HUD's Web Management Operating Procedures

Section 3: Management Controls

J. Using Web Analytical Tools

The Departmental Web Team has developed a number of tools to help Web Managers and Web Coordinators improve the website.

• Statistical reports (Webtrends): Statistics for HUD's websites are published monthly, normally by the middle of the month. Statistics can be very useful in
  • Promoting the website with both internal and external audiences (Did you know that HUD's website had more than 1 million unique visitors last month? Did you know that the "homebuying" page was the most used page this month?)
  • Identifying navigation problems - if you think a page should be getting more use than it is, then maybe you need to change the navigation to that page, so it's more prominent
    
    
• 404 error reports: These reports help you spot bad links - links to pages no longer available. See Appendix L for instructions on its use.
  
  
• File management reports - these reports help Web Managers identify files currently on the production server. You can use this report to find files that should be removed or archived.
  
  
• Linkbot reports: Linkbot reports help identify broken links.
  
  
• American Customer Satisfaction Inventory (ASCI): The ACSI helps us get feedback from citizens and partners who use our Internet websites, about their perception of the sites. Customer satisfaction scores help us know our audiences' perceptions about our sites. They may or may not actually reflect how well audiences can use our sites.
  
  
• Usability tests: usability testing helps us know what our audiences actually do on our sites. These tests can help us determine where we've got navigation problems or wording problems.