

Ask HN: I'm a beginner, who should I use for analytics on my site? - gmichnikov

I'm slowly learning to code and building a site for the first time. Right now, the site is free. Soon, I plan to charge a one-time fee for access. I don't have very many users/pageviews yet.<p>I want to use a free analytics product to get some pretty basic information:
How many visitors go to each page? Where did they come from? Where are they located? How long did they stay? (I'm probably missing some obvious ones.)
And eventually, something that helps me understand a bit about who is purchasing and who is not.<p>I'm using PHP and MySQL, and I'm looking for something that is as simple as possible. I strongly prefer ease of use to advanced functionality.<p>I've seen Google Analytics, MixPanel, Clicky, SiteMeter, KISSmetrics, and others mentioned on HN.<p>Who would you recommend for a beginner, and why? Is it worth trying more than one at the same time?
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dholowiski
Google Analytics, as others have said is a no brainer - go for it. Invest in
some time to learn it because it is _way_ more powerful than it first appears.
Thins you should investigate are 'event tracking' 'conversions' and 'goals'

As a second analytics app I would use Woopra - it is more basic but it gives
you real time analytics, and it's free for up to (i think) 10,000 visits a
month.

Stick with google analytics and only 1 or two other analytics programs. You'll
know when you need more, or something more specific.

The most important thing I heard(I can't remember where I read it) is to
_build your own dashboard_ - that is, code a custom dashboard that shows you
stats that are relevant to your site. For me it's a few lines of code that
shows me the 20 most recently added users and comments. For you it might show
you free and paid signups, and maybe a conversion ratio. This will evolve over
time to be far more important than any analytics program - paid or free.

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dirkdeman
Google Analytics is fine for now, it's easy to use, reasonably accurate and
free. a little further down the road you might want to consider other
analytics services besides google, because the results can differ quite a lot.
But for now, focus on GA.

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twog
Google analytics is by far the easiest to use, and its free. Dont over-
complicate with choices on analytics right now, focus on your core product.

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stc
I have used Google Analytics in the past and just tried Mixpanel. It is great.
Love the visualization. You can try out both pretty easily.

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leeHS
Quantcast is pretty good as well. I tend to use them and Google (both free)

