Initial Referrers

How to extract this, and how to use it

[fom2001uk]

One of the problems with referral data is that it counts internal referrers, so if a visitor looks at 6 pages while on the site, there are 5 referring pages from within the site. This inflates the figures for the site itself. What I really want to track is the initial referrer to the site (e.g search engines, links, email).

I know NetTracker does this by having a seperate report for Initial Referrers. But is there a way to tweak WebTrends (using filters) to get the same info ?

But maybe I don't need to because, theoretically, I can just ignore all internal referrers, delete them from the report, and just use the external referrer data.

What are your experiences with this metric and how do you use it in your reports (if at all) ?

[oilman]

I ignore internal referers for the most part but there can still be some hidden treasure there that you should be careful not to discount. Internal referrers can help you find out which pages are drawing the clicks and how effectively you are steering traffic through you site. You can often find out where the process breaks down during sales etc. Essentially internal referrers can help you find the weakest link (page) in the site.

As far as reporting - I'm sure WebTrends can filter them out - I jsut can't remember how at the moment.

[Hannu]

>>I'm sure WebTrends can filter them out

Yeps, add an exclude filter with the following in "Referrer":

[mysite.com*...]

Then WT will report only on external referrers.