I have a quick question. How accurate is Google Analytics? The reason I am asking is in my GA it says for last month I had 2800 visits with 12K page views. But when I look in my cpanel logs it says I had 3800 visits and 33K page views. I always assumed GA would be off by a little but this much? WTH?

GA's data is more relevant for marketers:

GA uses client side code to track, log files contain only server side info. (Winner: GA)

GA doesn't track spiders and bots, Log files record every time a file is requested. (Winner: GA)

GA records cached page views (ie, if you hit the back button). Log files don't cause there isn't a server request. (Winner: GA)

GA uses cookies to track visitors while log files use IP addresses...which isn't as accurate cause multiple users can share an IP. (Winner: GA)

GA does not track traffic that doesnt have javascript enabled. GA measures trends much better than it measures exact numbers. I actually prefer it this way though do you really care what robots/spiders are on your site? Other sources of errors are session cookies expiring and such but you can change these.

Thanks for the explanations guys. That makes sense.

Just for those interested - there will be a webinar organized by google on November 16 called 'getting your business on google+'. Might be interesting: http://adwords.blogspot.com/ found the link in here.

IRT to PR releases online we did one a while back and it seems to have stuck quite well:

http://www.google.co.uk/search?gcx=c...w=1680&bih=925

Overall happy with it, I probably would recommend people try it if you have the budget for it but if it's not working don't pump lots of money into it.

Jeff Atwood did a good question on Webmaster Exchange which is worth reading:
http://webmasters.stackexchange.com/...es-to-visitors

Ok - 1st press release update. Press release was sent out early Tuesday am (so just over 24 hours ago).

I got an emailed report telling me where it had been posting and I was able to confirm that. I will post a sample list at the bottom of this post. I also got 1 almost instant google alert when it was posted (so 1 of them at least was instantly seen by Google).

As a reminder, the release was kind of geared towards New Year's Resolutions - so hopefully any write ups will occur over the next month.

In the last 24-ish hours, I have had ~13 visits that I can track as coming specifically from this press release and have had 2 accounts created (1 validated and used the site (started a mission) and 1 did not validate)

Not a great result for day 1 in terms of generating traffic in my opinion, but we'll see where it goes from here.

I also got 1 random email from some PHD dude who has business in the 'habit changing' field who sent me a "I think you've got a great idea" type email.

Sample of places the release was posted - others are more or less like this (lots of city news papers, etc):
Atlanta Business Chronicle 263,000 Visitors/day *

Austin American-Statesman (Austin, Tx

Baltimore Business Journal 263,000 Visitors/day *

Birmingham Business Journal 263,000 Visitors/day *

Bolsamania (Web Financial Group)

Boston Business Journal 263,000 Visitors/day *

Boston Globe 634,000 Visitors/day *

Business First of Buffalo 263,000 Visitors/day *

Business First of Columbus 263,000 Visitors/day *

Business First of Louisville 263,000 Visitors/day *

Business Journal of Greater Milwaukee 263,000 Visitors/day *

Thanks for the info.

uhhhh

Hey guys, I'm going to promote a phone/online English private tutoring service to Latin Americans using SEM/Facebook. I'll have Spanish ads and landing pages. Any suggested reading materials/tips? I know a bit about SEO, but very little about SEM/FB marketing. We're going to hire three tutors and have sessions between 30 mins to 1 hr long. I want to get them 140 hours a month each fully booked in the soonest possible timeframe after we launch. If I get this wrong and we have massively negative ROI on our ads, I'll be out of a job pretty quickly, so it's quite important to me.

In particular, I know that there is heavy demand for this service in Latin America, but I'm not sure what to research in order to target the right demographic with Facebook ads. I also don't know whether it's mostly businesses or consumers looking for this service.

seomoz.org is pretty much the most complete source I have found for SEO. Use search to find topics you are curious about as you discover more. I dont think you can just decide how you are going to market online before you test it, FB marketing may or may not be effective. Be aware you are choosing two completely different marketing methods so you are adding more to the learning curve. The FB marketers I know are very graphically inclined and SEO's are much more technical.

Cool thanks. The issue I have with SEO is I feel like it will take too long to show results, and I need to generate them quickly.. Long term ROI may be higher with SEO (not sure), but SEM/FB you can just throw a chunk of money at it and see very quick results.

This is why I say you cannot decide which marketing medium you are going to use without testing. SEO can payoff immediately, I have started projects and received 3k uniques in the first month and 5k uniques a month average in the first 5 months without a team or much work beyond content and some projects where we barely got 100 in 60 days organic with a ton of content. You cannot make this kind of decision without testing and knowledge IMO. Run little tests as things prove effective dedicate more and more resources as it makes sense to the business, every single situation is different and your budget has a huge effect on what you can do.

Alex23, for SEM have a look at Trada.com. It can be hard to compete if you're a SEM noob. Trada crowdsource SEM experts and have them do the work for you. I have not used this service myself but it seems like an interesting solution.

I found out about this service via the This Week In Startups show when the Founder and CEO of Trada Neil Robertson was a guest some time last year. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9uV36J3DnuI

Also, 1+ on Seomoz.org

Thanks guys. Yeah, if I'm going to get beaten up on by more experienced guys then I shouldn't manage it myself to start with.

A guy that I've referred 2x $5000 website projects to has referred me a client that I'll be doing some SEM work for (like $2k set up + $1k/month). When they gave me the referral they mentioned something about some referral "bonus", but it wasn't discussed in depth. Should I feel obligated to pay them anything for the referral and if so how much? They're not doing any work. And if they do any work on this case they'll be paid for it by the client.

Did you receive anything for referring to 5k clients to them?

If not, I would'nt be happy paying a referral and I would throw that into the mix when it gets brought up again

Haha I wouldnt have expected that out of you Mr BB you still interested in joining my team or are babies taking up all your time?

You know it...i'll prob join you starting Monday...got a couple things to take care of first to open up some time

First of all a lot of good information in this thread, really got me excited about starting a website!
I was wondering though, where can I get those big overlapping ads that you sometimes see on big game sites. Like an ad that shows off a game like modern warfare 3 or like with eurogamer right now skyrim.

I think usually those are for high volume websites where they set up special deals. I've never seen them really on normal websites, could be wrong though.

Anyone care to give their thoughts on High PR Networks. I am not talking about BMR or the like. but private ones.

Read this book before you spend another $1 on adwords. http://www.amazon.com/Ultimate-Guide...dp_ob_title_bk

If your conversion rate is 10% and you're spending $3 a click, that's $30 a conversion.

If the average user stays subscribed for 6 months, that's $60 revenues.

$60 revenues - $30 advertising = $30 revenues net of advertising expense.

That said, I'm sure you can find more specific phrases in the $0.15-$0.50 range, that will probably convert at higher rates.

Higher Click Through Rates move you up higher on the results and lower your costs per click, as Google rewards ads that are most relevant to the users.