If you run a web startup , chances are that the question “how many pageviews are you getting..?” is more often than not used as a surrogate metric for your site’s current traction; The pageview has existed ever since the internet has been around and it made eminent sense when the internet was dominate by HTML web pages, largely containing static content. The number of time a page loaded (or its URL was called) was taken as a reasonably accurate representation of the consumption of the page content by users. So far so good.
Enter Web 2.0 and the pageview’s ability to adequately represent what it was originally meant for, has almost gone for a six (sorry for that cricket hangover, a la IPL!). For some of the things that make Web 2.0 what it is, are inherently at odds with this; consider these
Ajax: The widespread use of Ajax in web pages causes incorrect pageview counts. There are actually two diametrically opposite opinions here- some people report a bloated pageviews count due to Ajax, while some report a supressed number. My personal experience is that either of the situations is possible – it all depends on how the AJAX code is written, how the server is being pinged for additional within-page actions. And this miscalculation may be completely unintended- your developers may not realise it at all while writing the code. The realisation will come only if you do a careful profiling of server requests or look at your Google Analytics, Awstats, Webalizer, Urchin reports with a fine grained eye.
Rich Media: Websites where rich media dominates the content consumption e.g. videos, images, slideshows, podcasts etc would show a correct pageview count, but the watching of a video, slideshow etc while being a critical indicator of site stickiness, would not figure in the numbers at all. Hence there is likely to be a gross under-reporting of actual site activity and user engagement.
Widgets: Syndication of videos, images etc onto other websites & blogs through widgets adds another dimension to the pageviews conundrum; should the widget views be added to the pageviews? I think there is no general consensus here and different websites do their own thing.
At my own startup, we do look at our pageviews number, but with a pinch of salt. Other indicators like unique visitors, time spent on site per visit, no of clicks per visit etc in my opinion are better metrics to drive your business goals. As this post indicates, the internet world as started taking note of this anomaly. This post on Gigaom theorizes that the pageview should be replaced by engagement oriented metrics; AC Nielson apparently has stopped using pageviews as a metric for video sites, preferring ‘time spent on site‘.
Question to Indian web startups- whats your take on this?
Pay for performance is the yardstick.
Let this be a guideline strategy. What are the operative words for this?
Good content – how you do this is defined by the audience profile you address. B to B , B to C, C to C etc.
User friendly GUI
SCM – after doing all the above, if you don’t get your desired audience, …well you just cant operate. This is most imp.
Performance metrics – well, you got to manage your site. So if you need to improve the response for any aspect, you need to know what works and what doesn’t. Hence you need management control systems.
Current pay for performance metrics has operative words like
Pay-per-sale (PPS) or Pay per transaction (PPT) or Cost per transaction (CPT) – (revenue share)
Pay-per-lead (PPL)/pay-per-action/acquisition (PPA) or Cost per lead (CPL)
Pay-per-click (PPC) or Cost per click (CPC)
CPM now is not the most preferred way to go, but that doesn’t make pageviews irrelevant.
Web 2.0 , hence ajax , hence flash. That doesn’t really work in the real world as per my experience.
Intelligent SEO decides your strategy.
Flash is used only in very limited places…menu , navigation etc. any more…and it would show inexperience on my part. Moreover flash doesn’t even get picked up by search engines.
Ajax…plays havoc with your seo. that’s where your strategy comes into play. Your experience and research about your target audience will dictate when and how of ajax to use. Don’t forget google believes a lot in contextually relative content and ranks you accordingly. So a generous use of ajax would ensure you rank lower. In that case how many people would be able to see your amazing user friendly GUI?
It isn’t so straight forward. It’s a very fine balance between scm and GUI.. The right answer always comes from the context in which it has to be answered and the experience of the person addressing or responsible for it..
Page views may not be very effective for the sake of pageview based monetization. but you need it for contextual and relative seo. You need it in order to analyze your lead generation ratios (else how do you fine tune it?). How do you decide which content, which section, which article, which writer etc works for you and which doesn’t?
Well this is my opinion, I am sure there are a lot more experienced people out there.
Jeetendra,
“….The right answer always comes from the context in which it has to be answered ..”
completely agree with the above- the context I mentioned is web2.0 where pageviews are being questioned; more so ever in case of media sharing sites..
Your argument seems quite swayed by SEO, which has less of a role to play in many media sites, because of being password protection (orkut, facebook), lesser textual content etc.
Hi Amit,
Thanks to you for starting a meaningful debate. Actually I took the discussion offtrack since the answer to the actual question was most obviously a foregone conclusion. I assumed this would be a more helpful insight for the general argument.
My argument is swayed by SEO, because that’s the smart mantra that most other publishing sites need to adopt. The many media sites that you talk about are in my opinion a minority. Like I kept saying that it’s a thin line between right and wrong, the right decision is based on the aud profile and most definitely the kind of service you offer.
Hi Amit,
Completely agree with you. We have a AJAX-heavy site and when users move the map around, we refresh the content but alas, it doesnt affect our pageview-count. We implemented permalinks for the content right away just so that it gets indexed by the search engines (using sitemap_gen, etc). We have managed to get a PR of 4, but its tough to break into 5. AJAX was the only way to go for us since page refreshes on a map are slow – on the lookout for better ways to be google-friendly.
It’s not impossible to not track these things,no matter what form the pageview is “diluted” . I actually see an opportunity for startups to tackle this problem, and offer it as a solution/product.
Moreover, if most sites have page views as well as widgets as well as an plugin or a facebook app – the same will be the case for any site/app. And experts will no doubt relatively assess the stats. I feel people will use the pageviews or “other sources” by quoting them to their advantage.
What i am curious to know though, is what the next generation of thewaybackmachine will be like ?
Keep Clicking,
Bhasker V Kode
Impressive Blog and very nice writing style. I was looking for Indian blogs which dwelt into analysis and I think I have come to the right place.
I am surprised though that you have not been bitten by the advertising bug.
-Tarun
We run a media heavy site and I think the discussion is extremely relevant to all the sites that offer a lot of media content. Though pageviews offer a good idea of the traction, I think the avg time spent by a user on the site is also a very important stat. Its in fact very important since you might be offering more than one individual content on a single page saving the user some clicks. Playlists (audio/video) especially suffer from this but the stickiness and usage can be correctly identified by studying the avg time usage.
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Interesting discussion.
I feel that the original purpose of any startup is to create a new demand or satisfy an existing demand or solve a problem which the users face online.
Google, when it started, was singularly focussed on how to help people find what they want to find -easily.
The startup has to ask themselves ‘In what way would I provding value to my users? Would use of (say)AJAX at some/all places make things very easy for the users and give them delight in using the site. Or would it make a marginal difference only for which it would not be wise to lose the pageviews that we are getting..’ …
Assume that the use of AJAX creates great value for the users on the site . The users are delighted to use your site . I feel that in such a scenario , it would be better to forego the pageview argument as a small bunch of delighted and committed users can make the site more popular and viral than a very good SEO(though timeline may be different)..
In ultimate analysis it is the VALUE THAT WE PROVIDE TO OUR USERS that will make all the difference. The choice of technology should be subservient to this ultimate goal..
Ok people, to drag the argument back a little, can anyone please enlighten a newbie, on how can one even track the pageviews of a site, or the other metrics that you have been speaking about?
Sorry to go “real” off topic. If its not worth it, don’t reply. But if someone could, it’ll be helpful.
Cheers,
R
very much agree to Sandip !
Btw, I COMPLETELY agree with Sandeep. Maybe my views are old fashioned, but I doubt if Google worried about being visible on Yahoo or Altavista’s search engines.
I think the focus of a startup should be “Obsessively” into providing value. If that is done well, I think it will solve the problem, that you are trying to solve with better Google ranking : More visits.
Cheers,
R
P.S. Apologies, I am not familiar with the jargon.
Amit, i love the perspectives your point started off. And btw i am a slideshare addict!
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