I'm looking for the best FREE ways to keep track of who's visiting my website and where they're coming from.
I use statcounter but I hear googles analytics is very good as well. Both provide a very good free service and an even better payed one
I tested: StatCounter, MasterStats, ExtremeTracker, Google Analytics Google Analytics is the best - no doubts
Statscounter (Free) , Awstat (in Cpanel) and now feedjit (just to know the location and where they got my links)
Always the same questions... Why make things complicated? Just use Google Analytics - it's free and it's the most poweful tool.
StatCounter is good if you don't receive too many hits because their log size is 500 and you have to refresh the stats each time the log size is filled, otherwise you would do better with their paid stats. I tried the Google stats... their also good.
I have used both. But I prefer awstats over google analytics. For me its easier to read and follow. And the graphs are easy to follow and detailed.
All of them are complicated and difficult to use. Google Analytics is actually one of the most confusing ones. I love http://getclicky.com for it's at-a-glance, easy to understand graphs. And it's free for one website.