Google Analytics (Urchin) its not enough is it?

[Mark_A]

Just taken a job in which I am also responsible for the website.

The site has google analytics (urchin) on every page which is quite interesting.

But it does not seem to be enough, I want more, raw logs and the like ...

Does anyone manage sites and SEO etc with just google analytics?

[Receptional]

Many do. I don't if I can help it as it isn't really designed to track spiders and things. Then again, raw logs are just messy when it comes to tracking real people.

[Mark_A]

The other thing is Analytics does not give me 404 pages on the site .. etc

[danielthepoet]

For my blogs, I use GA (Google Analytics) and Woopra (real-time analytics). For most of my clients' sites, I use a combination of GA and ClickTracks. I prefer to always have both javascript and log file based tools so that if one goes down, I always have a backup.

Plus I can use the log file based analytics tools for historical analysis, so I can compare April 2010 to April 2009 and 2008. Essential for baselining and showing annual growth.

[Mark_A]

I have an old free server side stats package on some of my old sites (might be webaliser) trouble is I have forgotten where I stored the password!

[Mark_A]

But, I also had the raw logs!

[BillyS]

I think you need to take a closer look at Analytics. It took me about a minute to find this (from the Google team):

<script type="text/javascript"src="http://www.google-analytics.com/urchin.js"></script><script type="text/javascript">_uacct = "#*$!xx-x";urchinTracker("/404.html?page=" + _udl.pathname + _udl.search);</script>

[geekgirl]

We use Google Analytics and Quantcast. Quantcast gives you more detailed info and also many advertisers are using it to find publishers. It's also a good checks/balances for Analytics to make sure they are reporting the same numbers.

[boomerang]

Yes, Quantcast is good tool, I use statcounter to track my visitors.

[love2respectseo]

I think,each and every page of your website which you want to track should have urchine.js, posted before the </body> tag. It will track your website very well. Other one is to keep a log file and real-time tracking script, javascript for better tracking.

[Mark_A]

Just had an email exchange with the developer, me can you email me a weeks worth of logs, them : logs were never set up you have analytics which gives you all you need.

Snotty sod, if they gave me all I needed I would not be asking for logs!

[timchuma]

Depends on what you want to do with the logs. Analytics/Urchin can track individual pages if you configure it correctly.

It is also possible to import raw log data into a database so you can query it like normal data.

For my own site I just use a log analysis program to make a report once a month to check trends and such.

[valituguran]

If you want an enterprise class analytics software that looks like Google Analytics, can parse logs like Urchin so you will be able to track spiders and errors without feeding google your information check this out [advancedwebstats.com ].

It also has reports for individual session tracking.

[Mark_A]

Have spent a couple of weeks with google analytics now and for basic monitoring they do seem ok. I would like to know when the googlebot visits though, and how many pages he takes when he does come but that is not available from analytics.

I may take the plunge and put the site into webmastertools. A little hesitant as I have not used it before.