5 Tips for Negotiating A Winning Web Analytics Contract

web analytics contractIf you are a web analytics manager or a senior web analyst then one of your job responsibilities is to negotiate analytics contracts. Like any other technology vendor contracts, the web analytics contract contains a multiple level of intricacies. Some of the technical jargons make it really hard to sign a good contract.

In this post, I am going to provide 5 powerful tips to pull a winning contract and become a hero in your organization. These tips are time tested and proven to work. I have personally used them to significantly reduce our enterprise analytics software cost and get more value add services on top of it.

#1. Request for Proposal (RFP) to multiple vendors

Always make sure to send out the request for proposal to multiple vendors. Getting multiple vendors to compete with each other puts you in the driver seat of negotiating the contract. You can use one contract to negotiate the terms on others. I would even inform each vendor that you have sent out RFPs to multiple vendors.

#2. Server calls

server calls

 

Even if you are a killer ninja negotiator, and you feel you have negotiated a low price contract for your organization. This still does not guarantee you will be paying less.

One of the most important line items of the web analytics contracts is the annual server calls volume. Your analytics account manager / sales rep may try to convince you for a lower server call volume so don’t book yourself weak. I use a “5x rule of thumb” to calculate the forecasted server calls volume because it allows you to scale easily. Here is the formula -

New Contract Annual Server Call Volume =

Total server calls for the highest traffic month in last three years (traffic from all tagged sections of your website and campaigns) x 5 x 12

You could definitely go higher than 5x multiple, but you should never go lower than that.

#3. Length of the contract

The length of the contract is another lever that your vendor could use to charge more money. As a best practice you should always sign only a 12 month long contract, unless it’s free. :)

If you are concerned that you could lose money if the web analytics package prices go up then let me assure you that the prices of basic web analytics software are forecasted to go down. The reason behind is the increase in competition and exponential growth of the free Google Analytics solution.

Additionally, short term contracts allow you to shop around for better and more powerful solutions.

#4. Support hours

This is the most interesting piece of your analytics contract. You could pay a ton of money unknowingly for small issues like an account reset or lost password. Always negotiate to get free support if not then atleast try to get 10 hours of free support each month.

#5. Implementation & User Training

Most enterprise level analytics implementation and integrations are complicated. Your analytics vendor may charge you extra for new integrations or implementations. Always ask your vendor to train your web developers on web analytics implementations.

live training

 

Lastly, negotiate a free live training package for all the web analyst in your organization.

In most medium to large business organizations, contract negotiation is done by procurement. If this applies to your organization then you can provide these tips to your procurement manager.

Hope you enjoyed this post. Please share your thoughts, insights and comments because it really helps me write more effectively.

Here is a list of other helpful blog posts -
5 Web Analytics Predictions for 2010 and Beyond
Troubleshooting Website Traffic drop with Web Analytics
Top 5 Coolest Web Analytics iPhone Apps

http://www.keywebmetrics.com/wp-content/plugins/sociofluid/images/digg_48.png http://www.keywebmetrics.com/wp-content/plugins/sociofluid/images/reddit_48.png http://www.keywebmetrics.com/wp-content/plugins/sociofluid/images/stumbleupon_48.png http://www.keywebmetrics.com/wp-content/plugins/sociofluid/images/delicious_48.png http://www.keywebmetrics.com/wp-content/plugins/sociofluid/images/sphinn_48.png http://www.keywebmetrics.com/wp-content/plugins/sociofluid/images/twitter_48.png

Case Study: Using Web Analytics to Optimize Media buy

I recently participated in a case study with Omniture Inc., (Adobe company) on the campaign attribution success stories. The case study explains how Rackspace Hosting used Omniture Genesis & Eyeblaster integration to improve our media buy campaign attribution and performance.

Here are some of the actionable insights -

I have acquired special permission from Adobe to allow my blog readers to directly download this informative case study. Enjoy reading and please share your feedback, comments and tweets :)

ScreenHunter 05 Jan. 18 15

http://www.keywebmetrics.com/wp-content/plugins/sociofluid/images/digg_48.png http://www.keywebmetrics.com/wp-content/plugins/sociofluid/images/reddit_48.png http://www.keywebmetrics.com/wp-content/plugins/sociofluid/images/stumbleupon_48.png http://www.keywebmetrics.com/wp-content/plugins/sociofluid/images/delicious_48.png http://www.keywebmetrics.com/wp-content/plugins/sociofluid/images/sphinn_48.png http://www.keywebmetrics.com/wp-content/plugins/sociofluid/images/twitter_48.png

5 Web Analytics Predictions for 2010 and Beyond

I still can’t believe that 2009 has come to an end, and I want to take this opportunity to thank you for your comments, feedbacks and retweets. Your input has helped me become a better analytics blogger.

In this post, I will talk about my version of the web analytics predictions for the new year 2010.

#1. Web Analytics becomes Multi Channel Analytics

Web analytics has evolved from being a niche segment of the online marketing world to become a big piece of the web optimization pie. 2009 was the turning point for web analytics with free solutions like Google Analytics becomes more beefier and the shocking acquisition of the Omniture Inc. by Adobe systems.

web optimization

Web Analytics is definitely not a standalone system anymore. I remember when Omniture co-founder Josh James announced in their 2009 summit, that “we are a web optimization company”. He was clearly trying to reposition his company from being a pureplay web analytics company to a web optimization organization.

In 2010, web analytics will play a bigger role in multi channel analytics. Offline marketing initiatives will be closely integrated with web analytics tools and systems. Partner and referral marketing will be aligned with analytics systems to provide a holistic view of the marketing & sales performance.

#2. Enterprise Analytics Companies will offer free / almost free Analytics solutions

Google Analytics entered the enterprise analytics battle with full throttle in 2009 when they announced several new advanced features. New features such as analytics intelligence, annotations, mobile reporting, and custom variables became instantly successful. Google’s strategy of leveraging the analytics guru Avinash Kaushik’s brand evangelism paid off big time.

In order to survive and thrive in 2010, enterprise analytics solution providers will offer free basic web analytics software as a value-add with a high dollar online marketing package. Companies will focus more on services side of the analytics technology to acquire new and keep existing customer until someone comes up with a highly advanced analytics solutions (prediction #4).

#3. Mobile Analytics 2.0 will become the new buzz word

iphone analytics

In a fascinating post at the search engine land website, Joshua Odmark explained why this is the best time to focus on mobile marketing. Here are some of the staggering statistics mentioned in his post-

This exponential growth has already resulted in availability of mobile analytics tracking in popular web analytics tools. 2010 will be the year when mobile analytics will evolve from being a cookie based technology to pulse based real time analytics. The new analytics technology will be based on the International Mobile Subscriber Identity (IMSI) number. This is an absolute unique number tying each subscriber back to their service provider.

Mobile analytics 2.0 will be beyond normal pages views, videos / mobile app usage. It will rely on the capturing the unique pulse data that a mobile phone emits to the nearest cell phone tower. Commonly known as the cell phone ‘heart beat’ this pulse carries the IMSI number. The mobile phone pulse is always active even when you are not using the phone, unless the phone is switched off.

The data from each pulse is stored with the phone service provider. Imagine the possibilities of using this data for behavior analytics. This technology will allow companies to get the entire social graph of a consumer. Personal information like their favorite hang outs, best friends, favorite restaurant and lot more will be accessible. This does sound scary and it will soon become a reality even after the rising concerns about privacy.

#4. Integration of Predictive analytical tools with Web analytics

Predicting the future outcome using historical traffic data has always been a fascinating topic for me. You are not alone if your senior management asks you to prepare a web traffic and conversion forecast model. Analytics providers will soon incorporate a predictive analysis system like SPSS into the web analytics logic.

For web analysts, that will mean greater success will day to day analysis and will make them a hero in their organization. For marketer managers, that potentially means greater success with marketing campaigns and higher roi.

#5. Automated Web Analytics Integration Technologies Emerge

Integrating web analytics software packages with CRM, adserver, and sales software has always been a pain in the neck. The promise of a “seamless integration” by the vendor falls flat when the rubber hits the road. The core issue is that the web analytics providers try to sell a one for all solutions for integrations. They fail to understand the intricate details of technical infrastructure of each organization.

Analytics providers will soon develop more sophisticated integration technologies to provide truly seamless integrations. This would allow web analyst to focus on actionable insights without getting their hands dirty ;) .

Hope you enjoyed this post. Please share your thoughts, insights and comments because it really helps me write more effectively. Have a happy and prosperous new year :)

new year 2010

http://www.keywebmetrics.com/wp-content/plugins/sociofluid/images/digg_48.png http://www.keywebmetrics.com/wp-content/plugins/sociofluid/images/reddit_48.png http://www.keywebmetrics.com/wp-content/plugins/sociofluid/images/stumbleupon_48.png http://www.keywebmetrics.com/wp-content/plugins/sociofluid/images/delicious_48.png http://www.keywebmetrics.com/wp-content/plugins/sociofluid/images/sphinn_48.png http://www.keywebmetrics.com/wp-content/plugins/sociofluid/images/twitter_48.png

Top 5 Coolest Web Analytics iPhone Apps

Apple applications are raging the world by storm. There is hardly anyone who would not love to have one of these Apple mini computers. Web Analyst are not left behind and there are several apps that could improve analyst productivity.

#1. Analytics App ($5.99)

ScreenHunter 02 Dec. 29 11

Analytics App allows you quick access Google Analytics on iphone/ipod touch. You can instantly get a snapshot of your GA account or access detailed analytics reports. One of the most reviewed GA app, analytics app allows you to create custom reports on the fly from within the app itself.

ScreenHunter 03 Dec. 29 11

#2. HootSuite ($1.99)

YouTube Preview Image

After the exponential success of their web based application, Hootsuite recently launched the Hootsuite iPhone app. The iphone app is packed with same Hootsuite features like scheduling tweets, twitter list access, Twitter analytics and lot more.

ScreenHunter 04 Dec. 29 12

#3. Omniture SiteCatalyst (Free for Omniture SiteCat Customers)

sitecatalyst-iphone

If you are an enterprise analytics evangelist and love SiteCatalyst then SiteCatalyst iPhone app is a perfect fit. The app allows you to access SiteCatalyst reports and dashboards on the go. You can also access mobile analytics data from the sitecat app. The only drawback is the app does not displays advanced graphs like funnel visualization and geo segments.

ScreenHunter 05 Dec. 29 12

#4. Ego App ($1.99)

ScreenHunter 06 Dec. 29 12

One of the coolest features of the Ego app is the ability to view the Feedburner statistics. The app displays statistics for several other services including Google Analytics, Twitter and Vimeo.

ScreenHunter 07 Dec. 29 12

#4. SEM Calculator (Free)

ScreenHunter 08 Dec. 29 12

SEM calculator has several complex paid search analytics calculations built into one app. Web Analyst often find themselves at the mercy of the SEM vendor for ppc calculations. This app increases analyst productivity by providing multiple calculations at your fingertip. When you are on the road or in a meeting, you can instantly calculate CPM, CPA, and other ppc campaign metrics.

ScreenHunter 09 Dec. 29 12

Hope you enjoyed this post. Email me if you have any questions. Please share your thoughts, insights and comments because it really helps me write more effectively.

http://www.keywebmetrics.com/wp-content/plugins/sociofluid/images/digg_48.png http://www.keywebmetrics.com/wp-content/plugins/sociofluid/images/reddit_48.png http://www.keywebmetrics.com/wp-content/plugins/sociofluid/images/stumbleupon_48.png http://www.keywebmetrics.com/wp-content/plugins/sociofluid/images/delicious_48.png http://www.keywebmetrics.com/wp-content/plugins/sociofluid/images/sphinn_48.png http://www.keywebmetrics.com/wp-content/plugins/sociofluid/images/twitter_48.png

PPC 2.0: Google’s Top 3 Paid Search Updates

Paid search has always been my second hobby after the web analytics. It is pretty amazing how paid search has evolved over time.

With significant growth in social media, paid search growth has slowed down a bit year over year. According to latest research done by Forrester Research, Inc., more businesses will shift a larger percentage of their budget towards the social media marketing in next three years.

ScreenHunter 01 Dec. 14 11

Source: March 2009 US Interactive Marketing Forecast Online Survey by Forrester Research, Inc.

Google being the biggest player in paid search marketing (more than half of their revenue comes from paid search), is ready to accept the challenge.

YouTube Preview Image

Besides adding live twitter updates (watch the video for details) in organic listings to improve search relevancy, Google is testing a lot of new things on the paid search side.

Here are some of the most useful updates on Google paid search-

Paid Search Site Links

Paid search site links is one of the coolest feature available to advertisers on brand terms only. It looks similar to the organic search sites links.

sitelinks

PPC site links offers more visibility on the sponsored links providing a better search experience for users and a higher brand term CTR for advertisers. The links can be used to display multiple offer pages or different product/service offerings.

This is definitely my highest recommended paid search feature. If you have not activated this feature on your account yet then talk to your search/account manager now.

PPC Image Ads

Google is now displaying product images (product extention) on the SERP sponsored listings for some of its advertisers. Advertisers can display multiple product image ads directly in the search results.

Advertisers will be charged on a cost-per-click (CPC) basis. The CPC will be the same for clicks on any one of the image ads. The ads can be controlled from the Google Merchant Center. These ads are triggered when someone searches for the keywords in your adwords keywords list.

This could definitely improve the click through and it will be interesting to see how this feature could clutter the search listings once its out of beta.

product-image

Product Listing Ads

Google recently announced the product listing ads feature. The output of this new feature looks similar to the product extention ads but the key difference is the spend model. PLA is focused on the cost-per-action (CPA) performance model. Advertisers will only pay once a user completes a purchase on their site.

Another key differentiator between the Product Extention ads and the Product Listing ads is there is no need for keywords list or ad copy for the latter. Google’s adwords engine automatically pulls the entire inventory from the advertisers Google Merchant Center based on search keyword relevance.

This is a pretty significant step from Google to incorporate the organic search relevancy to paid search.

ScreenHunter 04 Dec. 14 12

Hope you enjoyed this post. Email me if you have any questions. Please share your thoughts, insights and comments because it really helps me write more effectively.

http://www.keywebmetrics.com/wp-content/plugins/sociofluid/images/digg_48.png http://www.keywebmetrics.com/wp-content/plugins/sociofluid/images/reddit_48.png http://www.keywebmetrics.com/wp-content/plugins/sociofluid/images/stumbleupon_48.png http://www.keywebmetrics.com/wp-content/plugins/sociofluid/images/delicious_48.png http://www.keywebmetrics.com/wp-content/plugins/sociofluid/images/sphinn_48.png http://www.keywebmetrics.com/wp-content/plugins/sociofluid/images/twitter_48.png

Troubleshooting Website Traffic drop with Web Analytics

Web analyst often take emotionally driven decisions in their analysis and this can often lead to unwanted issues. Identifying the exact cause of web traffic drop should be done in a highly systematic way. In order to help you troubleshoot traffic and conversion drop I want to share outcome based analysis approach.

Step#1. Analytics Intelligence (AI)

Your first step is to prepare yourself for future incidence and web traffic/conversion related issues. Google Analytics recently launched automatic intelligence alert feature. Using statistical significance analysis, the analytics system calculates and creates alerts in the “Intelligence reports” if data is out of trend.

You can also create custom alerts and setup auto email functionality when the alert is triggered. Here is a quick video on how to setup automatic and custom alerts using Google analytics intelligence.

YouTube Preview Image

Omniture Sitecatalyt offers custom alert feature with every report. Omniture’s alert feature is more advanced because it can send you email and text messages to your cell phone.

google analytics custom alerts

Step#2. Prepare control limit graph

Website traffic/conversion/bounce rate can fluctuate due to multiple uncontrollable environmental factors. You could see a spike in traffic due to a press release from top competitor or you could see a drop in conversion due to technical issues. Whatever the case is, it is your job as web analyst to identify a true trend and eliminate noise from data.

To eliminate noise, we will apply statistical control limits to visits data for the last 90 days. This will allow us to identify a true drop in traffic.

Calculate your website visits upper control limit (UCL) and lower control limit (LCL) using control chart calculator.

Sample size = 90

statistical control limits

Prepare a graph for your website visit with the control limits data. In my previous post I explained how to create the control limits graph.

The sample graph below clearly indicates that the traffic has been dropping consistently since week 3. This requires immediate segmentation of data to find out the “suspect” channel.

contro limit chart

Step#3. Create custom segments

By default, Google analytics does not offer email, banner or other campaign segments. Here is a quick video to create custom segments in Google Analytics.

YouTube Preview Image

Omniture Sitecatalyst offers paid search reporting feature. If this feature is not enabled then you can enable this feature from “Report Suite Manager”.

sitecatalyst paid search detection

I always use Omniture Discover because you can create custom segments on the fly and perform detailed analysis.

After creating custom segments, collect the traffic data from all channels and plot a multi channel line graph in excel using weekly buckets.

multi channel traffic

The line graph will reveal the exact cause of the traffic drop. In the sample graph above, notice how total website traffic is trending closely to the paid search visits and indicating that the paid search is the cause of the drop in traffic.

Once you identify the channel it will be easier to conduct further analysis for that particular channel.

Step#4. Channel Segment analysis

Here are the questions you need to ask in order to find and fix the traffic issue with respective channels.

Paid search

a. Has there been a change to the paid search budget?

b. Has there been a change to how the budget is allocated? (day parting, weekday/weekend parting, holiday budget)

c. Are you being penalized by Google? (quality score issues, ad copy, brand keywords)

d. Have you been aggressively outbid by your competitor? (bid adjustment, keyword level bidding)

Organic search

a. Has there been a big drop in the number of pages indexed in Google? ( find the exact number of pages by using site:yoursitename.com command in Google search. You can contact Google for reconsideration of the dropped pages and in most cases they will accept your request)

b. Have you seen a big drop in ranking for your head keywords?

c. Have you recently made changes to your site linking structure?

d. Are currently involved in unethical link building practices? (please remove all the unethical and unnatural links to your website as soon as you can)

Referring Site

a. Identify the biggest traffic driving referral site and find out if they recently updated their site and missed your link.

b. Have you annoyed your social media follows by a negative comment?

Direct Traffic

a. Social media activities can influence your direct traffic.

b. Has there been a negative press about your company?

c. Do you see a drop in brand term keywords in paid and organic search?

Hope you enjoyed this post. Email me if you have any questions. Please share your thoughts, insights and comments because it really helps me write more effectively.

http://www.keywebmetrics.com/wp-content/plugins/sociofluid/images/digg_48.png http://www.keywebmetrics.com/wp-content/plugins/sociofluid/images/reddit_48.png http://www.keywebmetrics.com/wp-content/plugins/sociofluid/images/stumbleupon_48.png http://www.keywebmetrics.com/wp-content/plugins/sociofluid/images/delicious_48.png http://www.keywebmetrics.com/wp-content/plugins/sociofluid/images/sphinn_48.png http://www.keywebmetrics.com/wp-content/plugins/sociofluid/images/twitter_48.png

Web Analytics Dashboard for Executives & Senior Leadership

Dashboard is one of the most important parts of web analytics reporting. It can provide a quick snapshot of your website performance. It can also be used to present your site performance to anyone in your organization.

You can create dashboards using several third party solutions , or you can use out of the box solutions from analytics solution providers like Google, Omniture or Coremetrics.

dashboard-pic

Honestly, none of these solutions can provide you web analytics dashboards for senior leadership or c-level executives. People in c-level groups do not have time to analyze data or interpret multiple graphs. They are fast decision makers, visually oriented, and they need something that can help them make effective decisions immediately.

This motivated me to take a strategic approach towards designing executive dashboard for my senior leadership team. Here is a step by step approach that I take to design an executive dashboard.

Step 1. Identifying Key Performance Indicators (KPIs)

Notice, I mentioned identifying KPIs and not creating them. It is funny that you can find a ton of blog posts on the internet on how to create KPIs. The truth is you don’t have to create kpis unless you are a brand new company with a brand new website. All you need to do is identify and align your kpis with your web metrics.

Ok Sameer, then tell me how to identify KPIs.

First, meet with different department managers in your company (lead generation, qualification, sales team). Identify the department level kpis and link them to your website metric.

Once you have a list of all the important kpis, reduce to list to only four kpis that can effectively present the performance of your website.

Here are the four KPIs that I use for my enterprise dashboard -

1. Multi channel traffic

2. Site Bounce rate

3. Conversion 1 = Traffic to lead

4. Conversion 2 = Lead to opportunity

Step 2. Prepare data set

I prefer using 12 months of data for e-dashboards and the data is segmented in quarterly buckets. This helps align your reports with the corporate financial reporting structure.

Here is a quick snapshot on the data sets used for preparing executive dashboard.

1. Multi channel traffic data – Contains traffic from paid search, organic search, referrals, direct traffic, social media traffic, banner, email and affiliate links.

2. Bounce rate – Overall site bounce rate from your analytics solution

3. Conversion 1 – Overall site conversion data from analytics solution

4. Conversion 2 – Conversion data from your internal lead / sales department.

Step 3. Statistical Significance

Google recently released “analytics intelligence” feature in their free analytics solution. The concept of analytics intelligence is based on using statistical control limits on data sets.

Upper control limit (UCL) and lower control limit (LCL) can be used to identify a positive or a negative trend in data. It allows you to take immediate action on the target channel.

To calculate control limits, I use the control chart calculator. You will need the data mean, standard deviation and the sample size to calculate the upper and lower control limits on data set using the control chart calculator.

statistical control limits

Step 4. Graphing data sets

Bar charts are very effective for presenting the traffic segment performance, and I prefer using them for the traffic KPI.

First, calculate the thirteen week average for each of the previous three quarters (Q1, Q2 and Q3 weekly average) traffic data set and align the data on excel table.

Second, align each week traffic segment data from week one to the most recent week for the present quarter.

graph2

At the start of each new quarter, you will move the aggregated weekly data to the last quarter thirteen week average row. The first quarter on your data set will be replaced by the second one and so on.

I know it may sound confusing and here is a screen shot of how the traffic graph will look like. Notice, how at one glance you will can look at annual performance of all the channels and at the same time get granular level insight on most recent data set.

This graph indicates that traffic for all the channels except the referral channel is consistent.

graph1

Our second KPIs graph is the overall site bounce rate graph. For the bounce rate, I use the line graph and plot the statistical control limit against the actual data.

Here is a snapshot of the excel table for the graph. The data set is tabled similar to the traffic graph with the only difference being the control limits.

bounce rate

Here is how the output graph looks like. The best part about this trend line graph is it automatically allows anyone to evaluate the performance of KPIs against the benchmark control limits.

In this case, the website bounce rate dropped 5% from the lower control limit.

ScreenHunter 11 Oct. 23 13

Creating graphs for the remaining two KPIs becomes a lot easier now. All you have to do is replace the bounce rate with conversion data.

Step 5. Presentation

In previous steps, we successfully reduced gigabytes of raw data to actionable visual elements.

Presenting these graphs on a power point slide is going to be challenging because if you put one graph per slide then you will need four slides. Keep in mind, senior leaders are too busy, and you do not want to waste their time with a ton of slides every week.

Don’t worry my friend..AIDA marketing formula comes to rescue here. Use AIDA formula to divide a single slide into four quadrants each representing one of the AIDA elements.

aida

You can use circle markers to identify key trends and add text box to explain core issues/success points.

Hope you enjoyed this post. Email me if you have any questions. Please share your thoughts, insights and comments because it really helps me write more effectively.

http://www.keywebmetrics.com/wp-content/plugins/sociofluid/images/digg_48.png http://www.keywebmetrics.com/wp-content/plugins/sociofluid/images/reddit_48.png http://www.keywebmetrics.com/wp-content/plugins/sociofluid/images/stumbleupon_48.png http://www.keywebmetrics.com/wp-content/plugins/sociofluid/images/delicious_48.png http://www.keywebmetrics.com/wp-content/plugins/sociofluid/images/sphinn_48.png http://www.keywebmetrics.com/wp-content/plugins/sociofluid/images/twitter_48.png

Ultimate Web Analytics Training Guide: From Click to Close

web analyticsHere is the most comprehensive list of all the top posts from my blog and other popular web analytics blogs on the internet. These are organized in order to give you a complete start to end training on how to perform web analysis like a pro on your website to improve conversion, reduce bounce rate and provide exceptional user experience.

Enjoy :) !

Getting started

1. What is web analytics?

2. Benefits of web analytics for small business.

3. How to install free Google Analytics solution on your website in 60 seconds?

4. Why bounce rate is the most important metric ever?

5. Most basic metrics of all: Visits & Visitors.

6. Top 5 web analytics reports.

7. Cookies: Fundamental of web analytics tracking.

Intermediate

1. Perform expert web analysis in 5 minutes.

2. Concept of daily, weekly, monthly unique visitors.

3. Understanding & Defining KPIs for business success.

4. Four useful KPI measurement techniques.

5. Why numbers from different analytical tools don’t match?

6. Top 3 web analytics issues that impact your business decisions and their solutions.

7. Seven steps for creating a data driven decision making culture in your organization.

8. Best practices for measuring web site lead/sales conversion.

9. Measuring the effectiveness of your paid search (ppc) marketing.

10.Why segmentation of web analytics data rocks!

11.Google analytics advanced segmentation training.

12.Social media analytics and roi measurement.

13.Tips for improving high bounce low conversion web pages.

Advanced Analytics

1. Five extremely useful Google Analytics tips, tricks & hacks.

2. Ultimate Google Analytics filters guide.

3. Measuring website engagement of your site visitors.

4. Visitor engagement measurement formula explained.

5. Measuring and analyzing voice of visitor/customer data.

6. Top five free/cheap voice of visitor/customer measurement tools.

7. Advanced internal site search analytics.

8. Performing statistical analysis to eliminate noise.

9. Brand measurement using web analytics.

10. Web analytics integration tips.

11. What is your web analytics communication strategy?

12. Web analytics 2.0: Thinking beyond clickstream data.

13. Web analytics career advice from Avinash Kaushik.

14. Web Analytics books.

Hope you enjoyed this post. Please share your thoughts, insights and comments because it really helps me write more effectively.

http://www.keywebmetrics.com/wp-content/plugins/sociofluid/images/digg_48.png http://www.keywebmetrics.com/wp-content/plugins/sociofluid/images/reddit_48.png http://www.keywebmetrics.com/wp-content/plugins/sociofluid/images/stumbleupon_48.png http://www.keywebmetrics.com/wp-content/plugins/sociofluid/images/delicious_48.png http://www.keywebmetrics.com/wp-content/plugins/sociofluid/images/sphinn_48.png http://www.keywebmetrics.com/wp-content/plugins/sociofluid/images/twitter_48.png

Top 3 Web Analytics & Web Data issues that impact Your Decisions

cleanseWeb analytics is a great solution for website authors and web administrators to know how well their site is selling and how to optimize it for maximum outreach. However, measuring raw data using web analytics solutions is not free from error and issues. Think about it, when was the last time you were 100% satisfied with the results you got?

There is always concern about the accuracy of data, reliability of the data collected and the everlasting first party/third party cookie argument.

Lets discuss some of the most popular web analytics issues and how to tackle each one of them.

1. Data Inaccuracy- Web analytics data is never hundred percent accurate. The data that streams through the dashboard of the analytics software is not free from error.

There can be several reason for data inaccuracy -

a. Installation- Error prone web analytics solution installation can be the number one cause of data inaccuracy. Each web analytics package comes with different installation mechanism. Some are tag based and others are based on java script and require different set of coding expertise.

Here are few suggestions to make sure your web analytics installation is free from installation flaws-

(i) Use free tools like wasp.com to debug your installation.

(ii) Install free solutions like Google Analytics on top of your enterprise installation. Google Analytics can be installed within minutes. Plus, two sources of data will help you compare the metrics and kpis more effectively.

(iii) Hire expert analytics programmers in your marketing department. [Hint: Web analytics should stay within the marketing department and not with your technical team]

b. Content issues – Depending on the programming language you use for your web pages, analytics installation should be installed accordingly. Your installation should also adapt to your cms system.

c. Cookie issuesStudy conducted by Comscore showed that 30% of the visitors delete their first and third party cookies. This means that you can lose campaign attribution data and upto 30% of your paid efforts could result in direct traffic (clean entry traffic) or unaccountable traffic.

To overcome this I suggest using the keyword brand identification technique. Here is how it works -

(i) Identify percentage of brand vs non brand keywords (paid and non paid) using advanced segments.

ScreenHunter 02 Oct. 04 15

(ii) Deduct your branded keyword % from your % direct traffic

ScreenHunter 03 Oct. 04 15

True direct traffic = % Brand keywords traffic – % direct traffic reported by your web analytics system

(iii) The number that you get will be your actual direct traffic originated from sources other than your paid or natural search. This is your actual branding effort and could be linked to referring sites, press release or other non paid sources.
2. Data Integration- There has been a big debate on the importance and reliability of data integration services. Enterprise analytics providers are a big player in promoting the heck out of data integration solutions as an upsell. Several new companies have their entire business model built on data integration.

Agreed, data integration is important and connecting the dots can provide you a complete picture from visits to the final sale. However, you have to be very careful in choosing the data integration service provider.

If you have resource then I would suggest you should integrate the web data to crm and other solutions in house using your datawarehouse team.

If you are resource constraints then ask your self these questions before paying money the data integration service provider -

a. Why should I integrate my web data?

Using simple coding hacks you could bring in your crm and other data sources into your web analytics reporting system.

b. Who are the stake holders involved?

Dealing with different departments who manage the software packages in your company can be a nightmare.

c. How long will it take?

This one is my favorite because all the promises about quick results are pure sales pitch. Make sure you put this on paper before your sign the contract.

d. Do I have to make changes to our software interface?

1 out of 5 times your integration will get delayed because the integration process is stuck due to variable mismatch between your web and other solutions.

Finally, I would highly recommend you read “Web Analytics Integration: Holy Grail or White Whale?” at webanalyticsdemystified.com.

3. Privacy- Almost all the analytics solutions in market including both free and paid capture personal site visitor data including their IP address, geo location, computer and internet configuration and time & frequency of visit. While most of the data is safe, the IP address tracking proves to be a sensitive issue especially when identity theft and spamming are concerned.

Consumers are getting frustrated because they don’t want their web actions to be tracked by companies. Companies on the other hand are paying big bucks to know everything they could about their prospects so they can sell more.

100597000 1d0376958d

Hope you enjoyed this post. Please share your thoughts, insights and comments because it really helps me write more effectively. .

Here is a list of other helpful blog posts -

Bounce rate…Does it really matters?

What is Web Analytics?

Five Rocking Google Analytics Tips, Tricks & Hacks

http://www.keywebmetrics.com/wp-content/plugins/sociofluid/images/digg_48.png http://www.keywebmetrics.com/wp-content/plugins/sociofluid/images/reddit_48.png http://www.keywebmetrics.com/wp-content/plugins/sociofluid/images/stumbleupon_48.png http://www.keywebmetrics.com/wp-content/plugins/sociofluid/images/delicious_48.png http://www.keywebmetrics.com/wp-content/plugins/sociofluid/images/sphinn_48.png http://www.keywebmetrics.com/wp-content/plugins/sociofluid/images/twitter_48.png

Top 5 Reason Why Paid Analytics Solution Rocks

Watch this video to find out why paid/enterprise analytics solutions like Omniture or Coremetrics can help you take your web analysis and data driven decision making process to the next level.

http://www.keywebmetrics.com/wp-content/plugins/sociofluid/images/digg_48.png http://www.keywebmetrics.com/wp-content/plugins/sociofluid/images/reddit_48.png http://www.keywebmetrics.com/wp-content/plugins/sociofluid/images/stumbleupon_48.png http://www.keywebmetrics.com/wp-content/plugins/sociofluid/images/delicious_48.png http://www.keywebmetrics.com/wp-content/plugins/sociofluid/images/sphinn_48.png http://www.keywebmetrics.com/wp-content/plugins/sociofluid/images/twitter_48.png