Like a lot of bloggers I have a small, but quiet audience. So I’m a fan of using analytics to see who’s visiting my site. It’s a delight to discover the various corners of the globe that have stumbled upon my writings.
However, most analytics tools don’t cater to this niche market. Google Analytics (GA) is the behemoth of tracking – it’s free but overkill, privacy-invading, and has a confusing web interface. Other choices are limited and often expensive, charging £10-£20/month, which isn’t justifiable for many small bloggers like myself.
As a result I simply haven’t used or cared about analytics for many years. The last time I regularly used one was when Mint was still alive.
That’s why I was thrilled to discover Tinylytics. Their free plan offers 1,000 page hits/month, which is perfect for many bloggers. And if you need more, their paid plan is a very reasonable $5/month – a price I’d gladly pay.
And one of the best features is that you can track up to 5 sites on the free plan and unlimited sites on the paid plan. As a web tinkerer with multiple small sites, this is a game-changer for me.
Also I love the page that explains why they offer a free plan, as it pretty much sums up what I’ve been saying:
A lot of analytics software is too expensive. Period. Heck, I just started a small side project or a personal site and I don’t want to shell out $9 - $14 per month just for analytics that looks pretty.
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There are free options from big providers, but guess what… they’re probably using your data to better meet their own needs and most likely advertisers.
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Having a free plan, from someone that deeply cares, and from an individual, not a huge corporate or venture funded company, is the best start you can give yourself without worrying what will happen with your data. It sits on my server, and is backed up hourly to an offsite encrypted backup. That’s it. Oh and you won’t break the bank either. I think that’s a win win.
If you’re a small blogger looking for an affordable, privacy-focused, and user-friendly analytics solution, I highly recommend giving Tinylytics a try.
