A Question About Alexa

Sorry if this is in the wrong category, but I dont know where I can post it here. Hopefully, it's relevant in this forum (if not please delete or move it)
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I've noticed something inconsistant about Alexa. On my website, I had an Alexa rating of apprx. 136,679. However, I've noticed that the one week average has been 576,320 according to them. This can't be right because I've checked my traffic logs and I've received the same number of visitors for that week.

I thought about this more and came up with my theory. I asked myself, how do they gather this info, of how many people visit my site? Well, I went to their website and dug this quote up:

"Gathering Web Usage Information

In addition to the Alexa Crawl, which can tell us what is on the Web, Alexa utilizes web usage information, which tells us what is being seen on the web. This information comes from the community of Alexa Toolbar users. Each member of the community, in addition to getting a useful tool, is giving back. Simply by using the toolbar each member contributes valuable information about the web, how it is used, what is important and what is not. This information is returned to the community with improved Related Links, Traffic Rankings and more. "

Aha! Just as I suspected, they use some sort of tracking mechanism that people install on their computer. What's the problem with this, you might think? Well, whenever people run any anti-spyware program, Alexa is at the top of the list. So, my theory is that people are removing, with their spyware programs, anything to do with Alexa. Hence, the wild traffic fluctuations reporting I'm getting from Alexa. That's my theory anyway.

Any comments?

Thanks

Sam

http://www.meilach.com

 

Alexa is a joke and not to be taken seriously. Not even for a second!

 

as Rob said, it is useless...if you want your number to "skyrocket" in Alexa...install the toolbar...set your homepage to your site...and pay somebody from the short-bus to hit the home icon every 10 seconds.

 

True, the ranking isn't correct. I downloaded the toolbar and my alexa rankings went sky high, not trustworthy.

 

They just put a bunch of spyware on your computer.

 

Alexa is great.

If you dont manipulate it by putting the toolbar(spyware) on your own p.c and clicking your site 5 million times.
Its the only semi-official ranking tool i know, and although its figures are TOTAL BOLLOCKS, it gives you a feel of how you are doing, eg: Digital point is ranked about 700 !!! which is pretty damn good...it would take a lot of faking, and we can tell that digital point is therfore receiving a lot of traffic. Its not an accurate system by any means, however if you make it to the top 10K sites, we will let you have bragging rights

 

Interesting....I've uninstalled the Alexa toolbar this past week. Maybe that had something to do with it. I installed the Google one instead, which has a interesting features, especially when you right click inside a website (Adsense preview is nice).

Am new to this forum....thanks for your replies.

Sam

 

Did I miss something - my right click isn't different with the googlebar...

 

Re: Google Adsense Preview Tool : Oops...my mistake. That's a different app from Google. Take a look at the details here: ...Since I cant post links yet, go to google and search for the term: "google adsense preview tool" and click on the first link for Google Adsense Support.

 

considering that Alexa's majority users would be webmasters and digital point is a popular webmasters style forum, you would expect it to have a high Alexa rank. All webmaster, SEO, webdesign, web marketing sites should have decent alexa ranks if they are popular.

I concur with Crazy Rob. If my site is an SEO site, and your site is an online t-shirt store, and my Alexa rank flogs yours, it doesn't mean I'm getting more traffic than you, it means I'm getting more people with the Alexa toolbar installed visiting my site than you have visiting yours. You might be getting 5000 unique hits a day and I might be getting 500, but 200 of mine might have the Alexa toolbar installed and maybe only 50 of yours do. It's only a useful ranking system if EVERYONE uses the toolbar. Only webmasters (and similar) would so it's a dud.

 

He probably knows about the adsense preview tool, just the fact that you mentioned it as a feature of the toolbar brought some confusion.

 

I agree with the comments above.

Alexa is an "estimate" and open to manipulation.

The ranking should be more reliable as you near the top 1000 or top 10000.

In my opinion, if you are comparing apples to apples then the numbers would give you a good estimate. For example, comparing the top SEO forums.

 

All "Alexa is useless" aside, I did like to track the progress of my numbers on Alexa. After rising slowly but consistently for a year to the 40,000's, in the last week or so my numbers have dropped off the table for some reason.

Today 342,322
1 wk. Avg. 267,248
3 mos. Avg. 61,009
3 mos. Change -2,224

I would assume few of my site's readers are webmasters and do not use Alexa but it has always been consistent. My site's traffic stats have not changed. If anything they are increasing so this is just a curiousity thing, not an OMG thing. Has anyone else seen this?

 

Well actually, if you have the google toolbar installed and you highlight a word or phrase then right-click you get an option "Google search" that searches for that phrase.
Tip: Hold shift to open in a new window.

Ross

 

With applications like AlexaBooster being widely available now, you cannot even rely on the Alexa traffic figures to accurately represent the browsing habits of Alexa toolbar users.

 

Totally agree, and alexabooster will only boost your hosting bill!

The top websites according to google: http://www.google.com/search?q=.com with yahoo at nr. 1(!)
The top according to alexa: http://www.alexa.com/site/ds/top_500 also yahoo at nr.1, the lists don't show much difference.
So the alexa ranking is not to bad but only for the top websites. (high traffic)

 

Alexa is not very accurate, but it can be used as a guide.

 

I was really surprised just how easy it is to affect an Alexa rating by just adding the toolbar, though I imagine it must get more difficult to manipulate on larger sites. I pay it little attention, although it is sometimes amusing to see a site obviously much more popular than mine with a significantly higher Alexa number.

 

Alexa is improving continuously. I know some cheaters, all of them were punished by Alexa some days ago.