Understanding the Stat feature

gundog

Guys...is there an informative link or sticky that describes what the Stat feature is capturing and how? I know we're not nearly as popular as the stats read and trying to determine what the 'hits' actually mean. OTHER than the brief description in 'Help'. ;-)

Thanks,

gundog

Andy

Right here in the help pages

http://www.smugmug.com/help/acctreport

gundog

Andy...I think you may have posted the wrong link? If you're pointing to the 'help' link...I've been there but it didn't elaborate much on what consititutes a 'hit'. Are my owner views included?

I have some photos in galleries that show 5500 hits and that can't be outsider views.

Just trying to get a better idea of how to use the stats counter as a metric of some type.

Thanks!

MikeMcA²

Hi Andy, One question I have about the "Stats" page is the "Photos Uploaded" section. On my site, it shows 16777215. I gotta check my shutter!

gundog

To better define one question within the big question...I use the Smugmug gallery style. Therefore...about 15 or so photos populate automatically within that gallery when opened. When that gallery IS opened...is that 15 thumbnail hits?

In the Smugmug gallery style - the current photo is usually posted at 'Large' size. If clicking through photo by photo in 'Large size' is that what is considered a 'Large' hit?

What if a viewer browses by page turns instead and only views the thumbs in Smugmug style...is the entire gallery contents recorded as a hit times x?

Thanks much,
Al

denisegoldberg

MikeMcA² wrote:

Hi Andy, One question I have about the "Stats" page is the "Photos Uploaded" section. On my site, it shows 16777215. I gotta check my shutter!

It's a bug....

A search for that number turns up a few posts... http://www.dgrin.com/search.php?searchid=1171404, acknowleged by Andy as a bug.

--- Denise

Andy

gundog: http://www.smugmug.com/help/acctreport

sorry for my linkFAIL

gundog

As stated...had already been there before seeking more info for clarification.

Doesn't seem the Stats feature is all that useful or accurate...was hoping you had a better answer.

Thanks anyway.

Andy

gundog wrote:

As stated...had already been there before seeking more info for clarification.

Doesn't seem the Stats feature is all that useful or accurate...was hoping you had a better answer.

Thanks anyway.

Hi Gun, ok, what's missing

scole

gundog wrote:

To better define one question within the big question...I use the Smugmug gallery style. Therefore...about 15 or so photos populate automatically within that gallery when opened. When that gallery IS opened...is that 15 thumbnail hits?

I recently sent an email to SM's Help to clarify this.

Yes- Thumbnail hits occur when a gallery is visited (I use the default SM Gallery, BTW). Small image views occur when a user clicks on one of the thumbnails & it loads in the space on the right hand side. Obviously, the first photo in your gallery will garner a ton of "small" views.

My bottom line is that I'll pay attention to any views larger than small. At least I know that that a visitor had to actually click on a photo to view it.

Photockie

Stats in control panel summary vs. detail
Right now my control panel stats tab shows

This month > Photos viewed: 10307

But when I click on details and look at the summary I see this

<table style="margin: auto;" border="0" cellspacing="10" width="974"><tbody> <tr></tr> <tr><td> <table width="320"> <tbody><tr> <td class="headlg" align="center" width="320"> Total for all Galleries: </td> </tr> <tr> <td width="320"></td> </tr> <tr> <td width="320"> <table align="center" width="320"> <tbody><tr> <td class="headmd"> Hits: 31238 </td> <td class="headmd"> C. Ratio: ~58% </td> <td class="headmd"> Bytes: 1.67 GB </td> </tr> </tbody></table> </td> </tr> </tbody></table> <!-- 1787963443 --></td></tr> <tr> <td colspan="2">
</td></tr></tbody></table>How does one interpret Photo's Viewed vs Hits? There's nothing on the chart that obviously is anywhere near 10,307. If 10,307 is supposed to be a summary of sorts I would expect it to obviously relate to something in the more detailed section.

KED

Photockie wrote:

How does one interpret Photo's Viewed vs Hits? There's nothing on the chart that obviously is anywhere near 10,307. If 10,307 is supposed to be a summary of sorts I would expect it to obviously relate to something in the more detailed section.

I happened upon your post in search of exactly the same information -- so MODERATOR there are questions pending here, can someone with the information please weigh in? Obviously the people posting here have been diligent in their efforts to figure it out on their own. You have invested resources to create the ability to deliver "hit" info, but I think that right now your investment is wasted; there's no real info here. Love you guys though!

coleygm

I'm curious about the exact same thing. I guess I'm using google analytics more and more these days, but a definition as to the issue posted above would be great.

phototristan

Hi,

When a visitor views a gallery page in the smugmug style, SmugMug will transfer several thumbnail images and one medium image. Stats have changed, and they're both more accurate and more useful. Now they include nearly every image view, including times where people go back and look at the same image a few different times. So you can truly see which photos are being seen most often, instead of which ones were simply being cached and thus not tracked.

Also, on the Stats page: http://www.smugmug.com/homepage/stats.mg
The conversion ratio is the number of small/medium/large/original hits divided by the number of thumbnail (both sizes) hits.

The higher the number, the more people are seeing larger-than-thumbnail versions of your images.

Unfortunately, it really doesn't indicate how many visitors you've had. You'd need a counter in your footer or for that.

Power and Pro users can add external counters. We have tutorials to help you:
Stat Counter: http://dgrin.smugmug.com/gallery/1092684
Google Analytics: http://dgrin.smugmug.com/gallery/1092794

Additional information here: http://www.smugmug.com/help/acctreport

If you have any questions or need any help, please contact us.

KED

phototristan wrote:

Hi,

When a visitor views a gallery page in the smugmug style, SmugMug will transfer several thumbnail images and one medium image. Stats have changed, and they're both more accurate and more useful. Now they include nearly every image view, including times where people go back and look at the same image a few different times. So you can truly see which photos are being seen most often, instead of which ones were simply being cached and thus not tracked.

Also, on the Stats page: http://www.smugmug.com/homepage/stats.mg
The conversion ratio is the number of small/medium/large/original hits divided by the number of thumbnail (both sizes) hits.

The higher the number, the more people are seeing larger-than-thumbnail versions of your images.

Unfortunately, it really doesn't indicate how many visitors you've had. You'd need a counter in your footer or for that.

Power and Pro users can add external counters. We have tutorials to help you:
Stat Counter: http://dgrin.smugmug.com/gallery/1092684
Google Analytics: http://dgrin.smugmug.com/gallery/1092794

Additional information here: http://www.smugmug.com/help/acctreport

If you have any questions or need any help, please contact us.

Thanks, but there's a very specific question left unanswered, which is how to explain the disparity between "Photos Viewed" on the main Control Panel page, and the stats themselves. Maybe an explanation of how "Photos Viewed" is calculated would clarify that.

Also, since we now understand that any opening of a gallery page in smugmug style will generate approximately 15 "thumbs" hits and one "small" or "medium" hit (the latter being the large image on the right side of the page), I'd say that your C-ratio is a little misleading too, since there is an automatic "conversion" (one larger image) every time a page is opened (again assuming smugmug style). That's not too big a deal, as long as people are aware that the C-ratio is overstated by 6.7% (1/15) right off the bat. That first enlargement is a "false positive" so to speak, but if people are tabbing through the thumbs and generating enlargements, those are legitimate conversions AFAIC.

Andy

KED wrote:

Thanks, but there's a very specific question left unanswered, which is how to explain the disparity between "Photos Viewed" on the main Control Panel page, and the stats themselves. Maybe an explanation of how "Photos Viewed" is calculated would clarify that.

I'll try and find out, but that photos viewed # has been a bit wonky at times. Sorry!

KED

Andy wrote:

I'll try and find out, but that photos viewed # has been a bit wonky at times. Sorry!

No worries, I just need to determine which is the proper statistical gauge of just how popular I am!

KED

KED wrote:

Thanks, but there's a very specific question left unanswered, which is how to explain the disparity between "Photos Viewed" on the main Control Panel page, and the stats themselves. Maybe an explanation of how "Photos Viewed" is calculated would clarify that.

Also, since we now understand that any opening of a gallery page in smugmug style will generate approximately 15 "thumbs" hits and one "small" or "medium" hit (the latter being the large image on the right side of the page), I'd say that your C-ratio is a little misleading too, since there is an automatic "conversion" (one larger image) every time a page is opened (again assuming smugmug style). That's not too big a deal, as long as people are aware that the C-ratio is overstated by 6.7% (1/15) right off the bat. That first enlargement is a "false positive" so to speak, but if people are tabbing through the thumbs and generating enlargements, those are legitimate conversions AFAIC.

Update: since posting earlier tonight, I have revisited my stats page and discovered that the statement above: "since we now understand that any opening of a gallery page in smugmug style will generate approximately 15 "thumbs" hits and one "small" or "medium" hit" is also not accurate - as evidenced by the fact that I have some galleries (early as it is in the month of October) with only one or two total "hits". If the quoted statement had been accurate, one would never have fewer hits (if gallery views >0) than the number of thumbs on the page plus the enlargement, even for only one viewer on the first day of the month.

Andy & mods, don't sweat it -- it is what it is; we should all just be on the same page as long as you have gone to the effort to monitor the stats. Let us know when we can determine with one or two clicks who (via IP address) exactly is looking, and who has downloaded (if enabled) -- that would be the Holy Grail IMO.

Andy

KED wrote:

Let us know when we can determine with one or two clicks who (via IP address) exactly is looking, and who has downloaded (if enabled) -- that would be the Holy Grail IMO.

You can do that now with Statcounter, it's free. Do you have it?

http://dgrin.smugmug.com/gallery/1092684

http://dgrin.smugmug.com/gallery/1092794

KED

Andy wrote:

You can do that now with Statcounter, it's free. Do you have it?

http://dgrin.smugmug.com/gallery/1092684

http://dgrin.smugmug.com/gallery/1092794

i have it as a ticker on my homepage but was not aware that there was information hidden underneath and will check it out. Thanks!

jfriend

Andy wrote:

You can do that now with Statcounter, it's free. Do you have it?

http://dgrin.smugmug.com/gallery/1092684

http://dgrin.smugmug.com/gallery/1092794

Unfortunately, the way Smugmug works with image downloads, there is no way with StatCounter, Google Analytics or any of those programs to track downloads. There's no "page" that Smugmug displays that corresponds to the download so there's no way to track them with a hitcounter program.

Photockie

The answer
The answer to the specific question asked is here

http://www.dgrin.com/showthread.php?t=105181

Lisa91

Each photo viewed?
Is their any way to tell which photo is viewed and what size it was viewed? Lisa

Smug Eric

Lisa91 wrote:

Is their any way to tell which photo is viewed and what size it was viewed? Lisa

To view these stats you will need to go into your Control Panel on the Stats tab. At the bottom of that section is a button More Details. That will bring up a view of your galleries and the hits they have had. If you select the image with the the bars it will open up a detailed view of the hits you are getting on your gallery on the specific images.