Pageview

{{for|the Johannesburg suburb also known as Fietas|Pageview, Johannesburg}}

{{For|information about pageviews on Wikipedia|Wikipedia:Pageview statistics}}

{{short description|Request to load a web page, tracked for web analytics}}{{Expand German| seitenabruf|date=August 2012}}

In web analytics and website management, a pageview or page view, abbreviated in business to PV and occasionally called page impression, is a request to load a single HTML file (web page) of an Internet site.{{cite book|last=Doyle|first=C.|year=2011|title=A dictionary of marketing|location=Oxford|publisher=Oxford University Press|isbn=9780191727962}} On the World Wide Web, a page request would result from a web surfer clicking on a link on another page pointing to the page in question.

In contrast, a hit refers to a request for any file from a web server. Therefore, there may be many hits per page view since an HTML page can contain multiple files such as images,

videos, JavaScripts, cascading style sheets (CSS), etc.{{cn|date=July 2023}}

On balance, page views refer to a number of pages viewed or clicked on the site during the given time.{{cite web|last=Carey|first=E.|year=2012|title=Page View versus Page Visits - Atlantic Webworks Perspectives|work=Atlanticwebworks|url=https://www.atlanticwebworks.com/blog/page-view-versus-page-visits/|access-date=28 October 2014|archive-date=30 October 2014|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20141030184447/https://www.atlanticwebworks.com/blog/page-view-versus-page-visits/|url-status=live}}

Page views may be counted as part of web analytics. For the owner of the site, this information can be useful to see if any change in the "page" (such as the information or the way it is presented) results in more visits. If there are any advertisements on the page, the publishers would also be interested in the number of page views to determine their expected revenue from the ads. For this reason, it is a term that is used widely for Internet marketing and advertising.{{cite web|last=Bennett|first=L.|date=January 10, 2012|url=https://blog.chartbeat.com/2012/01/10/metrics-that-matter-and-death-of-the-page-view|title=Metrics that Matter & the Death of the Page View|work=Chartbeat Blog|access-date=10 January 2012|archive-date=13 January 2012|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120113070158/https://blog.chartbeat.com/2012/01/10/metrics-that-matter-and-death-of-the-page-view/|url-status=live}}

Feature

The page impression has long been a measure of user activity on a website. However, the activity is not necessarily associated with loading a complete HTML page. Modern programming techniques can serve pages by other means that don't show as HTTP requests.

Since page views help estimate the popularity of sites, it helps determine their value for advertising revenue. The most common metric is CPM. It stands for 'Cost per thousand'(the M is the Roman numeral for 1,000){{cite web|author=Heisel, C.|date=November 30, 2008|title=What does CPM stand for?|work=Chris Heisel|url=https://chrisheisel.com/2008/11/30/what-does-cpm-mean/|access-date=30 October 2014|archive-date=19 October 2014|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20141019232053/https://chrisheisel.com/2008/11/30/what-does-cpm-mean/|url-status=live}} and it is commonly used metrics to measure page views divided by the thousands, that is, cost per 1000 views, used for the ad rates and thus, the less CPM is, the better deal it offers to advertisers.{{cite web|author=Scocco, D.|date=March 27, 2008|title=How Much Should I Charge for my Advertising Space? : @ProBlogger|work=Problogger.net|url=https://www.problogger.net/archives/2008/03/27/how-much-should-i-charge-for-my-advertising-space/|access-date=30 October 2014|archive-date=30 October 2014|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20141030174902/https://www.problogger.net/archives/2008/03/27/how-much-should-i-charge-for-my-advertising-space/|url-status=live}}

However, there has been a growing concern that CPM is not as trustworthy as it looks in the advertising market because, although, with CPM arrangement, everyone who visits a site makes publishers’ money, for an advertiser's view, CPM is being challenged in comparison to CPC or CPA in terms of adverts’ efficiency because visiting does not mean clicking the ads.{{cite web|author=Johnston, M.|year=2013|title=CPM vs CPC vs CPA: How to Sell Display Ads|work=Monetizepros.com|url=https://monetizepros.com/blog/2013/how-to-sell-display-ads-cpm-vs-cpc-vs-cpa/|access-date=30 October 2014|archive-date=7 November 2014|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20141107215330/https://monetizepros.com/blog/2013/how-to-sell-display-ads-cpm-vs-cpc-vs-cpa/|url-status=live}}

Measurement

The preferred way to count page views is using a web analytics software. They can measure the number of pages on any site and therefore, it helps people to receive a rough estimate of page views on web sites.{{cite web|author=Agarwal, A.|year=2008|title=Measure the Number of Page Views on any Site|work=Digital Inspiration|url=https://www.labnol.org/internet/tools/measure-page-views-of-websites/5252/|access-date=30 October 2014|archive-date=30 October 2014|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20141030181632/https://www.labnol.org/internet/tools/measure-page-views-of-websites/5252/|url-status=dead}} There are also many other page view measurement tools available including open source ones as well as licensed products.

Hit ratio

Hit ratio refers to the percentage of computer memory accesses (number of HTTPS requests delivered per requests received) that are found in certain levels of the memory hierarchy. In other words, it is a measure of content requests that a web caching system can deliver successfully from its cache storage, compared to how many requests it receives.{{Cite web|title=What is Cache Hit Ratio?|url=https://www.stackpath.com/edge-academy/what-is-cache-hit-ratio|access-date=1 February 2022|website=www.stackpath.com|date=24 May 2021 |language=english|archive-date=1 February 2022|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220201174813/https://www.stackpath.com/edge-academy/what-is-cache-hit-ratio|url-status=live}}{{Cite web|last=McKinnon|first=Jenni|date=2 July 2019|title=Hit and Miss Ratios, and how to calculate them|url=https://wp-rocket.me/blog/calculate-hit-and-miss-ratios/|access-date=2022-02-01|website=WP Rocket|archive-date=2022-02-01|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220201174812/https://wp-rocket.me/blog/calculate-hit-and-miss-ratios/|url-status=live}}

There are two types of hit ratios:

Cache hit ratio, referring to number of requests made;{{Cite book |last=Wessels |first=Duane |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=fVuWayXLdYIC&q=9781565925366 |title=Web Caching |date=June 2001 |publisher=O'Reilly Media, Inc. |isbn=978-1-56592-536-6 |pages=193–200 |oclc=1100903884}}
Byte hit ratio, referring to amount of bandwidth that a browser's caching system has saved.{{Cite web |date=July 2001 |title=Hit Ratios - Web Caching [Book] |url=https://www.oreilly.com/library/view/web-caching/156592536X/ch02s04.html#:~:text=The%20byte%20hit%20ratio%20measures,doesn't%20include%20request%20traffic. |access-date=12 March 2022 |website=www.oreilly.com}}

Criticism and concerns

Despite a wide range of uses of page view, it has come in for criticisms.

=Manipulation=

Page view can be manipulated or boosted for specific purposes.{{cite web|author=Holiday, R.|year=2012|title=What is Media Manipulation?—A Definition and Explanation|work=Forbes|url=https://www.forbes.com/sites/ryanholiday/2012/07/16/what-is-media-manipulation-a-definition-and-explanation/|access-date=30 October 2014|archive-date=30 October 2014|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20141030220312/https://www.forbes.com/sites/ryanholiday/2012/07/16/what-is-media-manipulation-a-definition-and-explanation/|url-status=live}} For example, a recent incident, called 'page view fraud', compromised the accuracy of measurement of page view by boosting the page view. Perpetrators used a tool called 'a bot' to buy fake page-views for attention, recognition, and feedback, increasing the site's value.{{cite web|author=Seidel, L.|year=2014|title=The Pageview Fraud, PLEASE READ! by Lilyas on deviantART|work=Lilyas.deviantart.com|url=https://lilyas.deviantart.com/journal/The-Pageview-Fraud-PLEASE-READ-220928240|access-date=30 October 2014|archive-date=11 November 2014|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20141111020731/https://lilyas.deviantart.com/journal/The-Pageview-Fraud-PLEASE-READ-220928240|url-status=live}}

As a result, some people already started building alternatives to measure audiences, such as "Ophan", saying that the page view is becoming passe.{{cite web|author=Fischer, M.|date=March 18, 2014|title=The Pageview is Passé: New Metrics Emerge to Measure Audiences|work=American Journalism Review|url=https://ajr.org/2014/03/18/pageview-passe-new-metrics-emerge-measure-audiences/|access-date=30 October 2014|archive-date=30 October 2014|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20141030190913/https://ajr.org/2014/03/18/pageview-passe-new-metrics-emerge-measure-audiences/|url-status=live}}

=Humans vs. machines=

Fake page views can reflect bots instead of humans.{{cite web | url=https://www.dmnews.com/channel-marketing/social/news/13057066/no-more-fake-page-views-from-machines-google-analytics-introduces-botfiltering | title=No more fake page views from machines! Google Analytics introduces "bot-filtering" | work=The Hub | date=July 31, 2014 | access-date=August 20, 2016 | author=Akhtar, Omar | archive-date=February 20, 2019 | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190220063112/https://www.dmnews.com/channel-marketing/social/news/13057066/no-more-fake-page-views-from-machines-google-analytics-introduces-botfiltering | url-status=live }}

Wikipedia pageviews

Wikipedia provides tools that allow one to see how many people have visited a Wikipedia article during a given time period. Such have been used for tools that for instance display the most popular articles of the day.{{cite web|title=Making our pageview data easily accessible – Wikimedia Blog|url=https://blog.wikimedia.org/2015/12/14/pageview-data-easily-accessible/|website=Wikimedia Blog|date=14 December 2015|access-date=30 April 2017|archive-date=11 April 2017|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170411115111/https://blog.wikimedia.org/2015/12/14/pageview-data-easily-accessible/|url-status=live}} Wikipedia pageviews of certain types of articles correlate with changes in stock market prices,{{cite journal|last1=Moat|first1=Helen Susannah|last2=Curme|first2=Chester|last3=Avakian|first3=Adam|last4=Kenett|first4=Dror Y.|last5=Stanley|first5=H. Eugene|last6=Preis|first6=Tobias|title=Quantifying Wikipedia Usage Patterns Before Stock Market Moves|journal=Scientific Reports|date=8 May 2013|volume=3|pages=1801|doi=10.1038/srep01801|issn=2045-2322|pmc=3647164|bibcode= }} box office success of movies,{{cite journal|last1=Mestyán|first1=Márton|last2=Yasseri|first2=Taha|last3=Kertész|first3=János|title=Early Prediction of Movie Box Office Success Based on Wikipedia Activity Big Data|journal=PLOS ONE|date=21 August 2013|volume=8|issue=8|pages=e71226|doi=10.1371/journal.pone.0071226|pmid=23990938|pmc=3749192|arxiv=1211.0970|bibcode=2013PLoSO...871226M|issn=1932-6203|doi-access=free}} spread of disease{{cite journal|last1=R.|first1=Laurent, Michaël|last2=J.|first2=Vickers, Tim|title=Seeking Health Information Online: Does Wikipedia Matter?|journal=Journal of the American Medical Informatics Association|date=1 July 2009|volume=16|issue=4|doi=10.1197/jamia.M3059|pmid=19390105|url= |language=en|issn=1067-5027|pages=471–479|pmc=2705249}}{{cite journal|last1=McIver|first1=David J.|last2=Brownstein|first2=John S.|title=Wikipedia Usage Estimates Prevalence of Influenza-Like Illness in the United States in Near Real-Time|journal=PLOS Computational Biology|date=17 April 2014|volume=10|issue=4|pages=e1003581|doi=10.1371/journal.pcbi.1003581|pmid=24743682|pmc=3990502|bibcode=2014PLSCB..10E3581M|issn=1553-7358 |doi-access=free }} among other applications of datamining. Since search engines directly influence what is popular on Wikipedia such statistics may provide a more unfiltered and real-time view into what people are searching for on the Web{{cite journal|last1=Spoerri|first1=Anselm|title=What is popular on Wikipedia and why?|journal=First Monday|date=2 April 2007|volume=12|issue=4|url=https://firstmonday.org/ojs/index.php/fm/article/view/1765/1645|access-date=30 April 2017|doi=10.5210/fm.v12i4.1765|archive-date=5 May 2017|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170505045715/https://www.firstmonday.org/ojs/index.php/fm/article/view/1765/1645|url-status=live |doi-access= free}} and societal interests.{{cite journal|last1=Huss|first1=Jon W.|last2=Lindenbaum|first2=Pierre|last3=Martone|first3=Michael|last4=Roberts|first4=Donabel|last5=Pizarro|first5=Angel|last6=Valafar|first6=Faramarz|last7=Hogenesch|first7=John B.|last8=Su|first8=Andrew I.|title=The Gene Wiki: community intelligence applied to human gene annotation|journal=Nucleic Acids Research|date=1 January 2010|volume=38|issue=suppl_1|pages=D633–D639|doi=10.1093/nar/gkp760|pmid=19755503|pmc=2808918|url=|language=en|issn=0305-1048}} For instance they can be used to gain insights into public anxiety and information seeking after or during events{{cite journal|last1=Tausczik|first1=Yla|last2=Faasse|first2=Kate|last3=Pennebaker|first3=James W.|last4=Petrie|first4=Keith J.|title=Public Anxiety and Information Seeking Following the H1N1 Outbreak: Blogs, Newspaper Articles, and Wikipedia Visits|journal=Health Communication|date=1 February 2012|volume=27|issue=2|pages=179–185|doi=10.1080/10410236.2011.571759|pmid=21827326|s2cid=3783651|issn=1041-0236}} or for the identification of concepts with significant increase of interest from the public.{{cite book|last1=Ciglan|first1=Marek|last2=Nørv\a ag|first2=Kjetil|title=Proceedings of the 19th ACM international conference on Information and knowledge management |chapter=WikiPop |date=1 January 2010|pages=1931–1932|doi=10.1145/1871437.1871769|isbn=9781450300995|s2cid=15890386}} In 2015, a study conducted by the Association for the Advancement of Artificial Intelligence (AAAI) examined the influence of Reddit posts on Wikipedia pageviews.{{cite journal|title=Determining the influence of reddit posts on wikipedia pageviews, AAAI Workshop - Technical Report, 2015, WS-15-19 pp. 75 - 82|url=https://www.aaai.org/ocs/index.php/ICWSM/ICWSM15/paper/view/10655|access-date=11 May 2020|journal=|archive-date=6 August 2020|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200806012029/https://www.aaai.org/ocs/index.php/ICWSM/ICWSM15/paper/view/10655|url-status=dead}}

Pageview

Feature

Advertisement

Measurement

Hit ratio

Criticism and concerns

=Manipulation=

=Humans vs. machines=

Wikipedia pageviews

See also

References

Further reading