Ever feel like you’re being watched? No, not by the geek in tech that has nothing better to do than watch individual’s web traffic or read everyone’s work email. Bigger than that, like watching an ant farm and you’re one of the ants.

Well there might be some truth to that feeling after all, at least on the internet.

Hitwise monitors 25 million U.S. internet users through their Internet Service Providers, which offers an opportunity to better understand web behavior and exactly where traffic is coming and going. Imagine having analytics for your site and everyone else’s, especially your competitors. It’s truly like stepping back and looking into an ant farm.

I’ve been a proponent of Hitwise for awhile; the difference is that now I HAVE ACCESS and will be crunching data and sharing the intimate details.

Go figure, Ray has already beaten me to the graphing and statistics punch.

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Yesterday Forbes’ Matthew Kirdahy released their Best Cities For Jobs In 2008, which ranks the Top 100 cities in America for projected job growth. Instead of listing all 100 I thought I’d stick with a Top 10 list ala David Letterman… Drum roll please….

1) Salt Lake City, UT
2) Wichita, KS
3) Austin, TX
4) Atlanta, GA
5) Fort Worth, TX
6) Indianapolis, IN
7) Houston, TX
8) Omaha, NE
9) Raleigh, NC
10) Seattle, WA

I was happy to see Forbes project Indianapolis, Indiana as one of the Top 10 Best Cities for Jobs in 2008. You’ll also notice an extremely strong showing from the state of Texas holding 3 of the Top 10 positions, while Atlanta’s job growth is only overshadowed by their traffic woes. - full article -

Indianapolis, Indiana

For more Best Cities in Jobs 2008 pictures click here

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RE: Web 2.0 Vendor Advice

The set-up:
Imagine hundreds of Fortune 500 companies focused on recruitment best practices, industry intelligence, technology, and labor market efficiencies. That’s DirectEmployers Association, a non-profit recruitment leadership group focused on more than merely round-table discussions, oh don’t get me wrong our monthly discussions are incredibly popular, although we focus on implementing and executing measurable initiatives, not just talking about them.

Where’s the advice? Patience, I’m getting there.

The situation:
Since DirectEmployers represents an extremely progressive group of staffing leaders from large companies, we are the target of every web 2.0 vendor in the world looking to spread the word of their new and bountiful offering to our membership. Okay, I get it, you have a great product. Although I won’t partner with a vendor unless they can provide results driven proof, a solid case study complete with hiring companies, preferably from one of our members, backing your data.

Hell, I’ll even blog about it if your numbers are solid and backed by hiring companies.

The Advice:
1) Vendors MUST have solid case studies available with real companies and real people available as references. 2) When presenting your case bring a user in to provide best practices and success stories instead of selling concepts laden with cool and hip web 2.0 buzz words.

Chad-fucius say… Provide examples of real success and you will receive real success in return. (a.k.a.) Find out what works and beat it too death with a stick!

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Real analytical data and competitive intelligence is vital in understanding how to better leverage your corporate career site and since Alexa has been unofficially labeled as a TOY, I have received calls and emails asking for a good alternative.

Enter Hitwise… I was introduced to Hitwise by one of our members, via demonstration, and was instantly hooked. Why? DATA!! Not just plain old “How many uniques do I get per month” data, I mean data complete with ranking, charting, upstream traffic, downstream traffic, search behavior, demographics, lifestyle, and even conversion ratios.

Best of all, Hitwise provides the same type of data from your competitor’s site. That’s right, no more guessing how popular job boards and other hiring companies are driving top talent to their site. No it’s not cheating; it’s more like an open book test where all of the answers were highlighted by the smart guy in last year’s class.

For example, imagine having all of the top search engine terms that drive candidates to you competitor’s site. You could then apply those terms to your search engine marketing program, to siphon traffic (potential candidates) away from your competitors, while implementing your SEO campaign to rank better organically for those same terms on Google, Yahoo, etc.

Best of all, the open book tests don’t stop there, and luckily that smart guy has highlighted much, much more.

No, Hitwise isn’t free, but that’s the difference between playing with a toy and leveraging a tool. Check out a fairly quick Hitwise tour, and plug your reader into the Hitwise research analyst blogs (Bill, Heather, Robin, and Sandra) for new trends.

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I have long thought of Alexa as more of a toy than a tool, but instead of focusing on my thoughts let’s see what others are saying.

Alexa needs an overhaul. It’s long since become less than useful. - TechCrunch by Michael Arrington

There are a number of flaws in the way Alexa operates. First of all, it’s terribly easy to spoof Alexa with the right requests to make it think your website is more popular than it really it…. Alexa seems like something that was invented 10 years ago and expected to withstand the ravages of time (and hackers). - Ugh!!’s Greymatter Honeypot by Owen

I have always doubted Alexa’s scores for two reasons: one we don’t know what the sampling size is, and two we don’t know who is being sampled. So it is impossible to derive any meaningful conclusion based on the Alexa score. - Thoughts from the edge of the ‘net by François Schiettecatte’s Blog

While Alexa is fun, there are better systems out there.. - TechWag

Measuring traffic levels for blogs, etc., would be difficult. But, Google and YouTube? That’s pathetic. - BPMonaco by Brennan

I’ve been saying it for a while now, but Alexa stats are utterly useless. - HireCalling by David Manaster

I’ll end all of the commentary with the following advice…

…just be careful with your Alexa proclamations. While an indicator of what’s hip, Alexa numbers are by no means an indicator of the larger truth. - Bold Internet Blog

I couldn’t have said it better myself….

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