A Glimpse into the Crystal Ball

I didn't want to let January 2008 slip past without at least one prediction for what this year will hold. Here's my take...

Web measurement technologies will continue to emerge as companies innovate ways to capture data from accredited sources (e.g., widgets, mobile devices, offline activity). These data capturing methods will enhance our knowledge of interaction and engagement, yet force a need for centralized reporting. Expect to see continued consolidation of peripheral marketing technologies (e.g., targeting, testing, optimization) by enterprise analytics vendors. Concurrently, enterprise analytics solutions will step up with integration capabilities to ingest data from disparate sources and provide comparable reporting. This function will bring the web analytics vendors closer to the center of the marketing universe and increase dependence on associated tools and data.