Network visualisation as a way to the web usage analysis

Abstract

PurposeThe aim of this paper is to present network visualisation as a way to analyse and to test the design of a website.Design/methodology/approachA network graph of the access to the webometrics.info site from its web logs was analysed. Several graphs (navigational and query graphs) with different added variables were explored. SNA indicators were used to extract the main findings of these networks.FindingsThe results show the double structure of the two language versions, the central position of the search engines as hubs that distribute the access to every page, how the pages are grouped by their thematic and structural relationships, and which pages are less requested through search engines queries or are less visible.Research limitations/implicationsThe results are based on the web performance of only one website and therefore generalisation has to be cautious.Originality/valueThe application of network visualisation and SNA indicators allows to explore the navigation of a website by users and to test how it is used. The graph representation makes possible an intuitive way to observe the structure of a website, the behaviour of users and information consumption.