How to Analyse Top Pages and Referrers
Knowing which pages are popular and where visitors come from helps you invest effort where it pays off. AWStats reveals both from your server logs.
Step-by-step
- Open Metrics → AWStats and select your domain (see using AWStats).
- Open the "Pages-URL" section to see your most-visited pages, ranked by views.
- Note entry and exit pages — entry pages are where visitors arrive; high-exit pages may need improvement.
- Open the "Referrers" section to see which external sites link to you and send traffic.
- Check "Search Keyphrases/words" to see what people searched before arriving (when available).
- Act on the insight — strengthen popular pages, fix high-exit pages, and nurture your best referrers.
💡 Good to know
- Pair AWStats with Google Search Console (see verifying it) for search-specific data.
- A page that is popular but slow is worth speeding up first.
- Referrer spam can appear in logs — focus on recognisable, real sources.