Internet Marketing Tycoon

**webspace** · 12-23-2006, 08:25 PM

Here's a good question. What percentage of visitors add your site/blog to their favorites?

This month I am at 21.2 %. This is above average for me. What is normal?

**chrishirst** · 12-24-2006, 05:03 AM

And how do you know this ???

and don't say it's the amount of times that the favicon was accessed because that is simply wrong.

Netscape, Opera, Firefox, IE7 and any IE with the MSN toolbar on will access the favicon on every visit to a page

**sandbox** · 12-27-2006, 05:21 PM

Would it not be in your web stats: Total visits minus visits from searh engines and links. If they didn't come from a search engine or a link on someones webpage they must have bookmarked you - or did I forget something?

My site comes out at 72.3% - not sure what that means though

**chrishirst** · 12-27-2006, 07:19 PM

Nope.

Many anti-virus, anti-spyware, and other "privacy" or internet security products remove the referrer from the browser info so this would appear to many stats packages as a "bookmarked" visit.
Users typing in the address from offline promotions etc also have no referrer.
Search Engine bots and some scrapers do not have referrer details.

There is no way you can reliably say that a user somewhere "bookmarked" your page or arrived on a page from a bookmark.

**webspace** · 12-28-2006, 10:07 PM

That is a pretty good point about the anti virus programs. I'm not sure. I mostly use AW stats. There isn't anthing on my site that would flag an anti virus program.

I had just assumed the stats were valid becuase search engines and links only account for about 50% of my overall traffic. The rest is from direct browser keyins and such.

Thanks for the black hat on that.

**Republikin** · 12-29-2006, 12:06 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by chrishirst

Nope.

Many anti-virus, anti-spyware, and other "privacy" or internet security products remove the referrer from the browser info so this would appear to many stats packages as a "bookmarked" visit.
Users typing in the address from offline promotions etc also have no referrer.
Search Engine bots and some scrapers do not have referrer details.

There is no way you can reliably say that a user somewhere "bookmarked" your page or arrived on a page from a bookmark.

Chris, your a smart man and a critical thinker; for what it's worth, I appreciate that.

I personally use Google Analytics (which formally was Urchin Stats). It's free and provides me with way better (yes I know that statement is subjective) data than AW stats.

**jingquan** · 12-29-2006, 10:13 AM

I say 0%, not even myself as google seemed to be more useful.

**MattCoops** · 01-07-2007, 04:43 PM

does users adding you to their favorites do anything for your rank in google?

and about google analytics, where does it show you how many have added you to favorites?

I know you can have numbers punched for link clicks on your site
so you can set up a "add to fav" link and google analytics can track that

**webspace** · 01-07-2007, 05:38 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by MattCoops

does users adding you to their favorites do anything for your rank in google?

To the best of my knowledge, No. Google's ranking systems are a closely guarded secret, so nobody knows accept some people who work for Google.

Let's keep this conversation on track though.

**MattCoops** · 01-07-2007, 05:55 PM

I was just wondering the validity of the original question

**webspace** · 01-09-2007, 09:06 PM

The original question is pretty valid from a scientific point of view.

I'm trying to figure out how many people add me to their favorites and compare with others to see where I stand, but like someone else said those aren't really very objective numbers. But what the hell.

I think the question is a good one for persons interested in developing a marketing strategy for their websites. After all that's what were all interested in or we wouldn't be reading or posting in the marketing forum.

Anyway since we really don't have a good way to find out the really who added me to favorites count it's not something we can really discuss from a purely logical point of view.

**Republikin** · 01-10-2007, 04:10 AM

you could get at least a partial view of people who have added you to their favorites using a social bookmarking tool like http://del.icio.us

**webspace** · 03-25-2007, 06:02 PM

I have been using digg alot lately. I can't stay away. Those social media sites are a great way to get to know your visitors. I also have a alot of MySpace friend. I use Delicious a little. I should probably use it more.

**wdwp** · 03-29-2007, 04:42 AM

What you really want to know isn't how many people bookmarked you, but how many people became repeat visitors.

Here are different ways that people could return to your site:
bookmarks,
good memory,
finding your url in browser history,
searching google every time they want to return to your site (that happens a lot),
social bookmarking.

You can see how people return to your site by aggregating visitors by IP address (or tracking them with cookies) over a few months.

**webspace** · 02:14 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by wdwp

What you really want to know isn't how many people bookmarked you, but how many people became repeat visitors.

Exactly.

Thanks for you input everybody.

**john546** · 04-09-2007, 10:41 PM

I new that awstats and webaliser stats were un-accurate for ages. Alot of the traffic you get is not really traffic. They are rather un-accurate compared to the stats that I made for my own site and using Google's Urchin.

Also, if the stats were true from awstats and webalizer then I would have had around 153% bookmark my site this month so far and 141% bookmark it the whole of last month. I think that is very good going and infact is impossible.

**camp185** · 04-11-2007, 09:44 PM

I used to keep track on one site, and the number was so low that I stopped tracking. I basically made the bookmark link link to a new page that had a counter, and then put the java script into action to bookmark. It still wasn't the most accurate, but at least I knew how many times people clicked on my link.

I guess another way would be to have a bookmark this link, and have it include a string. Like this: http://www.apopularitycontest.com/in...isits=bookmark

Then you could check your log looking for that. It still would not count how many times visitors bookmark if they just hit add to favorites using their explorer.

**john546** · 04-12-2007, 12:00 AM

Personally, how many times people bookmarket my site, I don't really worry. The main thing that I worry about is getting traffic and also getting repeat visitors. If you get repeat visitors then there is a chance quite a few of them were visitors that bookmarked your site anyway.

**newwalkingman** · 04-13-2007, 12:21 PM

I'm also worry about getting repeat visitors.What does your site can help them It's the main thing get them back.

**john546** · 04-13-2007, 05:30 PM

Yes, repeat visitors is the main thing you should be concerned of. Even if someone bookmarks your site, doesn't really mean that they will visit your site again.