.S. Chawla
As per 2005 statistics released, on line trade grew more by more than 22% over previous year. To accept credit cards for online trade, you need a merchant account. Getting a merchant account is not easy for all. It does involve a lot of money. To solve this issue, another fast emerging choice is use of third-party factoring services, also known as credit card processors.
|
- 9). Selling on ebay? Find a reliable wholesaler. For free. By : Mike @ TheTraderHub.com
If you want to make money selling on ebay, you should look at finding yourself a wholesaler in the field you are selling in. A wholesaler is the 'bridge' between the manufacturer and the retailer. Quite often the manufacturer doesn't want to deal with individual retailers because of they may only sell hundreds of their product, whereas the wholesaler can sell thousands.
|
- 10). The Pros and Cons of Online Commerce By : Sezer Bozkurt
As the Internet comes of age more and more people and buying goods online. This has becoming a growing trend that looks like it will continue to grow. But what are the pros and cons of buying goods online?
There are several things to consider. Let’s start with the pros. As competition for online business keeps growing exponentially the prices of goods are being driven down.
|
| New E-Commerce Articles |
- 1). What to Look for in a Watch Wholesaler By : Dustin Cannon
When searching for a watch wholesaler, there are many details that you should look into. If you take the appropriate steps during this process you will end up doing business with a highly professional company that is willing to work with you to meet all of your needs.
|
- 2). Ordering Wholesale Watches By : Dustin Cannon
After you are set up with a watch wholesaler your work is not done. In fact, it is only just beginning. It is great that you have found a wholesaler who you can trust, but the fact of the matter is that you are just at the beginning of the process at this point.
|
|
|
- 4). Selling Watches On Ebay By : Dustin Cannon
Anybody has the ability to make money online with eBay. The great thing about eBay is that you can sell any item you wish (within reason) without having to spend much.
|
- 5). Wholesale Watches: Buy Online By : Dustin Cannon
If you are looking to buy wholesale watches there are many options available to you. But just like any other item, the internet is a great place to start your search.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
- 9). Finding Products To Sell Online By : Obinna Heche
Billions of dollars worth of products are sold on eBay and other online merchants every year. Where are people getting all these items to sell? Surely, they have emptied their closets and garages by now. Even if they have, finding stuff to sell online is still relatively easy.
|
- 10). Ebay Store vs. Ecommerce Website By : Michelle Waters
Many times a new product seller is torn between creating an eBay store and setting up a web store on your own domain. This article will help you decide if an eBay store is the right choice for your business.
|
|
|
