Minty Goodness: Session Tracker And Friends
I’ve been using Mint for a few months now and am fully addicted to it. I’ve used other stat tracking software before, but I’ve never had so much fun! And just when I thought things couldn’t get better for Mint, a dude by the name of Beau Collins released a great Pepper called Session Tracker.
As you probably assume, Session Tracker records the path of your visitors… in real time. Not only where they’ve been on your site – but how they got there, how long they spent on each page and now thanks to Download Counter and Outclicks, what they downloaded while on your site and where they went when they left. It also shows you how many people are currently on your site. Seriously good stuff!
I was pretty stoked on Session Tracker from the get-go. But now I’m just plain hooked! Let’s take a look at an example of just how valuable this can be, shall we?
So, what do I know about this user? He/she…
- Made 5 hits while on my site (page loads or downloads).
- Spent a total of 7 minutes and 8 seconds on my site.
- Came from a message board at xbox-sky.com (clicking the url takes you to the exact page they came from).
- Spent 21 seconds reading Xbox 360 Controller For Windows: Review before moving on to Configuring Your Xbox 360 Controller For Windows.
- Spent 2 minutes and 56 seconds reading before click on this screenshot.
- Returned to read for another 3 minutes and 6 seconds before downloading the Xbox Imageguide I created.
- Viewed this screenshot.
- Returned to read for another 45 seconds.
How fucking cool is that?
I’m sure some of you are thinking this is a little too much information to be collecting from every user. But you need to look at it from a site owner’s perspective. My Configuring Your Xbox 360 Controller For Windows article was my first (and only at this point) ‘how to’ guide. I did something even more out of the ordinary by attaching a file I hoped would help others who found themselves in the same boat. If you take a look at the post, there’s only 6 comments and 2 of them are me. One might think this post was failure and that there’s little to no interest on the subject. But thanks to my good friend Mint and his buddy Pepper, I know this is hardly the case. I’ve been getting hits from gaming message boards all over the place, including GameSpot, IGN and Eurogramer. I’m getting even more hits from all of the top search engines. And the Imageguide (which would be of use to only those that own the controller) has been downloaded over 300 times. Needless to say, I’m glad I spent the time setting up the Imageguide… and writing the article, for that matter. It’s currently my most popular post – 2 weeks running.
It you don’t already have a good stats reporting tool and could benefit from one, I’d definitely recommend Mint. As I said, I’ve tried tons but nothing has satisfied me the way Mint has… and that sounds just plain dirty!