Google Analytics

And now, for a completely different type of post:

You could say that I'm quite the analytical whore. What I mean is that I love looking at data, dividing and grouping information, examining trends, and trying to figure out the reason why things are the way they are. It should come as no surprise, thus, that when I found out about Google Analytics, I was eager to use the tool to delve into the inner workings of this site's traffic.

Since installing the software back in 2009, I've been intrigued by the results that I've been getting. I check my analytics periodically, and it's absolutely fascinating to see how things have progressed over the years. What I present below are my GA statistics from 2009 to present. I hope that some of you can get as much of a kick as I do out of this; however, if you're not the analytical or inquisitive type, you may want to skip this post--caution: a wall of data ahead!

Note that 2009 only includes data from April 8, while 2012 covers only the first half of the year.

Statistic	2009	2010	2011	2012
Pageviews	468,708	995,603	996,685	566,274
Visits	182,007	421,068	500,636	286,537
Unique Visitors	85,471	181,733	210,434	138,690
Pages / Visit	2.58	2.36	1.99	1.98
Avg. Visit Duration	3:36	2:58	2:19	2:08
Bounce Rate	66.24%	68.40%	71.56%	69.78%
% New Visits	46.95%	42.21%	40.76%	45.97%
Overall, visits and visitors to the site have been increasing steadily, and 2012 is on track to continue that trend. In fact, I'm looking forward to hitting the million pageview milestone this year. However, unfortunately, as the number of visitors increases, the "quality" of each visitor tends to decrease, which we see in the decline in pages per visit and average time spent numbers. We can also view this phenomenon perhaps manifested in the lower number of comments per post. In the end, I believe that the huge proliferation of food blogs in recent years has diluted the impact of any particular blog, mine included.

Statistic	2009	2010	2011	2012
Top 10 Countries	United States (154,104) Canada (6,772) United Kingdom (2,825) Australia (1,946) Germany (985) Singapore (811) Japan (804) France (787) Philippines (751) Taiwan (710)	United States (352,502) Canada (14,934) United Kingdom (5,670) Australia (3,621) France (2,603) Mexico (2,443) Germany (2,351) Japan (1,928) Philippines (1,824) Singapore (1,704)	United States (422,682) Canada (15,565) United Kingdom (6,437) Mexico (4,059) Australia (3,594) Philippines (2,695) Germany (2,404) France (2,094) Singapore (1,889) Indonesia (1,807)	United States (232,422) Canada (8,469) United Kingdom (4,567) Australia (2,720) Mexico (2,346) Philippines (1,864) Germany (1,667) India (1,631) France (1,613) Singapore (1,595)
Top 10 US States	California (93,240) New York (9,670) Texas (5,158) Illinois (4,250) Florida (3,322) Nevada (2,592) Massachusetts (2,422) New Jersey (2,369) Pennsylvania (2,217) Washington (2,040)	California (221,133) New York (22,308) Texas (11,394) Nevada (9,093) Illinois (8,977) Florida (6,114) Pennsylvania (5,424) Colorado (4,717) Massachusetts (4,702) New Jersey (4,574)	California (273,931) New York (25,409) Texas (13,484) Illinois (9,631) Nevada (7,204) Florida (6,174) Washington (5,745) Massachusetts (5,571) Virginia (5,550) Pennsylvania (5,478)	California (145,969) New York (13,751) Texas (6,308) Illinois (5,469) Massachusetts (4,438) Washington (3,774) Florida (3,683) Pennsylvania (3,369) New Jersey (3,328) Virginia (3,060)
Top 10 California Cities	Los Angeles (27,729) Beverly Hills (3,857) San Francisco (3,764) Irvine (3,139) Santa Monica (2,683) Culver City (2,362) West Hollywood (1,930) Pasadena (1,547) San Diego (1,055) Westminster (1,002)	Los Angeles (64,668) Beverly Hills (11,500) San Francisco (8,716) Culver City (7,341) Santa Monica (6,148) Irvine (4,690) Pasadena (4,642) West Hollywood (3,388) San Diego (2,509) Torrance (2,064)	Los Angeles (93,381) San Francisco (10,861) Santa Monica (8,197) Irvine (7,920) Pasadena (7,724) San Diego (6,930) Beverly Hills (6,741) West Hollywood (5,411) Burbank (3,924) Torrance (3,788)	Los Angeles (45,351) Santa Monica (6,140) San Francisco (5,509) Pasadena (4,237) Irvine (4,198) San Diego (3,956) Beverly Hills (2,762) Burbank (2,477) West Hollywood (2,416) Glendale (1,810)
No big surprise here: in terms of traffic, USA is #1, with several other Anglophone countries taking up the next few spots. Japan, for some reason, seems to have fallen off completely, while the Philippines has witnessed good growth. Seeing India as a top contender in 2012 is peculiar. Another interesting thing to note is Mexico, which has gone from not even registering in 2009 to being a major source of visits to this site. In terms of US states, California's the top dog for obvious reasons. New York makes sense, given the financial, educational, and cultural achievements of the state; plus, I've got a decent number of posts about Manhattan restaurants. Same thing goes for Illinois, which I assume just means Chicago. I've never written anything about Texas, so its placement has got to be due to just having a large population. Colorado made an appearance in 2010 but then disappeared, curiously. What I find most interesting here is that former stalwart Nevada has completely dropped off for some reason. In general, states that appear on the list tend to trend high in both population as well as income. One more thing: the rank for visits per capita for 2012 goes California, Hawaii, Nevada, Vermont, New York, Massachusetts, Oregon, Washington, Colorado, and Rhode Island. Within the great state of California, the most prevalent city is, of course, LA. BH had a strong showing early on, but I'm not sure why it's fallen off so drastically; Culver City shares a similar story. San Francisco, meanwhile, does very well for a city that I don't write about too often, while Santa Monica and Irvine have been pretty consistent. San Diego has risen up the ranks, perhaps a nod to the City's burgeoning food scene, and Pasadena has come up nicely as well.

Statistic	2009	2010	2011	2012
Top 4 Browsers	Firefox (46.19%) Internet Explorer (30.44%) Safari (15.88%) Chrome (5.96%)	Firefox (37.40%) Internet Explorer (27.97%) Safari (20.83%) Chrome (12.06%)	Firefox (28.02%) Safari (27.36%) Internet Explorer (21.26%) Chrome (19.71%)	Chrome (27.41%) Safari (26.12%) Firefox (24.30%) Internet Explorer (18.69%)
Top 6 Operating Systems	Windows (72.37%) Macintosh (24.59%) iPhone (1.60%) Linux (0.84%) BlackBerry (0.16%) iPod (0.14%)	Windows (67.28%) Macintosh (27.15%) iPhone (2.80%) iPad (0.76%) Android (0.66%) Linux (0.65%)	Windows (56.52%) Macintosh (31.71%) iPhone (4.91%) iPad (3.45%) Android (1.78%) Linux (0.59%)	Windows (56.80%) Macintosh (32.13%) iPad (4.63%) iPhone (2.62%) Android (1.15%) iOS (1.08%)
Some interesting trends here. The notoriously outmoded Internet Explorer (lots of people are still on version 6.0!) has seen a steady decline in usership over the years. Initially, its users seem to have migrated to Firefox, but even Firefox traffic has fallen, leading me to believe that people have subsequently migrated to Chrome, which has displayed a pretty meteoric rise to the top. Safari remains strictly an Apple phenomenon, so the percentage of Apple users visiting this site has steadfastly increased, too (probably due in large part to the prevalence of iDevices). As far as operating systems go, I'm sure nobody's surprised that Windows is the most popular OS here, but its lead is quickly diminishing, losing its dominance to Apple, with its one-two punch of MacOS and iOS. Meanwhile, Android is creeping up there, but it'll probably be a few years before it becomes a significant player.

Statistic	2009	2010	2011	2012
% Mobile	2.76%	4.80%	10.63%	9.76%
Top 5 Mobile Operating Systems	iPhone (76.12%) BlackBerry (12.17%) iPod (5.28%) Android (4.37%) Windows (1.51%)	iPhone (58.37%) iPad (15.77%) Android (13.86%) BlackBerry (7.43%) iPod (3.82%)	iPhone (46.22%) iPad (32.42%) Android (16.70%) BlackBerry (2.57%) iPod (1.83%)	iPad (47.42%) iPhone (26.83%) Android (11.78%) iOS (11.06%) BlackBerry (1.60%)
Not surprisingly, mobile traffic has been on the rise (doubling each year from 2009 to 2011), though I'm pretty surprised at the slight dip in the first half of 2012. Initially, mobile was all about the iPhone, but its dominance has since given way to its bigger brother, the iPad, which now commands a firm grip of my mobile readership. The iPod has fallen off the chart--good riddance I say; who really uses their iPod to browse the Web? Android has quickly established itself as a player in the market, though the nearly 5% drop in the first half of 2012 seems a bit anomalous (this may have to do with the breakout of iOS as a separate entity from the other iDevices). To me, the real shocker here is that, as of 2012Q1, Android comprises a full 59% of the Smartphone market, yet trails the iPhone by a huge margin here. What this tells me is that Android users really must not be using their phones to surf the Net. But why? Is the Internet experience on Android so much inferior to that on the iPhone? I doubt it; my guess is that Android users probably have a standalone PC that's used for Web browsing, while iPhone users tend to use their phones more as a primary Internet device. Rounding things out of course is BlackBerry, which continues its steep, painful fall into irrelevancy.

Statistic	2009	2010	2011	2012
Traffic Sources Breakdown	25.27% Search Traffic 33.32% Direct Traffic 41.41% Referral Traffic	35.01% Search Traffic 33.14% Direct Traffic 31.84% Referral Traffic	44.25% Search Traffic 33.26% Direct Traffic 22.49% Referral Traffic	51.08% Search Traffic 28.38% Direct Traffic 20.55% Referral Traffic
Search has become a bigger and bigger source of traffic for the site, which I suppose makes sense since the amount of indexable content only grows with time. What's also fascinating is how Direct Traffic remained nearly constant from 2009 to 2011. Is this trend of Search dominance beneficial? I have my doubts.

Statistic	2009	2010	2011	2012
Top 20 Referral Sources	tastespotting.com (8,107 10.76%) chowhound.chow.com (7,246 9.61%) images.google.com (6,293 8.35%) kevineats.com (5,395 7.16%) foodgawker.com (3,879 5.15%) stumbleupon.com (3,765 5.00%) twitter.com (3,314 4.40%) reddit.com (3,184 4.22%) biggestmenu.com (2,492 3.31%) google.com (1,803 2.39%) chuckeats.com (1,666 2.21%) la.eater.com (1,660 2.20%) yelp.com (1,545 2.05%) facebook.com (1,467 1.95%) blogger.com (1,029 1.37%) photograzing.seriouseats.com (1,015 1.35%) kungfoodpanda.blogspot.com (995 1.32%) mattatouille.com (830 1.10%) gourmetpigs.blogspot.com (624 0.83%) digesty.com (532 0.71%)	google.com (18,279 13.64%) la.eater.com (10,448 7.79%) twitter.com (9,487 7.08%) images.google.com (8,974 6.69%) tastespotting.com (6,574 4.90%) kevineats.com (6,372 4.75%) facebook.com (6,000 4.48%) files.kevineats.com (5,289 3.95%) chowhound.chow.com (5,129 3.83%) digesty.com (3,830 2.86%) blogger.com (3,419 2.55%) biggestmenu.com (2,095 1.56%) stumbleupon.com (1,497 1.12%) google.ca (1,456 1.09%) yelp.com (1,405 1.05%) latimesblogs.latimes.com (1,372 1.02%) foodgawker.com (1,299 0.97%) chuckeats.com (1,077 0.80%) google.co.uk (1,014 0.76%) ludolefebvre.com (876 0.65%)	google.com (20,458 18.17%) facebook.com (8,061 7.16%) twitter.com (7,760 6.89%) la.eater.com (6,432 5.71%) chowhound.chow.com (4,751 4.22%) digesty.com (4,252 3.78%) t.co (3,492 3.10%) tastespotting.com (2,988 2.65%) blogger.com (2,259 2.01%) saveur.com (2,141 1.90%) darindines.com (2,095 1.86%) losangeles.grubstreet.com (2,021 1.79%) files.kevineats.com (1,874 1.66%) stumbleupon.com (1,510 1.34%) biggestmenu.com (1,330 1.18%) kungfoodpanda.com (1,283 1.14%) foodgawker.com (1,241 1.10%) kevineats.com (1,201 1.07%) gastronomyblog.com (1,031 0.92%) rodzillareviews.com (1,028 0.91%)	google.com (13,099 22.25%) la.eater.com (4,416 7.50%) facebook.com (4,236 7.20%) t.co (3,444 5.85%) saveur.com (2,686 4.56%) chowhound.chow.com (1,834 3.12%) blogger.com (1,677 2.85%) darindines.com (1,649 2.80%) digesty.com (1,048 1.78%) stumbleupon.com (1,045 1.78%) tastespotting.com (1,019 1.73%) losangeles.grubstreet.com (827 1.40%) animmovablefeast.blogspot.com (669 1.14%) files.kevineats.com (576 0.98%) foodjetaime.com (516 0.88%) foodgawker.com (500 0.85%) rodzillareviews.com (500 0.85%) kevineats.com (499 0.85%) yelp.com (493 0.84%) gastronomyblog.com (490 0.83%)
Some great trends on this one. First off, the significance of Eater LA jumped drastically in 2010, and the site has remained a major contributor of traffic since. Previous top dogs Tastespotting and Chowhound have fallen off a bit. There appears to be some confusion as to google.com versus images.google.com, so I'm not sure what's going on there, but in any case, Google Images is definitely a force to be reckoned with. We also see the meteoric rise of Facebook, and to a lesser extent Twitter. Saveur, meanwhile, shows up due to my nomination in their "Best Food Blog" awards. In terms of non-commercial sites, local blogs such as Gourmet Pigs, Kung Food Panda, and Mattatouille that were previously in the top 20 no longer register. In their place, we have the ascendancy of Darin Dines, as well as An Immovable Feast, which seemingly appeared out of nowhere this year. San Diego blogger Rodzilla Reviews is also an up-and-comer that demonstrates a lot of potential.

Statistic	2009	2010	2011	2012
Top 20 Search Terms	kevin eats (6,982 15.18%) kevineats (5,135 11.17%) sushi zo (665 1.45%) bouchon beverly hills (556 1.21%) kevineats.com (538 1.17%) kevin eats blog (531 1.15%) totoraku (384 0.83%) urasawa beverly hills (333 0.72%) shibucho (297 0.65%) urasawa (288 0.63%) the bazaar los angeles (272 0.59%) club 33 disneyland (253 0.55%) kevineats twitter (252 0.55%) father's office menu (245 0.53%) sushi zo los angeles (237 0.52%) thai nakorn (222 0.48%) www.kevineats.com (184 0.40%) saam at the bazaar (180 0.39%) melisse santa monica (164 0.36%) bazaar los angeles (160 0.35%)	kevineats (20,185 13.69%) kevin eats (18,297 12.41%) {Interactive Dining Map} (3,458 2.35%) test kitchen los angeles (2,213 1.50%) kevineats.com (1,659 1.13%) urasawa (1,273 0.86%) bouchon beverly hills (1,240 0.84%) bar masa las vegas (1,114 0.76%) kevin eats blog (891 0.60%) totoraku (883 0.60%) sage las vegas (833 0.57%) julian serrano menu (789 0.54%) julian serrano (777 0.53%) sushi zo (631 0.43%) {Interactive Dining Map} (505 0.34%) twist las vegas (499 0.34%) ludobites 5.0 (483 0.33%) kung fu panda food blog joel robuchon (480 0.33%) {Interactive Dining Map} (462 0.31%) saam at the bazaar (451 0.31%)	kevin eats (28,031 12.65%) kevineats (24,962 11.27%) (not provided) (7,488 3.38%) {Interactive Dining Map} (3,609 1.63%) urasawa (1,952 0.88%) lukshon (1,840 0.83%) lukshon menu (1,718 0.78%) son of a gun los angeles (1,497 0.68%) mb post (1,308 0.59%) kevineats.com (1,207 0.54%) totoraku (1,167 0.53%) sushi zo (1,034 0.47%) wolvesmouth (897 0.40%) http://www.kevineats.com/ (831 0.38%) e by jose andres (806 0.36%) son of a gun la (798 0.36%) son of a gun restaurant (772 0.35%) scarpetta beverly hills (666 0.30%) picca los angeles (664 0.30%) scarpetta brunch beverly hills (612 0.28%)	(not provided) (33,775 23.08%) kevin eats (11,689 7.99%) kevineats (8,701 5.95%) {Interactive Dining Map} (3,051 2.08%) urasawa (1,123 0.77%) kevineats.com (462 0.32%) post and beam (458 0.31%) sushi zo (430 0.29%) totoraku (430 0.29%) e by jose andres (355 0.24%) picca los angeles (353 0.24%) ink (346 0.24%) mori sushi (330 0.23%) wolf (315 0.22%) maison giraud (307 0.21%) red medicine kevineats (306 0.21%) e by jose andres menu (288 0.20%) ink los angeles (267 0.18%) red medicine (256 0.17%) burger parlor fullerton (253 0.17%)
Search keywords are another fascinating facet to examine, as they give you a peek at what people are interested in on the Net. Urasawa has always been a big draw to the site, and I'm told that the restaurant has actually seen a noticeable increase in business due to my posts. You can sort of see what restaurants are "hot" at the moment by looking at the search terms. For example, in 2009, we had the debut of Bouchon Beverly Hills. 2010 saw Test Kitchen do its run, and we also visited several new eateries in Las Vegas. In 2011, Lukshon, Son of a Gun, and MB Post all bowed, as did Picca, and José Andrés' é in Vegas. So far, in 2012, the focus for new restaurants seems to be on Post & Beam.

Statistic	2009	2010	2011	2012
Top 25 Pages Viewed	{Main Page} (191,890) Urasawa [5] (9,486) Urasawa [4] (6,579) French Laundry (6,018) Saam at The Bazaar (5,118) Joël Robuchon (3,711) The Bazaar (3,501) Alinea [2] (3,365) Urasawa (3,357) Bouchon (3,209) CUT (3,177) Sushi Zo (3,050) L'Atelier de Joël Robuchon (2,995) Restaurant Guy Savoy (2,927) The Dining Room at The Langham (2,851) Moto (2,702) L2O (2,643) Twist by Pierre Gagnaire (2,570) Per Se (2,560) Alinea (2,327) LudoBites at Royal/T (2,277) Providence [5] (2,246) Father's Office (2,221) Animal (2,208) Stefan's at L.A. Farm (2,156)	{Main Page} (429,048) Urasawa [5] (6,980) Twist by Pierre Gagnaire (6,950) Julian Serrano (6,867) Sage (6,812) Red O (6,634) French Laundry (6,625) Why Are There So Many Asian Food Bloggers? (6,382) Urasawa [6] (6,365) Bar Masa (6,213) Saam at The Bazaar (5,539) Joël Robuchon (5,538) Bouchon (5,111) Test Kitchen (4,634) Red Medicine (4,368) The Dining Room at The Langham [3] (4,350) Urasawa (4,249) Sushi Zo (4,187) Per Se (3,941) The Bazaar (3,835) Hatfield's [2] (3,833) Animal (3,710) Urasawa [4] (3,633) LudoBites 5.0 at Gram & Papas (3,536) L'Atelier de Joël Robuchon (3,533)	{Main Page} (411,085) é by José Andrés (12,439) Son of a Gun (12,053) ink. (7,920) Lukshon (7,121) Urasawa [6] (6,480) MB Post (5,537) Urasawa [5] (4,999) French Laundry (4,814) Aburiya Toranoko (4,687) Picca (4,675) Saam at The Bazaar (4,455) Molecular Menu at AnQi (4,219) Red Medicine (3,815) Animal (3,740) Fat Spoon (3,604) Per Se (3,495) Playa (3,461) Table 21 at Volt (3,249) Sushi Zo (3,219) Twist by Pierre Gagnaire (3,211) Joël Robuchon [2] (2,972) Le Bernardin (2,971) Bouchon (2,966) Alinea [2] (2,935)	{Main Page} (212,957) LudoBites 8.0 at Lemon Moon (5,939) é by José Andrés (5,189) Post & Beam (3,873) Urasawa [5] (3,323) ink. (3,289) French Laundry (2,841) Urasawa [6] (2,761) Son of a Gun (2,338) Maison Giraud (2,298) Black Hogg (2,288) Little Bear (2,271) Saam at The Bazaar (2,153) ink. [2] (2,132) Animal (2,083) Picca (2,054) Sushi Zo (2,043) Red Medicine (1,915) Sushi Nozawa (1,802) French Laundry [2] (1,795) Wolf in Sheep's Clothing (1,795) 2012-01 {Archive Page} (1,751) Ohshima (1,735) Per Se (1,696) Bouchon (1,687)
Much like the aforementioned search terms, looking at what pages are viewed the most provides insight as to what was "hot" during a particular period. Just look at how LudoBites 8 dominated this year; Mike Voltaggio's ink is doing pretty good, too. There are some stubbornly popular posts, though, such as Urasawa, and to a lesser extent, French Laundry. The exclusive é by José Andrés and Saam at The Bazaar may be heading in that direction as well.