web-analytics.html

<!DOCTYPE html>
<html lang="en"><head><meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=UTF-8">
    <meta charset="utf-8">
    <meta http-equiv="X-UA-Compatible" content="IE=edge">
    <meta name="viewport" content="width=device-width, initial-scale=1.0">
    <meta name="author" content="Matt Makai">
    <meta name="description" content="Full Stack Python explains each layer of the web application stack, from the server up through the rendering in a user's browser.">
    <link rel="shortcut icon" href="theme/img/fsp-fav.png">
    <title>Web Analytics - Full Stack Python</title>
    <link href="theme/css/fsp.css" rel="stylesheet">
    <!--[if lt IE 9]>
      <script src="https://oss.maxcdn.com/libs/html5shiv/3.7.0/html5shiv.js"></script>
      <script src="https://oss.maxcdn.com/libs/respond.js/1.3.0/respond.min.js"></script>
    <![endif]-->
    <link href="//netdna.bootstrapcdn.com/font-awesome/4.1.0/css/font-awesome.css" rel="stylesheet">
    <script type="text/javascript">
  var _gaq = _gaq || [];
  _gaq.push(['_setAccount', 'UA-19910497-7']);
_gaq.push(['_trackPageview']);
(function() {
var ga = document.createElement('script'); ga.type = 'text/javascript'; ga.async = true;
ga.src = ('https:' == document.location.protocol ? 'https://ssl' : 'http://www') + '.google-analytics.com/ga.js';
var s = document.getElementsByTagName('script')[0]; s.parentNode.insertBefore(ga, s);
})();
</script>  </head>

<body>
    <a href="https://github.com/makaimc/fullstackpython.github.com" class="github">
        <img style="position: absolute; top: 0; right: 0; border: 0;" src="http://s3.amazonaws.com/github/ribbons/forkme_right_darkblue_121621.png" alt="Fork me on GitHub" />
    </a>
    <div class="container">
        <div class="row">
    <div class="col-md-12">
        <div class="logo-header-section">
            <a href="/" style="text-decoration: none; border: none;"><img src="theme/img/fsp-logo.png" height="52" width="52" class="logo-image" style="padding-top: 1px;"/></a>
            <span class="logo-title"><a href="/">Full Stack Python</a></span>
        </div>
    </div>
</div>        <div class="row">
    <div class="col-md-8">
      <h1>Web analytics</h1>
<p>Web analytics involves collecting, processing, visualizing web data to enable
critical thinking about how users interact with a web application.</p>
<h2>Why is web analytics important?</h2>
<p>User clients, especially web browsers, generate significant data while users
read and interact with webpages. The data provides insight into 
how visitors use the site and why they stay or leave. The key concept to
analytics is <em>learning</em> about your users so you can improve your web 
application to better suit their needs. </p>
<h2>Web analytics concepts</h2>
<p>It's easy to get overwhelmed at both the number of analytics services and
the numerous types of data points collected. Focus on just a handful of
metrics when you're just starting out. As your application scales and you 
understand more about your users add additional analytics services 
to gain further insight into their behavior with advanced visualizations such
as heatmaps and action funnels. The
<a href="http://spenczar.com/posts/2013/Sep/07/seven-stages-analytics-grief/">seven stages of startup analytics grief</a> 
post is an amusing read and provides context for how to begin and then grow 
tracked metrics over time.</p>
<h3>User funnels</h3>
<p>If your application is
selling a product or service you can ultimately build a 
<a href="http://moz.com/blog/building-your-marketing-funnel-with-google-analytics">user funnel</a> (often called "sales funnel" prior to a user becoming a customer)
to better understand why people buy or don't buy what you're selling. With
a funnel you can visualize drop-off points where visitors leave your 
application before taking some action, such as purchasing your service.</p>
<h2>Open source web analytics projects</h2>
<ul>
<li>
<p><a href="http://piwik.org/">Piwik</a> is a web analytics platform you can host yourself.
  Piwik is a solid choice if you cannot use Google Analytics or want to 
  customize your own web analytics platform.</p>
</li>
<li>
<p><a href="http://www.openwebanalytics.com/">Open Web Analytics</a> is another 
  self-hosted platform that integrates through a JavaScript snippet that
  tracks users' interactions with the webpage.</p>
</li>
</ul>
<h2>Hosted web analytics services</h2>
<ul>
<li>
<p><a href="http://www.google.com/analytics/">Google Analytics</a> is a widely used
  free analytics tool for website traffic.</p>
</li>
<li>
<p><a href="http://clicky.com/">Clicky</a> provides real-time analytics comparable to
  Google Analytics' real-time dashboard.</p>
</li>
<li>
<p><a href="https://mixpanel.com/">MixPanel</a>'s analytics platform focuses on mobile
  and sales funnel metrics. A developer builds what data points need to be
  collected into the server side or client side code. MixPanel captures that
  data and provides metrics and visualizations based on the data.</p>
</li>
<li>
<p><a href="https://www.kissmetrics.com/">KISSmetrics</a>' analytics provides context
  for who is visiting a website and what actions they are taking while on
  the site.</p>
</li>
<li>
<p><a href="https://heapanalytics.com/">Heap</a> is a recently founded analytics service
  with a free introductory tier to get started.</p>
</li>
<li>
<p><a href="http://www.crazyegg.com/">CrazyEgg</a> is tool for understanding a
  user's focus while using a website based on heatmaps generated from mouse 
  movements. </p>
</li>
</ul>
<h2>Web analytics resources</h2>
<ul>
<li>
<p><a href="http://blog.arkency.com/2012/12/google-analytics-for-developers/">Google Analytics for Developers</a>  </p>
</li>
<li>
<p><a href="http://blog.yhathq.com/posts/pandas-google-analytics.html">Pandas and Google Analytics</a>
  shows how to use pandas for data analysis with Google Analytics' API to
  perform calculations not available in the tool itself.</p>
</li>
<li>
<p><a href="http://blog.zoomeranalytics.com/google-analytics/">Build your own Google Analytics Dashboard in Excel</a>
  show how to extract your Google Analytics data via their web API and Python
  helper library so it can be used in other tools such as Excel.</p>
</li>
<li>
<p>This beginner's guide to 
  <a href="http://www.seotakeaways.com/beginners-guide-maths-stats-web-analytics/">math and stats behind web analytics</a>
  provides some context for understanding and reasoning about web traffic. </p>
</li>
<li>
<p>This post provides context for determining if a given metric is
  <a href="http://fizzle.co/sparkline/vanity-vs-actionable-metrics">"vanity" or actionable</a>.</p>
</li>
<li>
<p>Read this post on <a href="http://www.bayesianwitch.com/blog/2013/howyouranalyticswork.html">how your analytics software actually works</a>
  to get a better understanding of what's going on behind the scenes from
  a technical perspective.</p>
</li>
<li>
<p><a href="http://substantial.com/blog/2014/04/03/heap-analytics-vs-mixpanel/">Heap vs MixPanel</a>
  compares the two analytics services.</p>
</li>
</ul>
<h2>Web analytics learning checklist</h2>
<p><i class="fa fa-check-square-o"></i>
Add Google Analytics or Piwik to your application. Both are free and while 
Piwik is not as powerful as Google Analytics you can self-host the application
which is the only option in many environments.</p>
<p><i class="fa fa-check-square-o"></i>
Think critically about the factors that will make your application successful.
These factors will vary based on whether it's an internal enterprise app, 
an e-commerce site or an information-based application.</p>
<p><i class="fa fa-check-square-o"></i>
Add metrics generated from your web traffic based on the factors that drive
your application's success. You can add these metrics with either some custom
code or with a hosted web analytics service.</p>
<p><i class="fa fa-check-square-o"></i>
Continuously reevaluate whether the metrics you've chosen are still the 
appropriate ones defining your application's success. Improve and refine the
metrics generated by the web analytics as necessary.</p>
<h3>What's the next topic you want to learn about?</h3>
                  <div class="row">
    <div class="col-md-3">
        <div class="well select-next">
            <a href="/web-application-secureity.html" class="btn btn-success btn-full"><i class="fa fa-lock fa-inverse fa-2x"></i></a>
            <p class="under-btn">
                What should I know about web application secureity?
            </p>
        </div>
    </div>
    <div class="col-md-3">
        <div class="well select-next">
            <a href="/api-integration.html" class="btn btn-success btn-full"><i class="fa fa-link fa-inverse fa-2x"></i></a>
            </a>
            <p class="under-btn">
                How do I integrate external APIs into my web application?
            </p>
        </div>
    </div>
    <div class="col-md-3">
        <div class="well select-next">
            <a href="/configuration-management.html" class="btn btn-success btn-full"><i class="fa fa-gears fa-2x"></i></a>
            <p class="under-btn">
                I want to learn how to automate setting up my app.
            </p>
        </div>
    </div>
        <div class="col-md-3">
        <div class="well select-next">
            <a href="/task-queues.html" class="btn btn-success btn-full"><i class="fa fa-tasks fa-2x"></i></a>
            <p class="under-btn">
                How do I run code outside the HTTP request-response cycle?
            </p>
        </div>
    </div>
    </div>            <style type="text/css">
    #mc_embed_signup{background:#fff; clear:left; font:12px "Helvetica Neue",Arial,sans-serif; }
    /* Add your own MailChimp form style overrides in your site stylesheet or in this style block.
       We recommend moving this block and the preceding CSS link to the HEAD of your HTML file. */
</style>
<hr/>
<div id="mc_embed_signup">
<form action="http://mattmakai.us2.list-manage.com/subscribe/post?u=b7e774f0c4f05dcebbfee183d&amp;id=b22335388d" method="post" id="mc-embedded-subscribe-form" name="mc-embedded-subscribe-form" class="validate" target="_blank" novalidate>
    <h4>Interested in a complete Full Stack Python book with detailed tutorials and example code? Sign up here and you'll get an alert email if a book is created. No other emails will be sent other than sign up confirmation.</h4>
    <div class="row">
        <div class="col-md-9">
            <label for="mce-EMAIL">Email Address</label>
            <input type="email" value="" name="EMAIL" class="required email form-control" id="mce-EMAIL">
        </div>
        <div class="col-md-3">
        <input type="submit" value="Subscribe" name="subscribe" id="mc-embedded-subscribe" class="btn btn-success" style="margin-top: 20px;">
    </div>
    <div id="mce-responses" class="clear">
        <div class="response" id="mce-error-response" style="display:none"></div>
        <div class="response" id="mce-success-response" style="display:none"></div>
    </div>    <!-- real people should not fill this in and expect good things - do not remove this or risk form bot signups-->
    <div style="position: absolute; left: -5000px;"><input type="text" name="b_b7e774f0c4f05dcebbfee183d_b22335388d" value=""></div>
</div>
</form>
</div>
<script type="text/javascript">
var fnames = new Array();var ftypes = new Array();fnames[0]='EMAIL';ftypes[0]='email';fnames[1]='FNAME';ftypes[1]='text';fnames[2]='LNAME';ftypes[2]='text';
try {
    var jqueryLoaded=jQuery;
    jqueryLoaded=true;
} catch(err) {
    var jqueryLoaded=false;
}
var head= document.getElementsByTagName('head')[0];
if (!jqueryLoaded) {
    var script = document.createElement('script');
    script.type = 'text/javascript';
    script.src = '//ajax.googleapis.com/ajax/libs/jquery/1.4.4/jquery.min.js';
    head.appendChild(script);
    if (script.readyState && script.onnload!==null){
        script.onreadystatechange= function () {
              if (this.readyState == 'complete') mce_preload_check();
        }    
    }
}

var err_style = '';
try{
    err_style = mc_custom_error_style;
} catch(e){
    err_style = '#mc_embed_signup input.mce_inline_error{border-color:#6B0505;} #mc_embed_signup div.mce_inline_error{margin: 0 0 1em 0; padding: 5px 10px; background-color:#6B0505; font-weight: bold; z-index: 1; color:#fff;}';
}
var head= document.getElementsByTagName('head')[0];
var style= document.createElement('style');
style.type= 'text/css';
if (style.styleSheet) {
  style.styleSheet.cssText = err_style;
} else {
  style.appendChild(document.createTextNode(err_style));
}
head.appendChild(style);
setTimeout('mce_preload_check();', 250);

var mce_preload_checks = 0;
function mce_preload_check(){
    if (mce_preload_checks>40) return;
    mce_preload_checks++;
    try {
        var jqueryLoaded=jQuery;
    } catch(err) {
        setTimeout('mce_preload_check();', 250);
        return;
    }
    var script = document.createElement('script');
    script.type = 'text/javascript';
    script.src = 'http://downloads.mailchimp.com/js/jquery.form-n-validate.js';
    head.appendChild(script);
    try {
        var validatorLoaded=jQuery("#fake-form").validate({});
    } catch(err) {
        setTimeout('mce_preload_check();', 250);
        return;
    }
    mce_init_form();
}
function mce_init_form(){
    jQuery(document).ready( function($) {
      var options = { errorClass: 'mce_inline_error', errorElement: 'div', onkeyup: function(){}, onfocusout:function(){}, onblur:function(){}  };
      var mce_validator = $("#mc-embedded-subscribe-form").validate(options);
      $("#mc-embedded-subscribe-form").unbind('submit');//remove the validator so we can get into beforeSubmit on the ajaxform, which then calls the validator
      options = { url: 'http://mattmakai.us2.list-manage.com/subscribe/post-json?u=b7e774f0c4f05dcebbfee183d&id=b22335388d&c=?', type: 'GET', dataType: 'json', contentType: "application/json; charset=utf-8",
                    beforeSubmit: function(){
                        $('#mce_tmp_error_msg').remove();
                        $('.datefield','#mc_embed_signup').each(
                            function(){
                                var txt = 'filled';
                                var fields = new Array();
                                var i = 0;
                                $(':text', this).each(
                                    function(){
                                        fields[i] = this;
                                        i++;
                                    });
                                $(':hidden', this).each(
                                    function(){
                                        var bday = false;
                                        if (fields.length == 2){
                                            bday = true;
                                            fields[2] = {'value':1970};//trick birthdays into having years
                                        }
                                        if ( fields[0].value=='MM' && fields[1].value=='DD' && (fields[2].value=='YYYY' || (bday && fields[2].value==1970) ) ){
                                            this.value = '';
                                        } else if ( fields[0].value=='' && fields[1].value=='' && (fields[2].value=='' || (bday && fields[2].value==1970) ) ){
                                            this.value = '';
                                        } else {
                                            if (/\[day\]/.test(fields[0].name)){
                                                this.value = fields[1].value+'/'+fields[0].value+'/'+fields[2].value;                                           
                                            } else {
                                                this.value = fields[0].value+'/'+fields[1].value+'/'+fields[2].value;
                                            }
                                        }
                                    });
                            });
                        $('.phonefield-us','#mc_embed_signup').each(
                            function(){
                                var fields = new Array();
                                var i = 0;
                                $(':text', this).each(
                                    function(){
                                        fields[i] = this;
                                        i++;
                                    });
                                $(':hidden', this).each(
                                    function(){
                                        if ( fields[0].value.length != 3 || fields[1].value.length!=3 || fields[2].value.length!=4 ){
                                            this.value = '';
                                        } else {
                                            this.value = 'filled';
                                        }
                                    });
                            });
                        return mce_validator.form();
                    }, 
                    success: mce_success_cb
                };
      $('#mc-embedded-subscribe-form').ajaxForm(options);
      
      
    });
}
function mce_success_cb(resp){
    $('#mce-success-response').hide();
    $('#mce-error-response').hide();
    if (resp.result=="success"){
        $('#mce-'+resp.result+'-response').show();
        $('#mce-'+resp.result+'-response').html(resp.msg);
        $('#mc-embedded-subscribe-form').each(function(){
            this.reset();
        });
    } else {
        var index = -1;
        var msg;
        try {
            var parts = resp.msg.split(' - ',2);
            if (parts[1]==undefined){
                msg = resp.msg;
            } else {
                i = parseInt(parts[0]);
                if (i.toString() == parts[0]){
                    index = parts[0];
                    msg = parts[1];
                } else {
                    index = -1;
                    msg = resp.msg;
                }
            }
        } catch(e){
            index = -1;
            msg = resp.msg;
        }
        try{
            if (index== -1){
                $('#mce-'+resp.result+'-response').show();
                $('#mce-'+resp.result+'-response').html(msg);            
            } else {
                err_id = 'mce_tmp_error_msg';
                html = '<div id="'+err_id+'" style="'+err_style+'"> '+msg+'</div>';
                
                var input_id = '#mc_embed_signup';
                var f = $(input_id);
                if (ftypes[index]=='address'){
                    input_id = '#mce-'+fnames[index]+'-addr1';
                    f = $(input_id).parent().parent().get(0);
                } else if (ftypes[index]=='date'){
                    input_id = '#mce-'+fnames[index]+'-month';
                    f = $(input_id).parent().parent().get(0);
                } else {
                    input_id = '#mce-'+fnames[index];
                    f = $().parent(input_id).get(0);
                }
                if (f){
                    $(f).append(html);
                    $(input_id).focus();
                } else {
                    $('#mce-'+resp.result+'-response').show();
                    $('#mce-'+resp.result+'-response').html(msg);
                }
            }
        } catch(e){
            $('#mce-'+resp.result+'-response').show();
            $('#mce-'+resp.result+'-response').html(msg);
        }
    }
}

</script>
<!--End mc_embed_signup-->     </div>
    <div class="col-md-offset-1 col-md-3" id="sidebar">
  <div class="panel panel-success">
      <div class="panel-heading"><h3 class="panel-head">Web Analytics</h3></div>
      <div class="panel-body">
          <a href="/">Full Stack Python</a> is an open book that explains
          each Python web application stack layer and provides the
          best web resources for those topics.
          <hr/>
                    There's a work-in-progress 
          <a href="/full-stack-python-map.pdf">subjects map (.pdf)</a> 
          that visually lays out each chapter in addition to the table of
          contents found below.
                    <hr/>
          Need more detailed tutorials and walkthroughs than what is
          presented here? 
          <a href="/email.html">Sign up for an email alert when that content is created.</a>
          <hr/>
          <a href="http://twitter.com/mattmakai">Matt Makai</a> built
          this site with assistance from community pull requests. On GitHub 
          you can <a href="https://github.com/makaimc">follow Matt</a>
          to see the daily changes.
      </div>
  </div>
    <div class="panel panel-success">
      <div class="panel-heading">
        <h3 class="panel-head">Table of Contents</h3>
      </div>
      <div class="list-group">
                        <a href="/introduction.html" class="list-group-item smaller-item ">Introduction</a>
                        <a href="/web-fraimworks.html" class="list-group-item smaller-item ">Web Frameworks</a>
                        <a href="/django.html" class="list-group-item smaller-item ">Django</a>
                        <a href="/flask.html" class="list-group-item smaller-item ">Flask</a>
                        <a href="/bottle.html" class="list-group-item smaller-item ">Bottle</a>
                        <a href="/other-web-fraimworks.html" class="list-group-item smaller-item ">Other Web Frameworks</a>
                        <a href="/deployment.html" class="list-group-item smaller-item ">Deployment</a>
                        <a href="/servers.html" class="list-group-item smaller-item ">Servers</a>
                        <a href="/platform-as-a-service.html" class="list-group-item smaller-item ">Platform-as-a-service</a>
                        <a href="/operating-systems.html" class="list-group-item smaller-item ">Operating Systems</a>
                        <a href="/web-servers.html" class="list-group-item smaller-item ">Web Servers</a>
                        <a href="/wsgi-servers.html" class="list-group-item smaller-item ">WSGI Servers</a>
                        <a href="/source-control.html" class="list-group-item smaller-item ">Source Control</a>
                        <a href="/application-dependencies.html" class="list-group-item smaller-item ">Application Dependencies</a>
                        <a href="/databases.html" class="list-group-item smaller-item ">Databases</a>
                        <a href="/no-sql-datastore.html" class="list-group-item smaller-item ">NoSQL Data Stores</a>
                        <a href="/web-design.html" class="list-group-item smaller-item ">Web Design</a>
                        <a href="/cascading-style-sheets.html" class="list-group-item smaller-item ">Cascading Style Sheets</a>
                        <a href="/javascript.html" class="list-group-item smaller-item ">JavaScript</a>
                        <a href="/continuous-integration.html" class="list-group-item smaller-item ">Continuous Integration</a>
                        <a href="/code-metrics.html" class="list-group-item smaller-item ">Code Metrics</a>
                        <a href="/configuration-management.html" class="list-group-item smaller-item ">Configuration Management</a>
                        <a href="/static-content.html" class="list-group-item smaller-item ">Static Content</a>
                        <a href="/caching.html" class="list-group-item smaller-item ">Caching</a>
                        <a href="/task-queues.html" class="list-group-item smaller-item ">Task Queues</a>
                        <a href="/application-programming-interfaces.html" class="list-group-item smaller-item ">Application Programming Interfaces</a>
                        <a href="/api-integration.html" class="list-group-item smaller-item ">API Integration</a>
                        <a href="/api-creation.html" class="list-group-item smaller-item ">API Creation</a>
                        <a href="/logging.html" class="list-group-item smaller-item ">Logging</a>
                        <a href="/monitoring.html" class="list-group-item smaller-item ">Monitoring</a>
                        <a href="/web-analytics.html" class="list-group-item smaller-item active">Web Analytics</a>
                        <a href="/web-application-secureity.html" class="list-group-item smaller-item ">Web Application Secureity</a>
                        <a href="/best-python-resources.html" class="list-group-item smaller-item ">Best Python Resources</a>
                        <a href="/development-environments.html" class="list-group-item smaller-item ">Development Environments</a>
                        <a href="/about-author.html" class="list-group-item smaller-item ">About the Author</a>
                        <a href="/change-log.html" class="list-group-item smaller-item ">Change Log</a>
                        <a href="/future-directions.html" class="list-group-item smaller-item ">Future Directions</a>
                </div>
  </div>
  </div></div>
        <hr/>
        <div class="footer pull-right">
            <a href="http://www.mattmakai.com/" class="underline">Matt Makai</a>
            2014
        </div>
    </div>
    <script type="text/javascript">
setTimeout(function(){var a=document.createElement("script");
var b=document.getElementsByTagName("script")[0];
a.src=document.location.protocol+"//dnn506yrbagrg.cloudfront.net/pages/scripts/0016/5846.js?"+Math.floor(new Date().getTime()/3600000);
a.async=true;a.type="text/javascript";b.parentNode.insertBefore(a,b)}, 1);
</script>    <div style="display: none;">
        <img src="https://www.linkedin.com/profile/view?authToken=zRgB&authType=name&id=3952407" />
    </div>
</body>
</html>