Determining your number of readers

[</you>]

hey everyone. by way of introduction, my name is Phil and i run The Shallow End, which got its start on keenspace before moving to its own domain.

i've had one really big question since i started my comic strip last september, and i've never really heard a satisfactory answer. traffic logs are a great tool to have, but how do i interpret the data given to determine exactly how many readers i have? is there a secret formula?

i don't think the 'unique daily visits' thing is what i need to be looking at; aside from myself, i don't know many other webcomic fans that check their favourite comics everyday (regardless of their actual update schedule). 'unique visitors' (i'm not sure if webalizer has this feature, but Awstats does)-- methinks that this may be a more accurate count, but it hardly takes into account the number of people who check out your site once, think it blows and never return.

so, i'm curious, how do you all determine how many readers you have?

thanks for your responses
-P.

[Psiogen]

There's no statistic that can tell you that. It's just not technically possible. The best you can do is put up a poll on your front page and see how many people identify themselves as "readers". Of coure, that won't account for people who don't bother with polls...

[[AOD]]

Yes. Do a poll and it might give you something of an idea of how many people are regular readers of your comic. Hopefully people will answer.

@~AoD

[STrRedWolf]

You really can't with Webalizer. That would require analysis of the logs over a certian period of like weeks, plus seperating some of the chaff out (errors, 404's, etc). Plus, you have to content with firewalls and DSL/Cable modems, which mask multiple IP addesses into one.

The best you can do now is the page views, and hope they grow over time.

[Terotrous]

A fairly decent indication would be to look at the amount of visitors you get from one update to another. You'd have to reduce that by some fraction to account for people who come back, but that's a partial estimate. It breaks down for comics that update daily or sporadically, however.

[</you>]

The best you can do now is the page views, and hope they grow over time.

i've heard someone else say to pay attention to page views, but i'm not sure i understand what kind of change (or lack thereof) i should be looking for. would you mind clarifying?

-P.

[War]

More is better .

[Melody]

Use Extreme Tracker. http://www.extremetracking.com . It is good because it essentially guarantees the stats that are being counted are from readers. This is because it uses an image, so when a reader's browser downloads the image, that's what triggers the logging. The downside of Extreme Tracker is that it will only log the stats on the page you place it on. But, if you place it on your main page, you will have a precise idea on the number of readers you have.

[Knightsaber]

I just assume I have zero, and therefore when I get a page hit, I'm always pleasantly surprised.

[Godoftarot]

I just assume I have zero, and therefore when I get a page hit, I'm always pleasantly surprised.

Well, I suppose that's a sorta optimistic way of looking at it.
I don't really care too much to know how many people view my comic. It's been a learning experience, sure, but I don't mind. If no one reads it, at least I won't have to feel bad if I can't update often when I start college in the fall. ^^

[</you>]

thanks for the suggestion, melody, but i think the stats programs my web host provides are adequate. i was mainly coming here looking for a bit of help interpreting the data that's given me.

-P.

[Ghastly]

A very, very rough estimate is to take the number of unique visits in a week and divide it by the number of times your strip updates in a week.

So if you;re getting 25000 unique visits in a week and you update your strip five times a week then very roughly speaking you have 5000 readers.

There's lots this method doesn't take into account but it will give you a good ballpark figure to work from.

There's no way to get a perfectly accurate idea of readership. All trackers are lossy, some more-so than others. Don't sweat it too much.

[Nyke]

Some methods are better than others. I'd personally suggest the dart-in-board method.

[Ghastly]

But, if you place it on your main page, you will have a precise idea on the number of readers you have.

It also loads the image into the reader's cache so it doesn't count repeat visits from that reader until the cache is refreshed.

[</you>]

Some methods are better than others. I'd personally suggest the dart-in-board method.

could you fill me in on what this is? i don't think i've ever heard of it.

ghastly - i'm not entirely certain i understand the logic behind that formula? could you explain it to me? that would rock. also, how do youfigure out your number of unique visitors per week? i believe that webalizer tracks the number of unique visitors per day, but doesn't that reset every day, meaning the same IP addresses could get logged on subsequent days?

i appreciate everyone's help and i sincerely apologize if it seems like i'm putting everyone's ideas down; i'm just trying to find something that seems really solid to me.

-P.

[Melody]

But, if you place it on your main page, you will have a precise idea on the number of readers you have.

It also loads the image into the reader's cache so it doesn't count repeat visits from that reader until the cache is refreshed.

In the webalizer logs, there is a "Hits by Response Code" section. One of the response codes is 304 - Not Modified. My point is that the server is able to detect if a person has the file in their cache already. Extreme Tracker takes this into account, so repeat visitors are counted even if they already have the image. http://extremetracking.com/open;reloads?login=suckbuns . But, I could be wrong. I am going to test it myself.

[McDuffies]

More is better .

Not if it's more kicks in the head.
Oh, wait, you're War.

Some methods are better than others. I'd personally suggest the dart-in-board method.

could you fill me in on what this is? i don't think i've ever heard of it.

[whisper]he fell for it[/quote]

[Ghastly]

Take your average uniques per day. Multiply by 7 and you've got a good idea of your average uniques per week. Or take you total uniques by month and divide by 4.

[Bekka]

But that would only work if you have a fixed schedule, so that your readers know that they can find a new strip, e.g. Mon Wed Fri. If you update as I do, 2-3 times a week but not on fixed days, I don't think that the formula would work.

Personally I wouldn't worry too much about knowing how many readers there are, I would be concerned if suddenly there was a decline in visits that went on for several days (I'd ask myself if my comic had started to suck). As long as your readers increase, it's all good

[Dutch!]

Outside of the handful of people reading School Spirit just to be nice cos they know me, I know I have ONE reader...because I suggested readers send comments so I know there is someone out there doing more than surfing by and giving it an idle glance.

So I have ONE!

And I am very appreciative of him too.

I'm sure there's others, but he's the only one who's been nice enough to say so.