Track Your Visitors in Real-Time with StatCounter.com

With StatCounter.com, you are given a free, reliable and invisible way to track your visitors in real-time. Unlike Google Analytics which updates once a day, StatCounter allows you to see data about your web site as it actually happens.

As the web site states, you can get your own StatCounter setup in four easy steps. After you register an account, you create a "project" for the web site you want to track. After entering a few details about your web site, StatCounter gives you a simple piece of code to paste into your source file. Unlike many free web counters, StatCounter is invisible and will not show any kind of meter or advertisements on your web site. As soon as you have updated your source file with the StatCounter code, you can start viewing the traffic information and data about your web site.

Overall, StatCounter provides a lot of data about your web site, ranging from popular pages to visit length to keyword analysis. If you are skeptical about the service or simply want to see it for yourself, you can try out the free demo. This web-based demo shows exactly what kind of data StatCounter is capable of tracking. Also, if there is a specific feature that you want to know about, StatCounter provides a comprehensive glossary of each and every feature.

Although you can access all of StatCounter's features for free, they also several levels of monthly paid subscriptions. The following is a breakdown of what you receive at each pricing level:




In closing, I think StatCounter, whether in the form of a free account or paid subscription, is a great compliment to programs like Google Analytics. I have found that StatCounter can come in extremely useful when you find yourself in a situation such as having an article hit the front page of Digg, because it allows you to monitor what's happening to your web site in real-time, which in turn can help you make any decisions about optimizing content for a specific situation or ensuring that your system can handle the sudden surge.