Log Analysis to improve your website!
Web server log analyzers take information about every single request, the who, what, and when and provide detailed reports on it. You cannot, however, draw conclusions about what path a single visitor took to get to a web page, unless the visitor started their browsing session of your site there.
Log analyzers based on browser actions can provide information on what paths, how long, and which buttons a visitor to you site used. There is powerful information in either approach or in combining them, if you know how to use it, and what to do with it.
The key is A – B Testing. In this type of testing, we create two different versions: Versions of content, versions of paths, versions of offers.
As an example, imagine an ecommerce site selling fuzzy pink dice. Write two different versions of the sales copy. Post one. Let the world react to it for a time. Then swap in the other version. Let the world react to it for a similar amount of time. Which one kept visitors on the page longer? Which one converted better? There’s the winner!
Now rewrite the copy again. Perform another A – B test. Repeat until you’re happy with the results.
It’s not just copy that can benefit from A – B testing. Any page element can. Buttons, page design, color selection will all benefit from testing and analysis.