This morning I got a message in my MyBlogLog from a fellow MyBlogLoger asking me if I’m familiar with Compete Site Analytics and their New Search Analytics Tool? I answered No and then I went on their website to check it out.

On Compete’s main page you can check stats for any website by entering domain name. Stats are displayed in very cool looking graphs what they call a “snapshot”. On the next page it allows you to enter two more domains to compare their stats in one graph which I thought was very cool. Here’s the snapshot:

There are several other stats you can get from this one search like:

• People Count (The number of people visiting a site),
• The number of visits made to a site ( A person can only be counted as one person in a month, but can make multiple site visits),
• Attention (The total time spent on a domain as a percentage of the total time spent online by all U.S. internet users)
• Average Stay (The number of minutes an average visitor spends on a site during each visit)
• Pages per visit (The number of pages an average person views on each visit to a domain)
• and Velocity (Velocity reports the relative change in daily Attention. Velocity is used to determine the relative growth of a domain over a particular timeframe or compared to other sites)

Here are couple of more snapshots:

Another Compete feature is their New “Search Analytics” that everyone is talking about. There are three main tools within Search Analytics; Keyword Referral Reports, Site Referral Reports, and Comparison Reports.

• Keyword Referral tool: helps you understand what sites are capturing traffic from specific keyword phrases and the variations of that phrase.
• Site Referral tool: helps you understand what keyword phrases a specific site or category of sites is using to drive traffic.
• Comparison tool: lets you compare two different sites to highlight gaps in search referrals that might represent new search marketing opportunities for your site.

You simply enter two different sites into the input boxes and then click the “Go!” button to generate report.Now this tool is not free, you have to buy “credits” to use it. How much? Well it comes about $2 per credit which gives you one (1) search. I haven’t tried this tool yet but it might be worth a try.

I did signed up for a free user account which was very simple and quick. Once you log in allows you to customize and save SnapShots views and now you can compare up to 5 domains in one graph.

Now I get most of these stats with my free Statcounter account but just availability to display 5 domain stats in one graph I thought was worth getting free user account.

So here’s the question: is the value you get out of the Compete’s Search Analytics tool worth the $2? The free services are great, but do they give you what you need?

I would like your input on this one, use comment form below. Any comments or suggestions are appreciated!

Enjoy.