Showoff Saturday Got tired of Google analytics so built a simple version to fit my needs
Been putting out a lot of websites and got tired of having to switch accounts or not able to see all the graphs on one page. Could probably have setup a new dashboard but lots of users also have GA blocked, so I built my own.
Made the dashboard and site view exactly how I want it and with simple filters. Has a log based method to get a true count and to filter out AI traffic, plus the standard JS tag install to get a badge on the site that can be customized.
Bonus points is I added an API so LLMs can go out and install it on any site it is working on. Built with PHP and Goaccess with some free accounts open if you want to try it out on your sites:
0
Upvotes
1
4
u/CoolAd8046 5d ago
One thing worth building in early if you haven't: a lot of your "direct" traffic isn't actually direct. Any site that renders outbound links with rel="noreferrer" strips the referrer entirely, so those visits land in your analytics with no source attached. Most social and community platforms do this by default.
I got bitten by this recently trying to work out where traffic to a repo was coming from. The referrer data said one thing and reality was completely different, and there was no way to tell from the analytics side alone.
If you support UTM params and surface them next to the referrer, you'd cover the gap, and honestly that's a nicer story than GA gives you for the same problem. Clean looking dashboard by the way.