How do statistics work exactly?

[DaelyxLenAuphydas]

Heyo. I'm new here, wanted to try posting stories that underperformed elsewhere here. I went to statistics but I don't think I entirely understand what the statistics actually mean.

So mostly I mean page-views. Are those the total number of people who clicked on the story page? Is it the total number of times clicked even if it wasn't unique accounts? Does it go up every time they read a new chapter, or is it just one view per read through of the whole story? etc.
For that matter is the readers number people who actually read it, or just people who assigned it to a list..?

Mostly just would like to know things like that. Thankyou for your time.

 

[John_Owl]

I'm uncertain exactly, but I've always figured it was views of the story homepage. I usually go "create -> Edit -> Table of contents" To view a chapter by chapter breakdown. I know that shows views of the actual chapter page, rather than those that viewed the story homepage.

 

[LilRora]

The number of views of the story is the sum of all chapter views plus the story page itself (for new stories, the latter will make up the most of that number). I'm pretty sure it doesn't distinguish unique views, just counts up every time any of those are opened.

For the number of readers, that's the number of reading lists your story is on. There's five types of those (labeled as User Stats on the story page), and it sums up all five including dropped. Not sure why, but that's how it works.

 

[DaelyxLenAuphydas]

Ah. Yeah, most of those are probably just myself then. Shucks.

O well, guess thats what I get for occupying the nebulous middle ground between fanfiction and original work.

Anyhoo, thanks for the answers!

 

[Rezcore]

I saw the title and was curious. If you mean on here, I couldn't tell you. In general... I couldn't tell you

 

[CharlesEBrown]

I think the quote Mark Twain attributed (it seems incorrectly) to Bejamin Disraeli summed it up best: "There are three types of lies: Lies, Damned Lies and Statistics"...

 

[RepresentingCaution]

https://onlinestatbook.com/Online_Statistics_Education.pdf

 

[ThrillingHuman]

https://onlinestatbook.com/Online_Statistics_Education.pdf

Beat me to it

 

[SwallowForm]

43.7 per cent of all statistics are made up on the spot