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April 2013

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Subject:
From:
Brian Hayden <[log in to unmask]>
Reply To:
UofMN Web Standards <[log in to unmask]>
Date:
Thu, 25 Apr 2013 15:48:40 -0500
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On Apr 25, 2013, at 3:41 PM, Andria Waclawski <[log in to unmask]> wrote:

> As I understand it (and I know some of you out there know much more than I do), a key difference lies in Urchin’s analysis of server log files and GA's javascript tagging. While Urchin may give richer results (because it can access more data), GA allows for advanced segmentation, benchmark analysis, and event tracking.
> 
> Maybe that doesn't help with the interpreting discrepancies part...
> 
> /Andria
> 
> 
> On Thu, Apr 25, 2013 at 3:23 PM, Ann Nordby <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
> Hi: 
> Can anyone advise me on how to interpret Google Analytics numbers versus Urchin? 
> 
> Urchin is telling me that our website's visit numbers dropped significantly over the past year, while GA says we had significant growth. GA's absolute numbers are lower, of course, but the trends are totally different. 
> 
> Can anyone advise on which to believe, how to interpret, etc? 

This is speculation, but depending on the configurations it's also possible that Urchin is more aggressively dropping hits from spiders, at the same time that more spiders are becoming JS-aware and thus increasing GA numbers (unrealistically). 

There are a lot of other possibilities, but that's one thing I'd been pondering recently based on some similar observations. 

-Brian

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