clickstream analysis

On a Web site, clickstream analysis (sometimes called clickstream analytics) is the process of collecting, analyzing, and reporting aggregate data about which pages visitors visit in what order - which are the result of the succession of mouse clicks each visitor makes (that is, the clickstream). There are two levels of clickstream analysis, traffic analysis and e-commerce analysis. Traffic analysis operates at the server level by collecting clickstream data related to the path the user takes when navigating through the site. Traffic analysis tracks how many pages are served to the user, how long it takes pages to load, how often the user hits the browser's back or stop button, and how much data is transmitted before a user moves on. E-commerce-based analysis uses clickstream data to determine the effectiveness of the site as a channel-to-market by quantifying the user's behavior while on the Web site. It is used to keep track of what pages the user lingers on, what the user puts in or takes out of their shopping cart, and what items the user purchases. Because a large volume of data can be gathered through clickstream analysis, many e-businesses rely on pre-programmed applications to help interpret the data and generate reports on specific areas of interest. Clickstream analysis is considered to be most effective when used in conjunction with other, more traditional, market evaluation resources.

What is clickstream analysis?

Clickstreams, also known as clickpaths, are the route that visitors choose when clicking or navigating through a site. A clickstream is a list of all the pages viewed by a visitor, presented in the order the pages were viewed, also defined as the succession of mouse clicks that each visitor makes. A clickstream will show you when and where a person came in to a site, all the pages viewed, the time spent on each page, and when and where they left. Taken all together, as aggregated statistics, clickstream info will tell you, on average, how long people spend on your site, and how often they return. It will also tell you which pages are the most frequently viewed. An interactive clickstream is a graphic representation of a clickstream; a list of pages seen in the order in which they were visited. The graphic allows you to click on the pages, and see what the visitor saw, hence the label 'interactive'. The most obvious reason for examining clickstreams is to extract specific information about what people are doing on your site. Examining individual clickstreams will give you the information you need to make content-related decisions without guessing.

There is a wealth of information to be analyzed, you can examine visitor clickstreams in conjunction with any of the information provided by a good stats program: visit durations, search terms, ISPs, countries, browsers, etc. The process will give you insight into what your visitors are thinking. Examples of questions answered by clickstream analysis: Q: What are people who enter my site with specific search terms doing when they get there? A: Clickstream analysis will answer this question, and give you the opportunity to identify the search terms that are the most valuable for your site, by actually telling you how they perform. For example, if you sell widgets, and notice that a lot of people type in blue widgets but leave without buying any, then you need to figure out why. Clickstream analysis will tell you where they come in, what they look at, and where they leave. It is up to you to figure out why they leave (also known as shopping cart abandonment). Maybe its because you dont sell the particular model of widget they are after, which you may be able to see from the search term they entered. You might also find, for example, notice that the visitors who are leaving all have screen resolutions of 800 x 600. Therefore, if you re-design your product display page, your visitors will be able to see the product pictures more easily.

Q: Why is my site not giving me the results I expect? A: Perhaps you have a newsletter, and you would like your visitors to sign up, but nobody is signing up. Clickstream analysis will allow you to re-enact visitor click-streams. This ability to see exactly what your visitors see, and the order in which they see it, is great way to trouble shoot. You might notice for example, that most visitors only spend a few seconds on the newsletter sign-up page, or the page before it. The information that nobody spends any time on a page tells you that an update is necessary. It tells you whether or not you are including the correct amount of information on your pages. This is a crucial aspect of any website.

Opentrackers clickstream analysis tool.

Our clickstream analysis gives you access to visitor clickstreams live, in real-time, while they are happening. If you login to our demo now, you will be able to see your own clickstream through our site (as you read this!) by going to visitors online. We have built an interactive tool that lets you see all the visitors on your site in real-time, those both online and offline. Every visitor is represented by an icon. If you click on any visitors icon, you will see a graphic representation of their clickstream. You will also see that visitors profile, which consists of their country of origin, their ISP, technical specs, the frequency of visits they have made to your site, the search engine and search terms that they might have used. You will

also know if they are a first-time visitor, and view the details of their visit, i.e. the times they entered and left. From all this information, it is possible to extrapolate any number of conclusions and understandings of what visitors are doing

Clickstream
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia Jump to: navigation, search This article includes a list of references, but its sources remain unclear because it has insufficient inline citations. Please help to improve this article by introducing more precise citations. (February 2008)

A clickstream is the recording of the parts of the screen a computer user clicks on while web browsing or using another software application. As the user clicks anywhere in the webpage or application, the action is logged on a client or inside the web server, as well as possibly the web browser, router, proxy server or ad server. Clickstream analysis is useful for web activity analysis,[1] software testing, market research, and for analyzing employee productivity.

Contents

1 Overview 2 See also 3 References 4 External links

Overview
A small observation on the evolution of clickstream tracking: Initial clickstream or click path data had to be gleaned from server log files. Because human and machine traffic were not differentiated, the study of human clicks took a substantial effort. Subsequently Javascript technologies were developed which use a tracking cookie to generate a series of signals from browsers. In other words, information was only collected from "real humans" clicking on sites through browsers. A clickstream is a series of page requests, every page requested generates a signal. These signals can be graphically represented for clickstream reporting. The main point of clickstream tracking is to give webmasters insight into what visitors on their site are doing.

This data itself is "neutral" in the sense that any dataset is neutral. The data can be used in various scenarios, one of which is marketing. Additionally, any webmaster, researcher, blogger or person with a website can learn about how to improve their site. Use of clickstream data can raise privacy concerns, especially since some Internet service providers have resorted to selling users' clickstream data as a way to enhance revenue. There are 10-12 companies that purchase this data, typically for about $0.40/month per user.[2] While this practice may not directly identify individual users, it is often possible to indirectly identify specific users, an example being the AOL search data scandal. Most consumers are unaware of this practice, and its potential for compromising their privacy. In addition, few ISPs publicly admit to this practice.[3] Since the business world is quickly evolving into a state of e-commerce, analyzing the data of clients that visit a company website is becoming a necessity in order to remain competitive. This analysis can be used to generate two findings for the company, the first being an analysis of a users clickstream while using a website to reveal usage patterns, which in turn gives a heightened understanding of customer behaviour. This use of the analysis creates a user profile that aids in understanding the types of people that visit a companys website. As discussed in Van den Poel & Buckinx (2005), clickstream analysis can be used to predict whether a customer is likely to purchase from an e-commerce website. Clickstream analysis can also be used to improve customer satisfaction with the website and with the company itself. Both of these uses generate a huge business advantage. It can also be used to assess the effectiveness of advertising on a web page or site.[4] With the growing corporate knowledge of the importance of clickstreams, the way that they are being monitored and used to build Business Intelligence is evolving. Data mining,[5] columnoriented DBMS, and integrated OLAP systems are being used in conjunction with clickstreams to better record and analyze this data. Clickstreams can also be used to allow the user to see where they have been and allow them to easily return to a page they have already visited, a function that is already incorporated in most browsers. Unauthorized clickstream data collection is considered to be spyware. However, authorized clickstream data collection comes from organizations that use opt-in panels to generate market research using panelists who agree to share their clickstream data with other companies by downloading and installing specialized clickstream collection agents.