confusion with web stats

rosyposy

im probably in the wrong place so u can tell me to feck off or point me in the right direction

Have just set up a new photography business and launched the website,but am confused by all the terminology when looking at the web visits and hits etc,anyone shed some light?

Whats the diference between hits,visitors,genuine visitors?
Thanks a mill!

axer

• Hit - A request for a file from the web server. Available only in log analysis. The number of hits received by a website is frequently cited to assert its popularity, but this number is extremely misleading and dramatically over-estimates popularity. A single web-page typically consists of multiple (often dozens) of discrete files, each of which is counted as a hit as the page is downloaded, so the number of hits is really an arbitrary number more reflective of the complexity of individual pages on the website than the website's actual popularity. The total number of visitors or page views provides a more realistic and accurate assessment of popularity.
• Page View - A request for a file whose type is defined as a page in log analysis. An occurrence of the script being run in page tagging. In log analysis, a single page view may generate multiple hits as all the resources required to view the page (images, .js and .css files) are also requested from the web server.
• Visit / Session - A series of requests from the same uniquely identified client with a set timeout. A visit is expected to contain multiple hits (in log analysis) and page views.
• First Visit / First Session - A visit from a visitor who has not made any previous visits.
• Visitor / Unique Visitor/UniqueUser - The uniquely identified client generating requests on the web server (log analysis) or viewing pages (page tagging) within a defined time period (i.e. day, week or month). A Unique Visitor counts once within the timescale. A visitor can make multiple visits. N.B. The Unique User is now the only mandatory metric for an ABCe audit URL="http://www.e-consultancy.com/news-blog/362305/unique-user-metric-replaces-the-page-impression-says-abce.html"][3][/URL.
• Repeat Visitor - A visitor that has made at least one previous visit. The period between the last and current visit is called visitor recency and is measured in days.
• New Visitor - A visitor that has not made any previous visits. This definition creates a certain amount of confusion (see common confusions below), and is sometimes substituted with analysis of first visits.

All taken from here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Web_analytics

rosyposy

Thanks a mill