A Facelift for StatCounter!

Hi all,

StatCounter Facelift!
We’re currently updating StatCounter – the new site will have a fresh, modern look; it will be more user-friendly and hopefully will make using StatCounter an even better experience. Our new interface will also give us flexibility to continue to improve the service we offer.

Help Please!
Internal testing of the new site has been ongoing for some time… but NOW we need YOUR HELP!

We’d love to get feedback from a really broad range of people from beginners, all the way up to advanced users.

It would also be great to hear from anyone with a blog or website, who is NOT yet using StatCounter but would like to join up.

So, if you would like to have an input into the new StatCounter design then please apply for beta access here!

Please note that while we are hoping to get as much feedback as possible, we may not be able to offer access to everyone who applies. We do, however, sincerely appreciate every single offer of assistance – StatCounter couldn’t be what it is today without the support and loyalty of you, our members.

IN DUBLIN?!
We would also be delighted to welcome any volunteers to our Dublin office to test the new site in person. If you’re in or around Dublin over the next few weeks and you have some time to spare, then we’d love to hear from you!

Questions, comments and suggestions welcome below.

156 Comments

  1. We would want the statcounter site to be more fast to load and efficient. Definitely, a new look would be an added benefit. But hope the end user don’t have to sacrifice anything else for the new StatCounter site.

    Best of luck once again for the StatCounter site.

  2. On my wish list for Statcounter is the ability to archive stats each month. Or at least retrieve them. We spend two hours on the last day of the month assembling our own archive. Recording stats is important. It would be nice if you could meet us halfway in the effort.

    Also, the stats are bouncing around lately. Pages are not always showing up on the same list (?) This seems to be new. Never noticed it until we recorded May numbers this afternoon.

  3. I agree with all the comments – statcounter is actually spot on and doesn’t need changing a great deal. The only things I would like to see are more customisation – like being able to track individual pages and perhaps being able to interogate the counter (I really wanted a count-down for shareworld).

    However, I sympothise with a re-design as you always need to push things foward. If I had to guess I’d say statcounter will simplify – go more bloggy’ in a bid to attract new users, just hope we don’t lose the nice feel it currently has!!

    When you look at the extreme end of design – for example google and their fuss over shades of blue- and how this can effect visitors, it is a very scary thing to do!!! I’m definately up for beta testing!!!!

  4. “We really can’t agree that old stuff always works better… we certainly wouldn’t want to go back to the days of dial-up!”

    It’s not wise to sneer at dial-up. Here’s a quote from a blog article:

    “Outside towns and cities in America, Europe, and wealthy countries in South East Asia, broadband penetration has been minimal. Elsewhere, it’s confined to major cities. A 2007 article in PC World magazine noted that Rural America is doomed to Dial-Up.”

    It’s true. My StatCounter reports often show visits from Farmers’ Telephone Cooperatives in the USA.

    Are you aware of the SiteMeter facelift fiasco of 2008?

    1. Hi Peter,

      We’re not sneering at dial -up… but I think you would agree that anyone who HAS access to broadband, certainly wouldn’t choose to move back to dial-up? We’re simply saying that not all updates (e.g. dial-up to broadband) are bad! That’s all.

  5. Don’t make any change. As all in life, the old stuff if it works ALWAYS has been better than the new.
    If something works and people is happy and pays for it, why take the chance to ruin it?

    All those services that had similar service and made all sort of changes, have gone to hell, so don’t follow them.

    Just look why the weekly reports are not being sent since the last 3 weeks.

    1. Hi William,

      We really can’t agree that old stuff always works better… we certainly wouldn’t want to go back to the days of dial-up!

      We do, however, absolutely understand your concerns. Change can be difficult… however we will be doing everything in our power to make the changes at StatCounter as easy and comfortable as possible for all our members!

      We are acutely aware of the support of our members, and it is this very support that motivates us to continue to improve the service we provide.

      Please consider taking part in testing our new site William – a healthy dose of scepticism can be very useful in helping to refine a new design! If you could dedicate some time to this then please just mention this blog comment in the “comment” area when signing up.

      Many thanks!

  6. A year and a half ago, I was forced to make the decision to leave a webstats service that I loved and had used for four years. The reason? They had decided to ‘upgrade’ and ended up absolutely ruining their entire operation, losing thousands of loyal customers in the bargain. That’s when I came over to StatCounter, and I have been extremely pleased with that decision.

    So far in the comments, I have seen an awful lot of concern about the impending changing of your service; concerns that it might affect the speed and reliability; concerns about it becoming bloated with extensive javascript code; even one concern that SC has been purchased by a large corporation (which is historically has generally been the death knell for any cool, small web service).

    Whether or not any of these concerns are valid, I have only one thing to say: think; please keep things simple. You don’t need to add much; your service is fabulous, fast, and mostly problem-free.

    Don’t become the next Sitemeter.

    PLEASE!

    1. AJ – thanks so much for your kind words! We are delighted you enjoy our service.

      At StatCounter we steer our own course and make all decisions with our members firmly in mind. We are acutely aware that StatCounter only exists today due to the loyalty and support of you and all our members so we have no intention of damaging your faith in us. Instead we hope to surprise and please you with an improved website and service offering.

      Here at StatCounter we have ourselves experienced the frustration of perfectly fine web services doing “updates” which make the sites WORSE than they were in the first place! You can rest assured that we have NO intention of going down that path…

      Our motivation to update the site is to make it easier and more useful for you, our members. We are frequently receiving feature requests for features which are already available! This means that the features simply aren’t obvious to people and that is something we simply have to remedy.

      We are also very much aware of all the good points about StatCounter – we want to build on (not lose!) these.

      Particularly in view of your past experiences, we would be delighted if you would consider testing our new design – we would be most interested in your educated view. If you could dedicate some time to this then please just mention this blog comment in the “comment” area when signing up.

      Many thanks!

  7. My hat’s off to the Statcounter team for all of their work. This is one of my most useful tools.

    My only suggestion is for totals for each column. I am sure some would also like to have the ability to group sites and have split totals.

    Thanks for providing the service.

  8. I can’t wait to see this new look been using statcounter for almost 3 years now i think its the time to have new better interface good luck you all

  9. I personally like the site as it is. It does a cracking job, is easy to navigate, fast loading, and provides me with all the data I need. I too would not like to see it go in the same direction as some other sites who switch to lots of javascript and flash action.

    Perhaps just a spring clean?

    Keep up the good work – you all do a brilliant job
    deb x

    1. Hi Deb,

      Please rest assured that we don’t intend to lose any of the great things about StatCounter… we just want to improve the not-so-good areas.

      Despite many new features and service updates over the last few years, the StatCounter site itself has not been updated since approximately 2003! This means that although the features on the site have evolved, the site itself hasn’t been updated accordingly… we’re aiming to fix this mismatch while still keeping the site intuitive and easy to navigate.

  10. I also like it as is, logical, easy to use, totally understandable. Maybe like a choice of the color theme would cheer up those who don’t like the blue could be useful. However I’m sure the new design will be even better. If my time allows I will join in on the testing.

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  12. Statcounter is great and very very useful.

    However, I have also noticed that I am being logged out after a very few minutes these last 3 days. Instead of being able to adjust settings to not log my visits with a simple insertion of my IP + check mark, this is now requiring constant adjustments. Yesterday I was updating two new pages and went to SC to check and all my visits were logged. I then had to reset the stats, which is fine, but this wasn’t happening before. It’s getting to be a bit of a juggling act now.

    Best Regards, JJ

  13. I think the site looks good and functions well just the way it is. I’ve never wished for anything different.

    I applaud your efforts to make the site even better, but sometimes making something better inadvertently introduces a whole new set of unanticipated problems and bugs. I know you guys will avaoid that, right?

    Thanks for such a great tool!

    1. Hi Chuck,

      Thanks for your concern – please know that we are working hard to minimise any “teething” problems with our new site.

  14. I think that the current layount and speed is very good. I hope the new site will be as fast 🙂

  15. when GeoCities went belly up (in Oct. last year) I had to relocate (find another host for) my web sites. But I still want to keep my old stats info. Can I have my new sites stats regularly displayed AND save my old sites (stats) info in a folder?

    Great job, guys. Keep up the good work!

    Dan

  16. I use (and pay for) StatCounter for information about my website…….and NOT as a source of entertainment.

    Undoubtedly, you may not want to support two formats (old & new)…….but you should seriously consider doing so. Advanced users may crave for “more”………..but I suspect most of us are perfectly happy with what we have now.

    Look at it this way………..after all these years….how would you react to an announcement from McDonald’s that they are changing the ingredients for their french fries?

    1. Hi Steve,

      We’re very glad to know that you find StatCounter so useful and we’re very grateful you took the time to share your thoughts.

      StatCounter is the success it is today completely as a result of the support and loyalty of you and all our members – we are completely and absolutely aware of that fact. As a result of that, everything we do is dictated by what is best for you, our members.

      We are certainly not “throwing out” the current design – the new design will be very much based on the existing layout. We definitely don’t want our members to feel lost so our aim is for the NEW site, to offer an improved experience and be similar to but much better than our existing site. We want to improve the user experience for BOTH new users and our existing, loyal members.

      While people might not be happy with McDonalds changing the recipe for their French fries, their decision to move to trans-fat-free oil back in 2008 was generally well received – so think of it this way… at StatCounter we’re not changing what’s in our fries, we’re just changing how we cook them! 😉

      Steve – please also consider testing our new design – we would be most interested in your constructive criticism. If you have some time to help us, then please just mention this blog comment in the “comment” area when signing up.

      Many thanks!

  17. Not sure if this is related to the new site but the session timeout has been slightly decreased over the last couple of days. I was able to keep my session for 1 hour before. Now, you are automatically logged out after 15 to 20 minutes 🙁

  18. I like the simplicity and loading speed of the present site. It has a clean logical layout which would be a shame to compromise for the sake of an update.

    Having said that, visually it could be made more appealing, and maybe some additional functions that you may have up your sleeve, although I haven’t even utilised what you have available anyway.
    Otherwise, cheers for a fantastic service.

    regards
    Craig

  19. The current site is fairly quick and easy to use so PLEASE don’t make the new one ultra slow with too much fancy javascript. I know several services that are a pain to use because my laptop can’t process the javascript fast enough.

    I also would like it if there was more than just blue in the theme, it looks a bit dull even though I like the overall design.

    Simon

    1. Hi Simon,

      Don’t worry! We have no intention of sacrificing the usability/speed of the site for any reason.

      Thanks for your feedback on this!

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