April Statporn

After all the froth created by blogging traffic figures last month, let me now be clear where I stand. This may be boring to most but it is important to get it on the record. Up until recently I used a stats tracking package called Extreme Tracking. They provide two statistics - page loads and what they call Unique Visitors. Their term, not mine. A few months ago I started using Google Analytics. They use three measures - Page Loads, what they call Unique Visits and then Absolute Unique Visitors. Because the numbers for Extreme's Unique Visitors and Google Analytics Unique Visits were almost identical I did not change the terminology in my monthly roundups. As I said last month, I now regard Absolute Unique Visitors as the most reliable measure, as this tracks everyone who visits the blog at least once a month.

That's the factual bit out of the way, but I wish to make clear that I have never inflated my traffic. I don't need to. If I have ever made a mistake it is not to understand fully the difference between Unique Visitors and Unique Visits - which seems to be something that Extreme Tracking themselves do not quite understand, so I think I can be forgiven for that. Anyway, I'm not intending to repoen any discussion on this and won't be commenting on it again. So, to April's figures from Google Analytics...

Absolute Unique Visitors
April 2008 61,008 - April 2007 36,642 - March 2008 53,255

Visits
April 2008 272,169 - April 2007 209,035 - March 2008 - 239,368

Page Loads
April 2008 414,848 April 2007 236,150 - March 2008 357,353

Here are my top 20 linking sites (ie incoming hits) for March, according to Google Analytics.

1. +1 Guido Fawkes 16,510 (12,724)
2. -1 ConservativeHome 14,191 (14,980)
3. +1 PoliticalBetting 6,700 (5,368)
4. +1 Spectator Coffee House 6,257 (4,421)
5. +1 Dizzy Thinks 4,576 (3,049)
6. -3 Daniel Finkelstein & Red Box 3,757 (6,668)
7. - Politics Home 3,165 (New)
8. -1 NHS Blog Doctor 1,912 (1,508)
9. +1 Ben Brogan 1,529 (1,188)
10. -2 Boulton & Co 1,512 (1,483)
11. -2 Bloggerheads 1,314 (1,397)
12. - Telegraph Blogs 1,112 (798)
13. +4 Devil's Kitchen 1,103 (711)
14. - LabourHome 854 (NEW)
15. -1 Biased BBC 754 (793)
16. -1 Burning our Money 732 (783)
17. -1 Archbishop Cranmer 669 (783)
18. - Little Man in a Toque 632 (NEW)
19. - Tim Worstall 611 (NEW)
20. -9 Recess Monkey 560 (931)

Dropping out are Chris Paul , Daily Referendum, Paul Linford and Tom Watson.