Understanding Traffic for Website Buying
When you decide to buy a website, one of the things that you must check is the traffic of the website. Not everybody though understands what traffic is so here are some traffic basics that will hopefully help you in checking the website that you would like to buy.
Before we go any further, it is important to know first the terminologies that are mentioned when discussing traffic. These terminologies are Google Analytics, Visits, Uniques/Visitors, Page Views, Bounce Rate and Average Time on Site.
Google analytics is a free service by Google that generates traffic statistics. In Google Analytics, you can see the traffic that your websites get; in fact this is the one tool that you need in checking the traffic of the website that you will buy.
Visits is the number of times the site was visited. Uniques or Visitors are the number of people that visited the site during a certain period of time. Page Views is the number of times that a page on a website was viewed. Bounce Rate means the percentage of the visitors that exit the site without viewing any other page. Average Time on Site is the measure of time that a visitor spends on viewing any pages within the site.
Now that you are familiar with Traffic terminologies you can accurately check the traffic of the website that you are planning to buy. You can ask the seller to provide you with an access to the site's Google Analytics and check the things mentioned above since traffic is the lifeblood of a website. Even if the website have the best product or offers the best service, but does not have a visitor then that website is meaningless and just a waste of space. Now, there are sites that have traffic, but the next thing to consider is if the traffic that it gets is consistent and sustainable.
A good traffic means a good level of traffic that is consistent everyday and onwards. However, if say there is a site that sells ornaments the traffic for that may be seasonal since it peaks during the Christmas season, as a buyer you have to be aware of that since there are times that the seller will show you the traffic that was gained during that season and not the entire season.
Now, in looking into Google Analytics, do not simply look on a single month, you have to check a 12-month period, to ensure that the traffic is consistent. Now, if a website does not have Google Analytics then you can ask the seller to check and provide you with the logs that one can get through their web hosting provider. Hosting provider usually has logs on website visits.
Before we go any further, it is important to know first the terminologies that are mentioned when discussing traffic. These terminologies are Google Analytics, Visits, Uniques/Visitors, Page Views, Bounce Rate and Average Time on Site.
Google analytics is a free service by Google that generates traffic statistics. In Google Analytics, you can see the traffic that your websites get; in fact this is the one tool that you need in checking the traffic of the website that you will buy.
Visits is the number of times the site was visited. Uniques or Visitors are the number of people that visited the site during a certain period of time. Page Views is the number of times that a page on a website was viewed. Bounce Rate means the percentage of the visitors that exit the site without viewing any other page. Average Time on Site is the measure of time that a visitor spends on viewing any pages within the site.
Now that you are familiar with Traffic terminologies you can accurately check the traffic of the website that you are planning to buy. You can ask the seller to provide you with an access to the site's Google Analytics and check the things mentioned above since traffic is the lifeblood of a website. Even if the website have the best product or offers the best service, but does not have a visitor then that website is meaningless and just a waste of space. Now, there are sites that have traffic, but the next thing to consider is if the traffic that it gets is consistent and sustainable.
A good traffic means a good level of traffic that is consistent everyday and onwards. However, if say there is a site that sells ornaments the traffic for that may be seasonal since it peaks during the Christmas season, as a buyer you have to be aware of that since there are times that the seller will show you the traffic that was gained during that season and not the entire season.
Now, in looking into Google Analytics, do not simply look on a single month, you have to check a 12-month period, to ensure that the traffic is consistent. Now, if a website does not have Google Analytics then you can ask the seller to check and provide you with the logs that one can get through their web hosting provider. Hosting provider usually has logs on website visits.
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