Forum Moderators: DixonJones

Message Too Old, No Replies

How can I tell which link the visitor is clicking on if

         

sithicus

4:58 pm on Dec 29, 2004 (gmt 0)

10+ Year Member



Here's my problem, I have the same link two or three times on one page, I can't tell which specific area the user is clicking on, for example if they are clicking on a picture link or one in a menu, it would be very helpful if i could tag the links so our tracking program could see which link they are clicking on. Is this possible?

Thanks!
-Sith

cgrantski

1:01 am on Dec 30, 2004 (gmt 0)

WebmasterWorld Senior Member 10+ Year Member



Definitely. just add a different tracking query parameter value to the end of the link for each separate button: destinationpage.asp?L=1, L=2, L=3 etc where L means "link".

zgb999

3:34 pm on Dec 30, 2004 (gmt 0)

10+ Year Member



Interesting question. The problem with page.htm?L1 ... is that search engines will look at those links as pointing to two different pages and page.htm won't get the full benefit of those links.

Is there another way to do this?

sithicus

4:32 pm on Dec 30, 2004 (gmt 0)

10+ Year Member



Thanks to both of you guys, that was a good answer to my question and for pointing out the potiental problems with it. I for one am completly stumped on a way to do this without messing up our SEO.

-Chris

topr8

4:37 pm on Dec 30, 2004 (gmt 0)

WebmasterWorld Senior Member 10+ Year Member Top Contributors Of The Month



check to see if this is a normal user or a bot (by whichever method suits you best)

if a bot then leave the links as is, if a normal user then adjust the links as detailed above.

this is a legitimate use of cloaking

topr8

4:52 pm on Dec 30, 2004 (gmt 0)

WebmasterWorld Senior Member 10+ Year Member Top Contributors Of The Month



another method i haven't tried is ...

point the picture link to a page like /picturelink/mylink.htm
then from that page just redirect to

mylink.htm

after having logged the click through in your database or other tracking system, then ban the /picturelink/ directory in your robots txt file to avoid dupe content.

of course ensure that one link goes directly to mylink.htm to ensure your site is spidered correctly.

(or use a variation of some sort, basically the theme being that of a click counter, any of the script sites will have them in different languages)

sithicus

6:27 pm on Dec 30, 2004 (gmt 0)

10+ Year Member



That's a good idea with the seperate pages, a bit of work and will also slow the site down a little, but it should return the correct info, the reason I am doing this is I need to know what layout is most popular and it is just impossible to figure out what picutes users like and stuff like that if those picutres lead to the same links as the left or top menus. I'm not trying to figure out if the user is a bot or a real user, using the robot's file to direct teh bots is a good idea to avoid problems.

Thanks
-Chris

Jon_King

7:15 pm on Dec 30, 2004 (gmt 0)

WebmasterWorld Senior Member 10+ Year Member



>>just add a different tracking query parameter value to the end of the link

How does ClickTracks do it then without this data? Their program will show you on-page activity by importing your server logs. Somehow they must get it from these logs.

topr8

7:23 pm on Dec 30, 2004 (gmt 0)

WebmasterWorld Senior Member 10+ Year Member Top Contributors Of The Month



Their program will show you on-page activity by importing your server logs. Somehow they must get it from these logs

does it tell you which link has been clicked if multiple links on the same page point to the same url?

if so then i imagine it is some kind of javascript the same as has been bandied around on this forum to see which adsense ad has been clicked.

i'm not sure, personally i like to do as much as possible server side rather than using client side js which costs me bandwidth.

afaik it is impossible to tell from the logs which link has been clicked, you can get the refering page of course but not which link on that page if, there is more than one.
therefore obviously if there is only one link from a given page to a given url then obviously that link was pressed, but more than one no way to tell from the logs.

sithicus

7:35 pm on Dec 30, 2004 (gmt 0)

10+ Year Member



I don't think so, I think clicktracks see's all the links as one and will give the same % unless there is something that makes them different. At least that is what I have noticed with the demo, does anybody have experience with clicktracks?

-Chris

sithicus

7:38 pm on Dec 30, 2004 (gmt 0)

10+ Year Member



Anyone have the url for the javascrip that detects the Adsense, maybe i can come up with an idea that would help from that.

werty

7:42 pm on Dec 30, 2004 (gmt 0)

WebmasterWorld Administrator 10+ Year Member Top Contributors Of The Month



I think you may be looking for this adsense click tracking script:
[webmasterworld.com...]

Jon_King

9:04 pm on Dec 30, 2004 (gmt 0)

WebmasterWorld Senior Member 10+ Year Member



topr8, download the evaluation version and you will see what I mean. Yes they show the activity for every link on a page, I can not see where the same link is a problem. I would like to know how they do it.

topr8

1:40 am on Dec 31, 2004 (gmt 0)

WebmasterWorld Senior Member 10+ Year Member Top Contributors Of The Month



>>topr8, download the evaluation version and you will see what I mean.

sorry don't have time to do that, i was only passing informed comment in this thread, we use our own custom built tracking software designed to fit our needs exactly - doesn't have those cute horizontal bars though :( , just churns out text data!

but i do remember talking to the english clicktracks guy at vegas if i remember correctly, so i've emailed them to ask if they can do this, i'll let you know - though i'd be amazed if they can without you having to add parameters to the link.

Jon_King

2:32 am on Dec 31, 2004 (gmt 0)

WebmasterWorld Senior Member 10+ Year Member



>>though i'd be amazed if they can without you having to add parameters to the link

It will be interesting to hear what they have to say. I look forward to their response.

AcsCh

5:45 pm on Jan 3, 2005 (gmt 0)

10+ Year Member



we do as cgrantski suggests, and only rewriting links if UserAgent is a principal browser, to avoid parameter problems for the SEs. Finaly it's only to get an idea, what user are doing, so we don't care to much if it's exact. IE user will not click significantly on other links than whatever new Browser comes up..

sithicus

7:39 pm on Jan 3, 2005 (gmt 0)

10+ Year Member



So basically you tag the links but make sure they are excluded the links in the robot txt to avoid SEO problems? I'm not sure what your mean by "IE user will not click significantly on other links whenever new Browser comes up.." but thats for your input!

-Chris

larryn

8:18 pm on Jan 3, 2005 (gmt 0)

10+ Year Member



Maybe I'm overlooking something, but why not just use Javascript and the onClick event to make a server request that identifies the link clicked (that server request would return nothing), and then the script returns true so that the browser moves on to that page?

Something like this (untested code, just to show the concept):


<script>
function registerClick( pID ) {
window.location.href = '/cgi/logclick.php?' + pID;
return true;
}
</script>

<body>
<a href="pg1.html" onClick="return registerClick('A');">Page 1 one way</a>

<a href="pg1.html" onClick="return registerClick('B');">Page 1 another way</a>

</body>