Let’s Do it Like They Do it!
filed in Name Appraisals on Dec.24, 2008
I’m not suggesting you replicate the movers and shakers of the web world. It would be naughty if I did. However, if we can learn a free lesson or two, why not? It is always better learning from other peoples’ success than from our own mistakes. Now, how did you like this quote of mine, huh? LOL
Both Alexa and Quantcast give you a wonderful possibility to download a table of the top 1 million most popular web-sites. Some time ago Alexa’s top was a paid service, now it is free.
Download Alexa Million here
and
Quantcast Million here.
Make sure you bookmark this page so that you could come back and download the updates.
Why are Quantcast and Alexa ranking different?
Because they are using different algorythms to gather traffic data. Quantcast’s data is more accurate because they have a line of code embedded in majority of their quanted web-sites while Alexa gathers data from users who have installed Alexa toolbar on their browsers. That means – if you are visited only by users who don’t have an Alexa toolbar, you won’t get any ranking at all. Yet, it is very interesting to look at both tops and compare the data.
What’s the point?
For me it is interesting from domain name appraisal point of view. I usually look at top 500,000 to 1 million results to see which domains rock and rule. It is no good basing domain name appraisal only on this factor alone though.
Newbies can grasp what topics and niches are popular at this very moment from these web-site lists.
I hope you will find these lists useful.
February 6th, 2009 on 5:30 pm
I think alexa needs to change the way they gather data if they are going to provide usefull data infuture most people I know dont have alexa toolbar.
handy list though
February 16th, 2009 on 4:01 pm
I don’t think they will change a concept that is many years old. Even if majority of the folks doesn’t have the Alexa toolbar, it still gives comparatively correct data. Although we have to take the niche into consideration. A lower percentage of housewives will have Alexa compared to us webmasters.
July 20th, 2009 on 11:05 am
though i may agree that alexa’s data is pretty reliable, i also think that them addressing the issue of not getting anything from visitors that do not have the alexa toolbar, would only make things better everybody… by the way your quote is great, cool to learn from people who already made the mistakes…
August 20th, 2009 on 1:28 pm
To date there has been no good way to truly rank websites especially if there busy sites that are close to each other. Alexa is nothing more than an ego tool since most of the people who use it are only interested in their personal project. Alexa is so skewed in it’s results that it should really be closed. At least quantcast is a little better. What would really be useful is if Google analytics started posting rankings. Then you would have a truer yardstick to measure by.