As some of you know, I’m a stats junkie. Since I’m involved with Cleveland web design, I love web analytics and keeping track of who is coming and going from all of Go Media’s sites. I use Google Analytics of course like everyone else. But the problem with Google Analytics, is it’s slow. Oftentimes you have to wait 24 hours or more for your stats to show up. So I tried using ReInvigorate for a free solution to real time stats. It’s been great so far, but my problem is that the most of the real time stats are only for the current date or even less. I can’t look at all my referrers from the past month. But I do get them in real time.

Then I discovered Clicky. They like to call themselves Web Analytics 2.0 – which is a fun buzzword. They are real-time and have a super friendly web 2.0 style interface that makes me feel comfortable. Their stats feel more valuable when designed nice. Weird huh? The numbers are the same as anything else, but because they are well designed, I find myself preferring them over other web analytics apps.

So after I first came across, I signed up right away because I was instantly drawn in by the friendly site design and appeal. It has the same look as most other web 2.0 sites out there, which is probably why I jumped on board. But after using it for awhile, I’m hooked.

One other feature I really like is the ability to output your stats to RSS feeds. This means you can share your stats with anyone, or even put them on your Netvibes or Google Reader pages. I can get stats in my email if I want to. How cool is that? Google Analytics can’t do that! In fact, here’s a chart (although probably a little bias) to compare Clicky to all the other big stat trackers out there.

But the only downside, if there is one, is that this service costs money if you’re a moderately large site. The more traffic you get, the higher price you have to pay for it. But it’s free for anyone to try of course. Go Media falls into their highest tier of pricing, but even that is only $6/month, which is still a good deal.

But anyway, I’ve recently became a sponsor of Clicky’s website because I’m confident they’ll be doing some big things. So if you see our ad on the site, you’ll understand why. If you guys start using it, let me know what you think of it. And tell them Go Media sent you!