Using Matomo · Knowledge
First steps in Matomo: what to look at after setup?
Matomo greets newcomers with dozens of reports – four of them answer ninety percent of a site owner's questions: the Visits Log, the acquisition overview, the page titles report and the visitors overview.
The habit that beats every dashboard: one fixed fifteen-minute look per week, always at the same views – trends emerge, panic numbers lose their grip.
The four views and the questions they answer
The Visits Log (Visitors → Visits Log) is the microscope: every visit as a sequence – entry page, path, duration, source. It answers “does my tracking work?” during setup and later “how do real people actually move through the site?”; reading ten random visits teaches more UX than an hour of averages. The acquisition overview (Acquisition → Overview and channels) answers “where do visitors come from?” – search engines, direct, referring websites, campaigns; it is the report that turns publishing decisions into feedback loops, especially once campaign parameters (the neighbouring question) tag your newsletters and posts. The page titles report (Behaviour → Page titles) answers “what do people read?” – sorted by views it shows the workhorses, sorted by average time it hints at what genuinely holds attention; for a Joomla site this is the editorial compass. The visitors overview with its evolution graph answers “how is the site doing?” – one line, weeks of context, immune to the Tuesday dip that looks dramatic in isolation. Everything else in Matomo is depth on demand: real-time for launch days, locations when regional reach matters, downloads and outlinks when files are the product. Start with the four, add on real questions only.
Key facts
- Visits Log: single visits under the microscope – setup verification and real user paths.
- Acquisition: search, direct, referrers, campaigns – the feedback loop for publishing decisions.
- Page titles: workhorses by views, attention by time on page – the editorial compass.
- Visitors overview: the trend line that immunises against single-day panic.
- Routine: 15 fixed minutes weekly on the same four views beats daily dashboard staring.