Analytics Evolution

On Leaving Forrester and Becoming A Change Agent

2009-11-12T15:54:00.001-05:00

My decision to leave Forrester Research didn’t come easy. It was actually quite excruciating because I really love my job. There are few careers where one has an opportunity to gain an insiders view on the operations, strategies, and future plans of both vendors and clients alike. Yet, having played the role of analyst for nearly a decade, I decided that it’s time to take a risk and embark on a new and exciting professional endeavor. While I cannot reveal where I’m going just yet, I’ve committed to transitioning my responsibilities and completing writing and client work at Forrester over the next two weeks.

In the meantime, I’d like to reflect back on a few of my experiences at Forrester. Working at Forrester has been one of the most rewarding and intellectually stimulating challenges in my career. I feel fortunate to have been a part of helping to build out the Customer Intelligence team and have confidence that my former teammates: Suresh Vittal, Dave Frankland and Julie Katz will continue to provide invaluable insight for Forrester clients and the market at large. The progress this team has accomplished in raising awareness for Customer Intelligence is invaluable. From Dave’s research that predicts the next CMO will come from Customer Intelligence to Suresh’s mission critical analysis of understanding the confluence of business intelligence, predictive analytics, online analytics and marketing analytics. This is groundbreaking research that is shaping the marketing and strategy of enterprises across the globe.

Yet, more importantly working at Forrester was a genuine privilege. I’ve not been a part of another organization where creative, bright and extremely motivated people collaborate and share ideas in such a productive way. The caliber of employees at Forrester is top notch and I’m glad that I was able to contribute to the collective mindshare. The good news is that Forrester is looking to fill my position with one talented analyst who shares my passion for all things analytics and optimization. Here’s a link to the job requisition and let me know if I can put in a good word for you.

For me, it's off to new challenges in the awesome field of Analytics and Optimization. My goal is to become a change agent for Web analytics and I plan to take an even more active role in Web analytics thought leadership, advocacy and evangelism. Jim Sterne said to me recently that becoming a change agent requires risk. Risks so big that you’re willing to lose your job over. I took his sage wisdom to heart and decided to break out and try my hand at truly creating change within the Web analytics and optimization industry. So stay tuned for how I plan to execute on that front and check back on this blog for BIG news to follow....

For now and while I finish out my time here at Forrester, I will carry with me valuable experiences that only a world class research organization like Forrester could provide. Thanks to Forrester all my talented colleagues for a truly remarkable experience.

Cheers,
 John Lovett

eMetrics Fall Wrap-Up

2009-11-02T07:28:00.003-05:00

Summarizing the Fall eMetrics Marketing Optimization Summit in DC last week is actually quite easy. Check the stream of Twitter traffic at #emetrics to see what attendees thought in real time. Kudos go out to industry insiders like @June_Li and @ed_wu for keeping up with their views of eMetrics as it happened. I certainly appreciated their shared view presentations supplemented with valuable insights and commentary. But in addition to our dedicated industry insiders, a significant media presence emerged at eMetrics, made felt by Jessica Tsai tweeting under the @DestinationCRM handle. Jessica’s coverage subsumed the tweet stream with journalistic style reporting of every notable quote and entertaining quip offered by on-stage presenters. So with the live reporting and play-by-play offered by social media devices – I’ll offer my alternative take on last week’s summit.

For me the week started off on a high note, arriving just in time to attend the Web Analytics Association member meeting. The highlight of this meeting was board of directors’ panel consisting of Alex Yoder (Webtrends), Matt Langie (Omniture), Pete Olsen (Microsoft), and Dennis Mortensen (Yahoo! Web Analytics). Jim Sterne facilitated a lively discussion that required the board members to contemplate where we’ve been as an industry, what our challenges are and where we need to go to ensure our survival. Tweetworthy quotes were abundant during the discussion, but I’d say that Matt Langie put it best when he stated that the best way to predict the future is to invent it. And that is precisely what the WAA is working towards.

The official eMetrics Marketing Optimization Summit opened the following day with anticipation for Google’s big announcement. While the morning keynotes were valuable, I’ll admit that they were a blur of information – some old – some new – yet a bit of preaching to the choir. The buzz of Google’s announcement was exacerbated by the Twitter stream which continued to get louder as Avinash prepared for the stage in a social media crescendo. Addressing the audience with his arm in a sling and surgery pending the following morning, he debuted the newly minted Google Analytics features with charisma and style. The enhancements included: additional engagement goals (expanding from 4 to 20), advanced table filtering, a true unique visitor metric, custom variables, segment sharing and alerting functionality. I hail the most exciting feature as the introduction of “Intelligent Analytics”, a solution that applies an algorithm to data sets with the goal of identifying anomalies. When such aberrations are discovered, alerts are delivered to Google Analytics users. While still nascent, this function presents incredible opportunity for shifting Web analytics to a proactive activity.

The second half of the day offered a plethora of valuable sessions and ultimately led to some lively discussions in the lobby bar that evening. Day two of the conference opened briskly at 8 am with an interesting session by Tim Ash of SiteTuners. He was followed by NBC Universal and then Omniture, who announced their enhanced social media measurement capabilities. I spent the majority of the morning preparing for my keynote panel on “Marketing Metrics Maturity”, where I would debate with Gartner’s Bill Gassman, maturity model thesis author Stephane Hamel, and CEO Laura Patterson. As the only panel member without a published model or company of my own, I held my ground by taking a contrarian view towards maturity models. I believe that marketing maturity models are like religion. For those that need it, they are great. Many have thorough documentation and worthy systems which organizations can follow. I however, have no use for them. In fact, I declared myself a Web analytics maturity model atheist. I’m of the belief that all organizations are inherently different and applying a generic model for purposes of evaluation is not a worthwhile endeavor. While I cannot say that my fellow panel members agreed with me, we did come to terms on the larger issues of managing people, culture and technology.

Later that evening, Web Analytics Wednesday brought eMetrics attendees together for libations and learning. Eric Peterson led a discussion of leading Web analytics practitioners that was both entertaining and informative. Day three of eMetrics delivered more insightful information and left most attendees feeling energized to hit the streets and create change within their organizations.

As I mentioned earlier, the details of the presentations and buzz at the event were all captured tremendously through the help of social media. Yet, the one thing that couldn’t be bottled up or summarized in 140 characters was the hallway conversations, post-session chats and late night debauchery. These off-the-record activities deliver the real value of eMetrics and similar conferences. So, while you may be able to get the play-by-play sitting by your laptop and chasing hashtags - the real deal is live and in person. I’m thankful to Jim Sterne and his team for delivering yet another successful eMetrics.

I’ll close by quoting a tweet of my own... “Hey #emetrics DC was a blast. Walking away with new ideas, new friends and new lobby bar stories.”

Truth, Lies and Delusion in Web Analytics

2009-10-19T13:13:00.001-04:00

Matt Cutler said it best recently at the Web Analytics X Change conference; “We are on a noble quest for truth”. He was referring to the fact that Web analytics - an industry that Matt helped to create - is about understanding. Yet, as with any epic story our protagonist (the industry), is challenged to find the way to the mysterious and intangible place that is Web analytics enlightenment. Matt went on to say; “Truth doesn’t happen easy…Truth doesn’t come for free.” And he was right on all accounts. These truths we seek in Web analytics are elusive because of innumerable factors such as lack of support, a dearth of qualified practitioners, low data confidence, and failure to derive actionable insights. This brewing storm of impediments has stymied the Web analytics industry since its inception. However, collectively we are determined to find the truth - a workaround – a reinvention – an evolution - or perhaps a wholesale revolution is afoot.

The lies we tell in Web analytics are white ones. Our numbers, metrics and KPIs are communicated with the best intentions, yet our data oscillates within a range of deviation. Most practitioners have forsaken precision for accuracy and resigned to the fact that our measures provide directional guidance – not empirical facts. Our current measurement practices dance around the issues of accuracy by offering insights at a generalized level, offering shards of intelligence, which undoubtedly are better than none. However, communication tactics require silver tongued practitioners to educate with accuracy while avoiding the details of precision. Educated marketing guesswork has devolved from the visions of an infinitely measureable Web. Still we persevere because our noble quest nags our collective conscience in knowing that we can deliver more.

Delusion is the shroud practitioners use to keep themselves on the path towards truth. Despite that the majority of Web analytics practitioners claim well-defined strategies, most offer fledgling plans that lack truly progressive vision. Further, despite the perception of unequivocal support, most practitioners tirelessly combat widespread internal cynicism. Yet, those dedicated to the cause endure by squinting to see the positives. I too am one of these eternal optimists that choose to push on. Yet, I forecast change for Web analytics. Our industry is undergoing metamorphosis and those that resist change will be left behind. I choose to act as an agent for change and to expose new initiatives with merit; to question the statements of the collective whole; and to insist that the status quo is not capable of delivering us to analytical excellence.

This rant comes as I sit in wait to arrive at eMetrics in DC where, Web analytics practitioners, vendors and optimists like myself will gather to ruminate on our future. While I envision miles to go before we sleep, I’m confident that change will lead to better optimization overall. What do you see?

eMetrics Goes Social

2009-08-27T09:10:00.003-04:00

If you haven’t heard of the eMetrics Marketing Optimization Summit by now, you’re missing out. Founded by Jim Sterne, Web Analytics guru and widely recognized Godfather of Web analytics. This is the original #measure conference. With topics that delve into the real issues of Marketing in today’s world, eMetrics places its finger squarely on the pulse of digital marketing endeavors across the globe.

Most recently, the eMetrics establishment launched a user group on LinkedIn to keep the conversation flowing in the months when there’s not a Summit event near you. Additionally, they introduced a Blog Partners program to further spread the good word about eMetrics. I’ve been a regular blogger about my experiences at eMetrics for years, but now have the opportunity to synthesize my ramblings with other like-minded bloggers. And of course, eMetrics has its own hashtag to follow the buzz on Twitter whether you’re attending or sitting at your desk wishing you were there. Follow #eMetrics.

I’m proud to say that I’ll be participating in the upcoming Summit in Washington D.C. on October 20-23. Jim Sterne informed me and my fellow keynote panelists that he was breaking his own protocol by inviting analysts (myself and Bill Gassman of Gartner) and consultants (Stephane Hamel and Laura Patterson) to speak this year. The majority of the D.C. sessions will feature marketing practitioners who will share their stories of success and recount the ways in which marketing optimization has benefited their organizations.

If you’re planning to attend; please seek me out to say hello. If you’re on the fence; here’s a discount code for 15% off a 3-day pass to eMetrics D.C. [JOHNLOVETT09]. Or if you just want one analyst's insight on this event; feel free to drop me a line.

Webtrends Acquires Widemile

2009-07-30T18:18:00.003-04:00

Things are happening up in the Northwest these days as Portland, OR based Webtrends (recognized as a leader in the recent Forrester Wave: Wave Analytics, Q3 09) announced today its acquisition of Seattle based testing firm Widemile. Financial terms of the deal were undisclosed, but the technologies are a perfect match.

Widemile began its operations as a multivariate testing company in November 2005 and has been expanding on its capabilities; it’s proprietary Design of Experiments (DoE) algorithm; and client base ever since. The company delivers both self-service and managed service offerings that leverage its on demand testing and targeting platform. Widemile also maintains close ties with digital agencies that leverage the testing and targeting services on behalf of their clients. Primary competitors to Widemile include Omniture’s Test & Target (formerly Offermatica), Intervoven Optimost, SiteSpect and Google Website Optimizer among others. Watch for Forrester’s upcoming vendor landscape on testing companies for a complete list.

This acquisition adds momentum to the trend that Web analytics firms are augmenting their offerings by adding adjacent and complementary services. Testing is a logical progression for company’s that are maximizing their online opportunities with Web analytics data. Widemile’s technology falls under the realm of site optimization, which offers companies inherent benefits when delivered through a Web analytics platform. I see this as a very strong move for Webtrends who is steadily emerging from a position of transition to one of strength. Webtrends currently maintains a substantial client base that is ripe for testing and site optimization services.

Webtrends has had a busy summer thus far with a divisive social media campaign that sparked local outcry; a new product release due out next week; and now an acquisition. Congratulations to Alex, Jascha, Casey and the team at Webtrends for executing on their vision for strategic growth. And big congrats go out to Bob Bergquist, Bob Garcia and Dean Kimball of Widemile for growing a compelling offering worthy of integration into a Web analytics platform.

What Makes A Standard?

2009-07-28T16:11:00.002-04:00

Something rather amazing happened yesterday in the Web Analytics realm that was enabled by social media. A longstanding conversation regarding all things Web analytics has been playing out in Twitter under the hashtag #wa. [If confused by this already, you may want to drop off here.]

Recently, Washington state has jumped on the Twitter bandwagon and was creating "noise" on #wa. Thus, a number of Tweets ensued to shift the conversation from #wa to something we Web Analytics wonks could call our own.

While @dustinwallace claims credit for conceiving the idea, the market was effectively moved by @ericpeterson. At the speed of a few Tweets, I watched this saga unfold via Tweetdeck yesterday. It went something like this:

Let’s put aside the fact that reading this preamble only a year ago would have sounded utterly ridiculous…and it still may read like jibberish to many…but this change and the speed with which it occurred is remarkable.

Thus, it got me thinking about standards, which is a topic I visit often. A standard on Twitter is something that a group can agree on collectively. In Web analytics, we’ll now use the hashtag #measure to discuss Web analytics. Similarly, #MVT is used when discussing multivariable testing, #waa is used for reference to the Web Analytics Association and #analytics is commonly associated with Google Analytics.

But how do standards evolve for more consequential matters? The WAA has been rallying for standards for years. They’ve gone to great lengths to establish standard definitions for Web Analytics and open their thoughts and process to public scrutiny for the greater good. The Internet Advertising Bureau (IAB) also works towards developing standards for measuring Web site traffic to guide advertisers in their financial planning. There are numerous other examples of standards which exist. In fact, there’s so many to choose from that they lack effectiveness. Further, given that new standards can emerge in the flurry of a few tweets, what really constitutes a standard?

I have my ideas, and welcome your input. This topic is one that I’ve invested time and thought into. At the upcoming X Change conference in San Francisco on September 10th, I’ll be leading a discussion on Standards and welcome all interested parties to attend.

When moving at the speed of tweets, standards will become increasingly important. Don’t you want to be a part of the conversation?

Forrester Wave: Just the Facts Please

2009-07-23T15:45:00.008-04:00

In my line of work, sometimes you strive for shock and awe, while other times, you just write the facts. In the case of the Forrester Wave™: Web Analytics that published today, I did the latter. While it felt somewhat anticlimactic because there was no sizzling scandal and no juicy uproar (at least not yet), I’m confident that the report is an accurate reflection of the state of the Web analytics market today. Somewhat ironically, Web analytics practitioners told us throughout this study that accuracy of information was atop the list of most important vendor selection criteria. As such, data accuracy is critical in all things analytics and I too aim to please in this regard.

This research was six months in the making and was an arduous (yet rewarding) process for me and hopefully for the vendors that participated as well. With excruciating detail I assessed eight vendors at the top of this field. I held strategy discussions with their executives; interviewed their clients by phone and via online survey; and validated their capabilities in exploratory demos. The end result revealed an extremely tight field of highly capable solutions. As much as I tried to push the evaluation criteria to the limits of analysis, vendors met the challenge with their standard offerings and ability to customize their tools to perform seemingly endless tasks. The result produced 5 leaders amid a field of 8 with nary a laggard in the bunch.

This research will help Customer Intelligence professionals understand the complex Web analytics landscape and determine which vendor is best suited to meet their needs. Key findings revealed:

Web analytics is the decisive tool for measuring online customer intelligence.

A highly competitive vendor race ends in a photo finish.

Discerning the details of who provides the strongest social media measurement or which vendor excels at attribution measurement is critical. But these considerations also need to account for which vendor provides the best overall package for any organization. My evaluation of these vendors is meant to serve as a guide for Web analytics users. A little known fact about the Forrester Wave is that the weightings of categories, subcategories and criteria can be modified to suit individual business needs. While the scores remain constant, Forrester clients can adjust the weights applied to each area, which changes the placement of vendors on the graphic.

Thus, while I feel this reflects the state of the market, it’s presented in a way that applies to enterprise organizations on the whole and should be tweaked for individual use as a decisioning tool. Please feel free to reach out to me with comments or if you’d like a better understanding of how the competitive field stacks up. I’m happy to help.

Forecasting Change for Web Analytics

2009-05-19T09:18:00.003-04:00

This week my forecast for Web analytics will publish on Forrester.com and I’m calling for a change in the climate. We expect dollars spent on fee-based Web analytics software will grow at a compound annual rate of 17% over the next five years. That will bring us to just under $1 billion dollars by the year 2014. A respectable growth rate and not too shabby for a market size, but those in the know will ask why we haven’t hit the $1B mark by this time already? In fact, the 2009 to 2014 forecast isn’t all that dissimilar (in numbers only) from the one we published at JupiterResearch about 5 years ago. So what happened? Did the Web analytics industry stall? Did we collectively take our eye off the ball? The answer to these questions is a definitive no – but significant market conditions over the past 4 years altered the course of Web analytics indefinitely. Here’s what happened:

Promises unfulfilled. At its inception Web analytics came out of the gate on the wings of a lofty promise that reeked of amazing insights and countless online riches. Inflate this promise with some dotcom exuberance and an injection of post bubble Internet veterans. The result was a technology ahead of its time, whereby consumers weren’t ready for it and most marketers couldn’t handle it. Yet, this modern day snake-oil wasn’t a sham – it really worked. The problem was that the complexity and inability to take action on the data largely inhibited success.

Expertise sequestered. It’s been widely documented that Web analytics talent is tough to come by. These days not a week goes by that a client doesn’t pass a job requisition across my desk seeking a talented analytics staffer. But rewind four years and many of the best in Web analytics were working relentlessly to demonstrate the value of Web analytics within their organizations (many still are). Some persevered and perhaps were rewarded for their efforts, but many abandoned client-side frustrations and embarked on journeys as consultants and hired guns. This resulted in a thriving secondary market of highly qualified Web analysts (our last count revealed 91 independent firms providing Web analytics services with an average experience of 4 years per employee). Yet, many corporations were still unconvinced and left without talented in-house analytics staff to dazzle them with metrics.

Incoming tide. It’s said that a high tide raises all boats, but when a technology company wields the power to disrupt a chunk of the entire Internet, expect some lunar-level movement. Yes, I’m speaking of the introduction of Google Analytics to the marketplace. While the initial entry may be have been scoffed at by some, there is no denying the market prowess of GA today. According to numbers kindly shared by WASP for February of this year, Google Analytics holds 70% of the market for all installations of Web analytics. Free tools overall maintain 78% and while there is notable duplicity (sites installed with more than one solution, which Stephane’s data has pinned at 37%) that is a massive portion of the market capitalizing on free software. While it's great that users are adopting Web analytics in this manner, they're not contributing dollars to increase our Forecast.

So where does that leave us? Luckily, the Web analytics industry is brimming with visionaries, advocates and enthusiasts who aren’t giving up easily. Thus, change is imminent:

The promise and delivery of Web analytics is adjusting to meet expectations.
Expertise is increasingly rewarded and new talent is cultivating.
The rising tide is forcing vendors to improve their offerings and broaden their services.

Whether you like it or not – Web analytics is destined to become an integrated marketing service. If you’re unconvinced, simply take a look at your vendor… Either they’re supporting a marketing optimization suite, opening access to their data to other applications or giving away the Web analytics for free.

Web analytics is no longer a point solution – its part of something bigger. For vendors, this means that you should plan on diversifying or instilling your data collection solutions into as many marketing applications as possible. Agencies and consultants should maintain an agnostic approach to Web analytics tools and focus less on which solution and more on applying the right metrics, reporting quality (actionable) information and uniting data from disparate marketing functions (like advertising and site-side information). Organizations should be asking themselves how their Web analytics solution is supporting their entire marketing efforts. Not just in the data that the tools are producing, but in their ability to generate insight and automate marketing processes. Practitioners, it’s your time to shine. As I mentioned, the job market is ripe and your skills and talents are more in need now than ever.

Engaging With WebTrends

2009-04-10T19:56:00.003-04:00

Here at the webtrends Engage 2009 conference there’s energy in the air. And not because we’re in Vegas and they’re pumping in the oxygen, it’s that the message is clear and the future appears bright. For CEO Alex Yoder and his newly minted management team, it’s all about finding meaning within the numbers. They’ve taken this message to heart with a newly vamped Website, a renewed focus on Web analytics and a personal call to action for each employee.

The Scene: Well, we are in Vegas, so that tells you something. But webtrends Engage was a small gathering of about 250 customers and like-minded peers who are serious about Web analytics. The sessions and hallway conversations were stimulating, the management was accessible and the overall vibe was optimistic. Let’s face it, webtrends has been off the map for a while and this was their new coming out party.

The Message: Alex Yoder kicked off the events by introducing their quest for finding meaning within the numbers. He talked about his commitment to webtrends’ customers and the four tenets of customer engagement: acquire, grow, recover and keep them. He went on to describe the three pillars that they believe will fundamentally change webtrends and analytics as we know it: Power, Elegance and Open. Within these pillars, webtrends plans to demonstrate Power through investments in scalability and flexibility in data. The flexibility in data will be exemplified through free APIs and new methods for portability. Elegance will manifest in their pending interface redesign that improves the user experience beyond the existing platform. And Open extends through their data, their people and their culture. This promise of Openness is the core message of the “new” webtrends and was delivered with genuine sentiment.

I can attest that openness resonated throughout the conference and all the new directions that webtrends revealed. Alex’s message and that delivered by everyone at webtrends was honest to the point of self deprecation, but truly genuine. They admitted outright that they’ve had their problems with management changes, product focus and communication. But they’re committed to admitting their shortfalls and working to earn their customers and focus on their core competency of Web analytics. If you’re wondering why I continue to write webtrends in lowercase, it’s because that’s their new logo. Lowercase letters reflect that they dismissed any pretension they previously held and now they’re focused on business.

The Announcements: The most notable announcement underscores their commitment to Open with the release of their free APIs that allow new methods of access to data. They built a Web Services interface (leveraging REST) that allows users to pull XML by accessing a URL. Data can be exported from webtrends to Excel or integrated directly into applications (check it out here).

Webtrends Open Exchange is their partnership program that makes the APIs even more meaningful. The concept is to leverage webtrends data within other marketing applications like content management, CRM, email, campaign management, search…and the list goes on. By making the data accessible and allowing it to flow into other applications, the potential for data-driven marketing becomes profound. While smaller in its number of partners than Omniture’s Genesis program, the concept is inherently the same, yet with a dramatically different architecture. Webtrends also announced a new developer network to support Open Exchange and provide a forum for developers and apps gurus to learn, share, rant and network.

On the social media front, webtrends announced their partnership with Radian6 which allows uses to listen, measure and engage on social media fronts across the Web. The Radian6 interface is slick and provides real-time access to social media, from wherever the buzz may flow. It provides the ability to compare buzz to that of competitors or monitor activity by channel. It also has workflow processes for users to allocate response duties to employees for a managed and unified corporate response.

The final announcement was the release of 8 industry solutions aimed at serving vertical markets. The design is to eliminate data silos and make data more powerful by catering to specific industries. According to customers, some hope these vertical solutions will provide a welcomed launching point for deeper analysis into their unique issues and challenges.

The Numbers: So I started with the numbers and finding meaning within them…each webtrends employee has a unique number on the back of his/her business card which serves as a call to action. The numbers at first glance are, well…just numbers, but each has a significant meaning to webtrends’ employees. Some represent children’s birthdays, wedding dates, lofty aspirations…and my favorite so far…the atomic weight of titanium. That’s the number that Barry Parshall has on his card. He informed me that titanium is a metal similar in composition to webtrends - it is incredibly strong, yet flexible - and you can beat the crap out of it, but it takes a beating and keeps on going - an analogy he warmly extends to webtrends from experience. These numbers on their cards may be innocuous, but they serve as a call to action by showcasing the openness of employees. By design they are meant as a method for employees to share personal stories and for customers to ask about them. These numbers subtly signify that any combination of numbers can have deep meaning. Webtrends even has a new manifesto that's all about the numbers.

The Key Takeaway: So my takeaway from all this is that webtrends has made some very positive changes to its management team and developed a renewed focus aimed directly at their customers. Alex Yoder has revived the fire within his team and brought on bright talent like Jascha Kaykas-Wolff and Casey Carey to tell the story. They all assured me - and more importantly, their clients - that they are serious about Web analytics. They plan to demonstrate this by continued investments in product and innovation as well as a quest for deriving understanding from the numbers.

From the peek at the new interface wherein “the data itself becomes the interface” – to their commitment to Open – all signs point to go.

Social Media Blunders

2009-03-31T20:18:00.002-04:00

By now, you’ve probably heard of the agency VP who was traveling to visit his client FedEx in Memphis who Tweeted an unsavory note from the airport. His thoughtlessness was unappreciated by FedEx employees and did not go unnoticed.

Or what about the prospective employee at Cisco who pondered aloud via Twitter whether or not to accept the job offer? She wrote; “Cisco just offered me a job! Now I have to weigh the utility of a fatty paycheck against the daily commute to San Jose and hating the work.” A channel partner at Cisco responded “Who is the hiring manager. I’m sure they would love to know that you will hate the work. We here at Cisco are versed in the Web.”

Perhaps Michael Phelps crushing the dreams of admirers around the globe with one careless slurp grabbed your attention?

Here’s an email sent from a youth soccer coach to the parents of his new players. Certainly this is a frightening introduction to a man who will be mentoring children.

Each of these lapses in judgment resulted in bad circumstances. Lost business, wasted opportunities, revoked endorsements, and resignations… Perhaps well deserved, but nonetheless a reflection of the new age we live in. Is this a case of digital Darwinism, weeding out the utterly techno unsavvy? Carelessness taken to new heights? Sheer stupidity?

Whichever you believe, the key takeaway here is: Don’t be an idiot.

Do you have a social media blunder to share?

Defining Optimization

2009-03-12T14:28:00.004-04:00

Optimization by itself is an immensely ambiguous term, yet it has reached a buzz-worthy crescendo among marketers and IT professionals alike. By the simplest definition, optimization is the process of making something better. To optimize a process is to improve upon it. Thus if something is optimized, then presumably it’s as good as it gets. However, as the term optimization flutters around business applications, the meaning becomes diluted and often times abstract. So much so, that someone recently described a conversation to me regarding optimizing where both parties were in vehement agreement with dramatic headshaking and belabored guffaws…But the dialogue abruptly ceased when they discovered that they were each conceptualizing an entirely different manifestation of optimization. So how could this happen?

Consider that optimization has been around for quite some time and despite the common misconception of late that optimization is a technology – rather, it is a process that is aided by technology. Further, the process of optimization can be applied in myriad forms. Take for example, revenue optimization, fulfillment optimization, call center optimization, pricing optimization, search engine optimization, channel optimization, marketing mix optimization…and the list goes on. Pretty much any noun (or combination thereof) imaginable can precede the term optimization and presto, you’ve got a something new to optimize.

Yet, the circles I run in, and most likely yours too (since you’re reading this blog) are most often referring to marketing optimization. Some may call it online optimization – or perhaps, business optimization, but these descriptors really don’t help us to narrow the field of optimization possibilities. So I propose more descriptive language to identify the optimization process which a marketer is attempting to improve.

Let’s break down the category of Marketing Optimization into components that are easily understood and clearly defined such that individuals can take responsibility for each piece. I’ll offer a few examples of online marketing that I believe can benefit from optimization:

Interaction Optimization – the real-time dialogue between a visitor and an online channel (Web, email, chat)
Search Engine Optimization – the process of associating keywords to content
Site Optimization – improving the navigation, flow or design of a Web site
Ad optimization – targeting or tailoring advertising (placement and message) to attract a specific audience
Contact optimization – identifying the appropriate frequency and timing of a customer contact strategy
Channel Optimization – determining the most appropriate channel to deliver a message, product or service
Marketing Mix Optimization – which combination of marketing programs lead to the most profitable outcomes

While these distinctions still barely scratch the surface of defining the entire gamut of marketing optimization possibilities, the next time someone throws out the term optimization looking to cash in on the buzz, ask them to describe precisely what they’re talking about optimizing.

On the second thought, a buzzword or topic often gets even more hyped when there’s some mystique or uncertainty involved. Just look at how well Web 2.0 did in that regard. So, if you’re betting on optimization as your meal ticket…maybe ambiguity is your plan?

Unraveling Marketing Attribution

2009-02-10T10:13:00.004-05:00

Marketing Attribution is one of those very tough marketing problems that’s been around for a long time, yet few have truly figured it out. In more traditional marketing speak it’s known as Marketing Mix modeling, but it really comes down to understanding which marketing efforts have an impact on your customers and your bottom line. At Forrester, I defined Multi-Campaign Attribution in the digital world as: The practice of attributing credit to all marketing exposures that led to a Web site and subsequently resulted in a conversion event, rather than attributing all credit to the exposure immediately preceding the conversion.

But the big secret behind Marketing Attribution is that there is no tool that will get you all the way there. No switch can be flipped where Attribution appears from the vapor. There simply is no panacea for Attribution that will resolve all your troubles. Instead Attribution requires a great deal of work. It’s a method for analyzing data in not just one way but in three ways. It also requires expertise that consists of complex analysis and a relentless drive to continually explain an unconscionable process to non-marketers. Moreover, the outcome of Attribution generally creates animosity within organizations because it can rob credit from seemingly heroic efforts and deliver it to unsung heroes.

Yuk! Sounds like something you want to skip and leave for somebody else right? The problem is that Marketing Attribution is critically important. Right now accountability is at an all time high. Organizations are looking for budget areas to trim and programs to drop. Attribution can illuminate what’s working and oust the sleeping dogs among your marketing efforts. It can save programs that don’t appear to contribute but really lead profitable customers to your site. It can also identify where the greatest ROI comes from and which programs need to be accelerated for accomplishing your objectives. Attribution can propel you to superstar status within your company.

So how do you get started? There are a ton of great resources out there including a Forrester report that will soon publish on Marketing Attribution. John Marshall and his crew at Market Motive published a great video series on Attribution. Microsoft’s Young-Bean Song at the Atlas Institute is tackling the problem from an ad serving perspective with their “Engagement Mapping” solution. And ClearSaleing’s Attribution guru, Adam Goldberg, has been hosting forums to educate and reach consensus on quantifying attribution.

But if you want the final word on Attribution, tune into the Webinar sponsored by Coremetrics that will feature me and Eric Peterson called “Effectively Managing Your Online Marketing Mix with Advanced Attribution”. Tomorrow at 1:00 ET we, along with John Squire of Coremetrics, will paint the landscape for Attribution. We will identify the issues and set the standard for comprehending Attribution. Best of all, we’ll both offer tactical advice for getting started. While we may not fully agree on our methods, we do concur that Attribution is a necessary process.

So, if you are charged with unraveling the riddle of attribution, start with any of these resources, sign up for the Webinar, or drop me a line to find out more.

Omniture Gets Cozy with WPP

2009-01-29T21:34:00.003-05:00

Omniture dropped news today of its newly minted partnership with the WPP Group. WPP is the second largest media conglomerate on the planet and not a bad dance partner for OMTR.

The partnership involves three key facets:

Here are a few thoughts on why this is a strong play:

It’s good for Omniture because:

WPP brings marquee advertising brands like Gray, Ogilvy, Y&R Advertising and Wunderman which will all have exposure to Omniture’s suite of optimization products.

They have the opportunity to train 500 new consultants on their products; thereby elevating the accessibility of OMTR trained experts.

Omniture just gained 130 new resellers.

Their visibility into advertising analytics just increased exponentially with a slew of new integrations to the Genesis platform.

WPP derived $4 billion worth of revenue from consumer insights. If OMTR gets even a sliver of this business, expect their market cap to rise.

It reaffirms their solid placement as a leading vendor in the optimization space, despite their recent hiccups and bad press.

It’s good for WPP Group because:

They can benefit from the increased knowledge of customer insights that OMTR provides.

It expands their research capabilities by incorporating the business optimization intelligence that OMTR delivers.

It brings a foundation for measurement and accountability to marketing activities conducted by agencies. Clients can monitor success through a hosted 3rd party tool that is configured to demonstrate results.

It provides a foray into new business opportunities for WPP companies.

It’s potentially good for the Marketing industry because:

We may start to see some common analytics definitions and standards that both advertisers and site operators can agree on.

It elevates the practical use and understanding of optimization technologies to a wider audience. This offers the potential for more companies to reach out to their agencies for help performing analysis and making the jump from data to action.

Okay, so when you tally it all up, it appears that Omniture should be all smiles about this deal. And they are…

I had the chance to speak with Aseem Chandra today (Omniture’s SVP of Product Marketing). When I asked…”Why the $25 mil? From an outsider’s perspective, it seems like you could have established this partnership without any financial terms.” He responded that the investment was proof of commitment to ensure that WPP had some skin in the game. Aseem went on to say that the investment also ensured that both parties would advance the partnership and develop mutually profitable solutions that would in turn aid their clients in achieving success. He was clear that the partnership does not preclude Omniture from forming relationships with other agencies, so the door is still open for more expansive agency relationships. That said, WPP retains the option to purchase more shares if undisclosed performance goals are achieved.

So, congrats to Omniture and let’s hope this new partnership bears innovation that benefits the entire analytics industry and moves us forward.

Red Hot Social Media Measurement

2009-01-23T16:43:00.003-05:00

Social media measurement is sizzling. Unless you’ve been living under a rock, you know that Twitter, the Blogosphere, Facebook, YouTube and other burgeoning forms of social media are exploding. While 2008 may have been the year for “experimentation” with social media, 2009 will be the year of “measurement”. Whether you deem social media as fun & frivolous or ripe with opportunity…I’m here to tell you that it’s real marketing…so capitalize on it.

Here are a few thoughts on how:

Get specific. As with most endeavors, trying to measure everything without calibrating your focus can prove unprofitable. Think about social media measurement in terms of three distinct categories: 1) Individuals, 2) Content, and 3) Exposure. Once you establish these independent lenses for measurement, you can get fancy with your analysis. There’s a great tool for measuring Twitter influence of individuals that can shed light on social media impact and opportunity for exposure. Content is the lifeblood of your marketing and something you do have control over, so understanding which social tools are referring traffic to content and what types of content resonate (or go ChaChing!) with different audiences is extremely valuable. Finally, Exposure incorporates all that branding and PR that you work so hard to get out there as well as the buzz generated from it. Understanding your reach, the conversation, overall pick-up and redistribution will help you get more tactical about reaching your target audiences via social channels.

Don’t reinvent. By this I mean - as much as possible – use established reporting methods and familiar tools for communicating metrics. This will help you to ingrain social metrics within standardized reporting without requiring your old dog colleagues to access new interfaces and learn new tricks. Just this month Tealium announced its new measurement service for tracking social media. These former Visual Sciences entrepreneurs have tapped into the ROI of social media by enabling measurement through popular Web analytics tools. Their solution can report metrics about YouTube referrals, blog mentions and even PR exposure. They make this insight available through plug-ins to popular analytics tools like Google Analytics, Omniture Site Catalyst, Unica NetInsight, WebTrends and Coremetrics so your Web analysts get more information in their existing tools. I’m eagerly looking forward to my demo next week…so stay tuned for more.

~~Another Web analytics vendor~~ Lyris HQ just gave me a preview yesterday of their new social media measurement capabilities adding more steak to the sizzle. They’ve added social media tracking to their analytics solution to identify referrals from various social marketing efforts as well as the opportunity to create segments from social media channels to identify opportunities. Expect a press release to drop on Monday.

Really measure. Clearly there’s been a lot written about Social Media Measurement already, so I’m not breaking new ground here. However, I am excited about the progression beyond buzz monitoring and aggregate dashboarding of social metrics (not that these tools aren’t valuable…they are), but most lack real analytical chops regarding the ROI of social marketing. The recently published The Forrester Wave™: Community Platforms, Q1 2009 (here’s Jeremiah’s take) identifies analytics as a critical component to monitoring a successful community. Yet, many of the Strong Performers identified in the report still fall short on their analytical capabilities. Listening is the first part of the solution, but taking action is where I see most companies stumble with analytics.

Moving Analytics Forward, Collectively

2009-01-13T12:19:00.004-05:00

It’s a shame that Brandt Dainow couldn’t have been a bit more copasetic regarding his views on the Web Analytics Association’s standard definitions because he does make a few salient points. But his words and my unpublished retort forced me to think about what each of us can do to move the Web analytics industry forward. We are, after all, a relatively nascent industry and we will shape our own destiny, whether we like it or not.

Yet, this presents a problem: Web analytics is inherently an introverted exercise. Individuals within their respective organizations can apply insight, rigor and analysis to data in hopes of improving the realm over which they control. We may share ideas or tactics for individuals to take back to their own data sets and poke and prod with hopes of finding efficiencies and improvements. Sure, you can pay a hired gun to implement process, develop strategy or create sexy dashboards, but ultimately they are helping analytics practitioners to improve individual companies. Vendors facilitate advancement by acting in the best interests of their customers and shareholders to develop and deliver innovative products. But again, the application of these solutions is up to the individual organizations.

Where we break free from the shackles of analytics solitude is in our network and thriving community of evangelical data savants. Findings from the most recent WAA Member survey show that 41% of members surveyed consider themselves champions for Web analytics. We champions sing the praises of Web analytics. We identify problems and attempt to provide solutions. We talk to each other to commiserate about the shortfalls with technologies and lack of comprehension by the rest of the world. We network and blog [and tweet] in hopes that the persistent din of our ramblings captures an audience. But we accomplish this collectively.

So, instead of detracting from Web analytics with grievances and diatribes, here’s how I encourage those vested in Web analytics to move forward:

Expand your network. If you haven’t noticed it yet, Web analytics people are social and welcoming creatures. In my experience nearly every person that I’ve ever reached out to in our industry is responsive and genuine. And there’s lots of opportunity to meet new people. Attend a Web Analytics Wednesday event, sign-up for an eMetrics conference, trade big ideas at XChange or tune into the conversation on the Yahoo! User Group. These are just a few of the many resources available today in Web analytics.

Give back to the community. So this is where my thoughts for this post originated. The WAA, despite its shortfalls, is an extraordinary organization. Comprised of nearly 100% volunteers, active participants are pushing the industry forward by tackling monumental tasks such as attempting to establish a common vernacular for Web analytics with their standard definitions. Further, the recently published Outlook 2009 findings provide some fantastic insight to where we’re headed and what’s in store. This information would not be available without committed individuals giving back to the community. And by no means is the WAA the only method of contribution…host an event, attend one…share a revelation…just spread the good vibe of what you do.

Communicate with conviction. A recurring challenge that I’ve heard over the past few weeks is our need to elevate awareness of Web analytics to senior management. This challenge isn’t new; but the urgency is reaching a crescendo. Thirty-two percent of respondents to the WAA Outlook survey listed this as the second greatest hurdle they will face in 2009. Here is where I think Dainow was onto something…by creating computing standards…will we finally be accepted? Perhaps, but the process of gaining consensus on definitions is a necessary step in the progression. In the interim, communicating Web analytics in tangible terms is paramount. This will mean different things to unique organizations, but I offer replacing complexity with accountability as a starting point. Communicate in terms that resonate with management by avoiding the esoteric. Then relay your successes to your fellow champions.

Thus, in the spirit of moving Web analytics forward, I offered these few thoughts. More will follow, yet I am just one individual in our collective environment.

Are you a champion for Web analytics? If so, what are you doing about it?

How “Real” is Real-Time Web Analytics?

2008-12-26T12:34:00.003-05:00

The nuances of real-time Web analytics are elusive, underused and often misinterpreted. Yet, real-time Web analytics is a feature that several vendors are seeking to fulfill. The way I see it, real-time has two components; real-time reporting and real-time processing. Real-time reporting makes Web analytics data visible within an interface instantaneously (or within 10 seconds). Real-time processing is the ability to create reports or segments and view data instantaneously (or again, within 10 seconds or less).

Real-Time Reporting
The last time I checked (back in May 2008), only Coremetrics, IndexTools, Nedstat and Omniture claimed to have real-time data reporting capabilities. At that time, Unica could report metrics within 15 minutes and Google Analytics shortly thereafter provided same day reporting (although they make no promises). So, overall the major Web analytics players are pretty fast about reporting, yet not impervious to flaws [I welcome comments on real-user data delay horror stories]. Of course, log files can typically be processed in real-time as well, yet don’t necessarily provide the slick interfaces of the previously mentioned vendors.

Now don’t get me wrong, I believe that Web analytics data should be reported as quickly as possible. I for one like to gauge metrics the same day I post or make changes to my site, however, it’s my opinion that real-time reporting is a luxury that many want but few properly exercise. To obtain real-time reporting so that a neurotic analyst can watch metrics as they accrue is not a good use of real-time reporting. However, those that use real-time data to populate content on pages or shift messaging to segments…now that’s interesting. But there’s a distinction here, where real-time automation is different than real-time decision-making. Decision-making based on data rarely (if ever), happens in real-time. Some might argue that alerting functionality provides the ability to make real-time decisions, but c’mon…is that really real-time?

Alert -> Think [allot appropriate time for comprehension, protocol and red-tape] -> Take Action. A time lapse view of this process will likely reveal less than optimal Alert-to-Action reflex.

Real-Time Processing
The second component of real-time is processing. This facet of real-time serves the instant gratification need in all of us. A typical scenario might unfold like this:

Idea -> Create report to illustrate idea -> Processing… -> Insight! Again, going back to my research from May 2008, I asked about each vendors’ ability to create segments in real-time with no delay in data representation. Most vendors did offer this functionality, with only Clicktracks and Nedstat reporting that they did make you wait (Omniture can perform real-time segment processing within Discover and Google Analytics didn’t have custom segments at that time, but they can do it now). Once data appears within an interface, analysts can slice and dice to their heart’s content. Processing times will vary based on complexity, the amount of information being processed and hardware and/or bandwidth available. But this really has nothing to do with real-time. Rather, it’s the ability to create a new report, segment or data view and gain access to it without having to wait.

Real-time automation of data – using rules-driven processes, event triggering and content delivery that occurs in real-time based on data derived from analytics does elevate the need for real-time data. While the applications that enable this type of real-time activity may be independent of Web analytics, there is an opportunity to improve – dare I say – “optimize” the process with real-time capabilities.

So, I’m really wondering if people are using real-time data in other ways that provide tangible value to their organizations? Beyond real-time dashboards that make great corporate lobby eye-candy are businesses making real-time decisions that require real-time Web analytics?

It’s Called “I Buy, You Wear”

2008-12-19T14:57:00.003-05:00

Here’s some Friday fun and a bit of commercialism thrown in to illustrate just how far some people will go. My brother and I often play a ridiculous game we called “I Buy, You Wear”, when we find ourselves traveling in strange places or sometimes when we’re just bored. The game consists of going into a thrift shop, Wal-Mart or other haberdashery and buying an article of clothing that the other must wear. We usually cap expenses at $20 bucks, but the idea is to make my brother wear some unflattering garment, which is typically worn in the most audacious and self deprecating manner possible. I’ve received really bad Hawaiian shirts, funny hats and even a sequin blouse that still hangs somewhere in the depths of my closet.

But the story I read today in the LA Times about the guy wearing a t-shirt a day with capitalistic goals is a new one for me. He’s already racked up $66,795 in pre-sold days just for getting dressed in the morning. Jason plans to Twit and Blog his way to stardom in just 365 days. Is this social media at its best? I think not.

An Interview with Jascha Kaykas-Wolff: WebTrends Newly Appointed VP of Marketing

2008-12-04T17:20:00.004-05:00

I’d like to start off by thanking Jascha for taking the time to speak with me in just week three on his new job at WebTrends. I sent him my interview questions in advance, so he had a bit of time to ponder his answers. But just so you know…Jascha is a very fast talker. I did my best to type as quickly my fingers would allow, but alas, some responses include paraphrasing. Here’s what we discussed:

JL: What will be your #1 priority upon moving into your new role at WebTrends?

JKW: The way I’d frame it is that I’m providing the definitive voice for our customers throughout all our communications, internal and external. Listen: I’m going to spend time with our customers; engage in dialogue, share ideas. In my first three weeks I’ve already been fortunate enough to have met with some of our partners like New York Times, McGraw-Hill and Reuters and I will continue to do so. My goal is to get to know the industry experts such as you and begin a consultative dialogue. I’m going to share my vision with our partners and you – AND – I’m looking for feedback. Most important to me is that I’m going to make changes because of the feedback where it’s appropriate. I want our relationships to drive value both ways.

I’ll do this by focusing on a Solution Viewpoint: We have an awesome collection of industry experts (business analyst, consultants, marketers, executives, sales people, partners and developers). As a company focusing on marketing optimization we will explicitly solve for the business problems of our customers with the right mix of our services, our partner services, our products and our partners products. For too long, web analytics vendors have focused on products and features instead of solutions.

I also plan to focus on our Customer conference: I’m shaping an event that will create meaningful experiences. Real, tangible value. I’ve been an attendee of customer conferences and usually left feeling unsatisfied with the substance of the content. Being spoken to just didn’t resonate with me as an individual or as a marketer. I’m driving a change in the style and delivery of the event to better meet the needs of customers and industry experts such as you. How? I believe that form meets function and that means driving a many-to-many discussion instead of the typical one-to-many oration.

JL: Can you provide some insight into your professional background at Microsoft and involvement with Web analytics, but more importantly how will you leverage this experience at WebTrends?

JKW: I was one of the first customers of WebTrends at Microsoft. My history with WebTrends in particular dates back around three years ago when I helped create what has now become Microsoft Store, Microsoft PinPoint, Windows Marketplace and digital locker. As we received funding to execute on the concept of marketplace & digital locker, I was challenged with the task of building and running the marketing team. In the context of this team, marketing encompassed: MarCom, Demand Gen, Merchandising, User Experience, Business Development, and Analytics. I chose WebTrends after a head-to-head RFP with the other major players. Once I was up and running as a business began to fully appreciate the power of the services and products. I understand the challenges and opportunities that web analytics customers face as I've been one for most of my career I intend to take my experience, the learning’s in particular, and reinforce them through our messaging. For example:

I plan to support this vision using the three pillars:

Open access to data drives product innovation:

Information empowers all parts of the business:

Partnership and thought leadership are an Absolute necessity:

JL: Can you share any great success stories or breakthroughs you’ve had with Web Analytics and related marketing tools that influenced you to move from user to the vendor side?

JKW: Analytics has always played a significant role in my professional career. This opportunity for me personally is really exciting. Very specifically, I’m working for WebTrends because I believe in the passion they have for their customers. That starts from the top down with Alex Yoder as the company leader and extends to everyone here at this company.

I think that web analytics is entering an exciting time. In fact, the core benefit Web data will produce in the future probably shouldn’t even be called “Web analytics.” It’s not just about the “Web”. My view is that the introduction of the Web channel’s data will provide the most current and accurate view of customer behavior that any enterprise has ever known. The next step of maturity will be moving from a channel-centric, historical view of performance, to organization-wide use of customer-centric insights. At the end of the day, all this integration is about better predictive capabilities as well as continuous improvement against business problems. It’s a bit of a practical application of Ian Ayer’s Supercruncers.

JL: WebTrends has a large customer base, many of whom are on legacy versions of the product. How will you encourage existing customers to upgrade and continue using WebTrends solutions?

JKW: I really like this question. It gets at the heart of what we have to do to continue being successful. The large majority of our enterprise customers are on WebTrends On Demand; they are all on the current version. Software customers are thus the ones that can sometimes fall behind on their versioning. Regardless if they are on software or on-demand some of the things we are, and will be doing, to drive value include:

Introducing new service and support programs designed to help customers recognize more value from the solution and our products.
Creating and refining education programs to inform customers of new functionality and related service programs.
Making the upgrade process itself easier with things like deployment cookbooks and easier installs. I can tell you that easy deployment is something near and dear to my heart. At Microsoft, my team worked with so many partners and had to deal with numerous installations. So I recognize that it is a necessity that partners can empathize with pains that users feel.

At the end of the day, we believe it’s our responsibility to reach out to our customers and ensure they are not only getting the most out of our products but help them create solutions to solve their business problems.

JL: How do you envision supporting the “data independence” vision at WebTrends?

JKW: My vision is to drive our marketing initiatives to support three key contributors to success in this space:

Invest heavily in our ecosystem:

Publishing and promoting our standards:

Foster community engagement:

JL: Web analytics is one of several products offered by WebTrends including: Marketing Warehouse, Visitor Intelligence, Score and Ad Director. Given this product mix, which direction do you see WebTrends heading in the next 12 months?

JKW: At its highest level, the product mix we have today is about addressing the broader marketing optimization needs of our customers. We want to help customers get their message out and determine if the right behaviors are tied to business. It’s about leading with solutions and prioritizing services and products that support these solutions. Ad Director can be a part of a solution to help customers by creating a funnel that will bring customers to them and analytics will help them understand and influence changes in behavior. But this means exposing data out to others systems. We will continue to invest in marketing warehouse and rich insights about customer data and push forward on products that support data enrichment. That said, analytics remains a core product and we will continue to improve that as well.

JL: Considering the Web analytics market at large, how do you think the analytics industry will weather though challenging economic times ahead?

JKW: I tend to believe that in business and in our personal lives, we return to our comfort areas when things get tough. When I fall back, it is to being a data monger. I want to understand the successes and failures of my marketing efforts and web analytics gives me that opportunity. I think you said it well in your blog, and I’ll paraphrase: “The accountability that WA brings to marketing is irrefutable”. I think it’s prudent to prepare for challenging times ahead but I also believe that players in our space whom add real measurable customer value will continue to be healthy.

JL: WebTrends has been relatively quiet over the past year, what is the one thing you’d like to communicate to analytics practitioners, consultants, competitors and onlookers about WebTrends?

JKW: So, if you’re going to make me stick to one statement, it’s this: WebTrends is first and foremost a marketing optimization firm. But, that in and of itself isn’t the end. We empathize with the business problems of our customers. Our management has a deep understanding of the issues our customers face and the experience and flexibility to solve real business problems. This will help us make our customers and partners successful. We will do everything in our power to make customers successful in their marketing optimization initiatives.

JL: Thanks Jascha for taking the time to speak with me today and best of luck in your new role.

JKW: My pleasure. Thank you.

Black Friday, Cyber Monday and the Importance of Benchmarks

2008-12-01T15:37:00.002-05:00

The 2008 retail frenzy is upon us and site operators are busy maintaining online shopping carts while executives are anxiously watching their bottom lines. An early report issued by ComScore this morning indicates that Black Friday 2008 drew in $534 million in online spending. This is a meager 1% bump from last year’s sales. While these numbers are low, it could be worse since myriad factors – including the dismal economy – are looming down on would-be shoppers. But don’t ink those calculations just yet. Today, dubbed “Cyber Monday” by the National Retail Federation is historically a more accurate predictor for online spending. The JupiterResearch US Online Holiday Retail Forecast pins 2008 online retail growth at 12% despite the woeful economic challenges. Still, this is the smallest increase in online shopping since the inception of the Internet, which is poised to blow away off-line holiday sales, forecast at only 2% growth. As an impartial outsider, these figures lead me to ponder the importance of benchmarking within retail and Web site operations at large.

As Americans, we love to compare. Benchmarks within the online world offer us the opportunity to gauge success against industry norms, fierce competitors, and even ourselves. Companies like Gomez, Inc benchmark Web site performance and availability to inform us how well sites stand up against traffic spikes and heavy loads. In typical fashion, this year proved that even the largest brands are susceptible to performance degradation. Today beginning at 10am ET the Victoria Secret shopping cart was producing errors and Williams-Sonoma experienced slowdowns at their shopping cart page – a critical transaction juncture. Over the weekend, Overstock experienced an uncharacteristic slowdown from 5 to 6 second average to over 17 seconds for synthetic transactions. Sears.com suffered the biggest outage, with nearly 40% of transaction attempts squashed on Black Friday. While these numbers are interesting, they are possible through benchmarking. By evaluating performance and availability during non-critical times, the numbers during the holiday crunch can be evaluated in light of what’s normal.

Coremetrics applies this rigor to Web analytics benchmarking. Traditionally Web analytics is an introspective endeavor, with metrics used to compare internal hourly/daily/monthly/seasonally/yearly performance against one’s own measures. Enter the Coremetrics Benchmark Industry Reports that now provide historic comparisons of retail performance across a number of key Web metrics. Data parsed out for the Black Friday surge indicated that 2008 online shoppers; spent less time on sites, converted fewer new visitors and decreased in average order values, when compared to data from Black Friday 2007. A few verticals within retail including department stores and gifts showed promise, but not enough to buoy the entire retail category. While the data may be bleak, the benchmark provides a granular look at metrics that matter for retailers. These data, when evaluated internally, should be used to help site owners determine where to prioritize action on their own sites. An external comparison should be used to illustrate how individual numbers compare against the whole. This tactic may save few merchandisers from the fire, but at least provides context to metrics that matter.

Benchmarking is fairly unique among Web analytics vendors and currently offered by only Coremetrics and Google Analytics. Do you use Web analytics benchmarks? If so, I'd love to hear your use cases and how benchmarks provide valuable insight to your organizations.

Web Analytics Afloat, Despite the Falling Economic Tide

2008-11-18T09:58:00.005-05:00

Read the papers, check the blogosphere or talk to your peers; the economy is great fodder for discussion these days. There’s a great thread at Web Analytics Demystified that rebukes the notion that Web Analytics technology is recession proof. Most commenter’s agree and there is compelling evidence to indicate that times are getting tougher all around, but I’ll share a few anecdotes about why I believe that Eric is wrong and that Web analytics (and Web technologies in general) are more insulated than he leads us to believe.

For starters, I’ve been viewing the current economic crisis through a comparative lens of what happened when the bubble burst in 2001. One fundamental difference is that in ’01 we entered a technology recession that stunted the growth of a nascent channel that was still in the throws of proving its worth. So many investments were sunk into the digital channel that was predominantly managed by twenty-somethings (spinning in their Aeron Chairs), that a crash - or at least a grounding - in reality was imminent. In 2008 we have entered into an entire economic recession that affects technology as well as all other industries around us. Forrester President and CEO, George Colony comments here as well as makes a few didactic points highlighting the pervasiveness of technology, the burgeoning use of cellular devices and finally “Social Sigma”.

While I won’t argue with layoffs and increased scrutiny for all technology spending, I do believe that the accountability that Web analytics brings to Marketing is irrefutable. This holds true no matter how well ingrained analytics is within an organization. My clients that currently use analytics are stating that they’re getting more responsibilities and attention from the upper ranks of their organizations. While new dollars may not be flowing into these analytics teams, they are relatively in tact and viewed as important sources of information regarding performance of online initiatives. Further, funds that were earmarked for analytics projects, such as upgrading from HBX to SiteCatalyst and acquiring DataWarehouse are still moving forward for the companies that I talk to. This may have something to do with Omniture’s successful third quarter and optimistic outlook for the future. For companies that aren’t yet sold on Web analytics, it’s my hunch that as things get tougher in the economy, the free tools on the marketplace will become attractive. Increased use in capable tools such as Yahoo! Web Analytics and Google Analytics will help many organizations weather the economic storm and may even provide additional business for analytics consultants.

So, here are a few thoughts on why Web analytics is insulated from economic cutbacks and supporting quotes from clients.

Accountability is paramount. Undoubtedly the economy will affect all businesses and the tide of irrational spending on unproven technologies, experimental marketing initiatives and exuberance surrounding non-revenue generating endeavors will lower all boats for some time. However, IT departments, Marketers and Web analysts will be asked to do more with less. To accomplish this feat, reliance on technology will become more prominent. Thus, as we move to a “prove it” mentality, the metrics derived from Web analytics (and testing technologies) will serve as bullets to strengthen arguments and prove why spending/campaigns/initiatives were successful. I do expect that overhead will be trimmed and new hiring is unlikely to occur, but organizations that have Analytics practitioners and investments in Web analytics technologies will increasingly look to these resources for answers.

“Two weeks ago 10 percent of my company was let go. But the analytics team is still in tact and we’ll be getting more responsibility.” Web Analytics Manager

We’re short on [Web analytics] staff and our open requisition was just frozen, so it’s a team of two. We are however moving ahead with a product upgrade and key initiatives such as mobile measurement.” VP Online Marketing

eBusiness is becoming all Business. Again going back to 2001, for many organizations, the Web was a garage venture that didn’t merit a seat at the big table. “Those Web Guys” were creating content for a few early adopters that were bold enough to shop online and brazen enough to use the Internet as their main source of information. Fast forward to today and the Web is an undisputable tool for every organization doing business. It is the face of the brand to customers and the first impression companies make on the majority of their visitors. The Web is no longer a choice for businesses; instead it is an imperative. Lack of a Web presence is an instant loss of credibility. And for many brands the conversation taking place off-site is equally important (and potentially more effective) than the one that they’re orchestrating. Measurement technologies provide a method to identify where the conversation takes place and to use that knowledge to impact change. Stalwart brands like the New York Times are using the Web as a bellwether for offline decisions and impacting both top and bottom line revenue as a result.

“Our CEO just said in a board meeting that eCommerce is helping drive the turnaround in the overall business…” Vice president, eCommerce, large multichannel retailer (Forrester Report)

Failure on the Web is not an option. It’s not. Failure at this point in time would be catastrophic. However you look at the economic situation, consumers will be seeking more information given tough times and the Web is the primary vehicle for this effort. Failure to have an informative, engaging Web site is grounds for dismissal. Consumers, prospectors and site visitors alike will flee to other Web sites and yours will be left in the dust. The Web is the lowest and most cost effective channel available and businesses should be fortifying their efforts in this area. My evidence shows that while companies are slowing on wholesale Web site redesigns, there is increased activity in optimizing online efforts and eeking out incremental improvements to existing capabilities. In fact, companies that I talk to are actually fortifying their infrastructures to place their Web sites on more secure footing to brace for an economic slump. If companies take away Web analytics from this critical channel, they’re essentially taking away the control tower from the airport. It simply won’t happen. Regardless of whether companies embrace Web analytics, they know enough to realize that it’s a key tool for understanding what’s happening with their brands, their customers and their technology investments.

“Companies are spending money to save money” VP EMEA

I do agree with planning for tough economic times by focusing on profits, producing insightful information, and evaluating your personal situation. However, it’s my opinion that Web analytics will weather the economic storm more favorably than many other discretionary tools. Wait – with 88 percent of companies over $50M in annual revenue using analytics – I’d venture to say that Web analytics is beyond discretionary and has reached necessary status. I also believe that Web analytics will grow in 2009, most aggressively in the areas of testing and targeting (where we’ve got a lot of room to grow). Yet, I’ll admit that my information and insight is derived from a small sample of customers and organizations. To that end, we are currently fielding executive surveys that ask these questions of Web site decision makers, so that we have the data collected outside the echo chamber which supports the claims I’m making here. Stay tuned for hard numbers and I’ll keep writing. I’m certain that this topic has some longevity to it. But by all means let me know what you think.

eMetrics was Buzzing

2008-10-26T10:07:00.001-04:00

I’m jetting home from the 2008 eMetrics Marketing Optimization Conference held in DC and can’t help but feel jazzed about the enthusiasm, energy and optimism on display over the past week. Jim Sterne, the emcee of the event, kicked things off by sharing a bit of where we’ve been and where it’s possible to go with analytics, optimization and all things digital. He successfully infused some highly contagious energy into the conference, which set the tenor for things to come.

We heard from Eric Peterson about Tom Davenport’s successes with Competing on Analytics, or as Eric interjected, competing on Web analytics. Analytics with a capital “A” (old school analytics as in BI and other disciplines) has demonstrated that businesses using data are indeed highly effective. Those that interject capital “W” for Web analytics into their organizations are truly competing for success by embracing the digital revolution. Real world examples were delivered in the Keynotes from James Robinson of the New York Times, whose director of marketing insisted that Web analytics become ingrained within the DNA of their organization. James shared some great examples of how the Web data resolved some of their traditional print challenges by anticipating precisely how many papers to print on any given news day. From their online traffic metrics, they could discern demand and thereby print enough papers to satisfy demand, while minimizing waste and not overprinting. Joe Megibow from Hotels.com delivered one of the most entertaining presentations and truly demonstrated their ability to compete with Web analytics. Their VOC technology is tightly integrated with analytics enabling them to identify problems and resolve issues with their online interface. He also shed light on the benefits of loyalty and described Hotels.com’s success with rewards and what it takes to really get consumers engaged.

Vendors at eMetrics also delivered some compelling and newsworthy presentations. Matt Langie from Omniture encouraged the audience to “let your cell phones ring” and emphasized the impact that mobile will have on the marketplace. Their image tags are capturing mobile data as quickly as it accrues and providing insight to organizations delivering on the rapidly burgeoning devices. Alex Yoder, WebTrends newly appointed CEO shared his vision of an “open” analytics solution that provides the ability to share data across the enterprise and leverage business intelligence tools for greater insight. Yet, the most notable announcement was delivered by Avinash, Google Analytics bonafide evangelist. In true Avinash style, he enthusiastically informed the room of Google’s newest upgrade. I quipped a full write up of the GA upgrade in my post Google Analytics and the Chocolate Factory.

Amid all the presentations and announcements, I found the true vibe of this event resonating in the hallways, lunch tables and of course, the infamous eMetrics lobby bar. Nearly everyone I spoke with shared stories of optimism and enthusiasm for Web analytics and the possibilities therein. In my presentation, I asked the audience if anyone else was having a good time and the answer was a resounding yes. I’m encouraged by the momentum surrounding Web analytics and adjacent technologies and believe that we’re genuinely on the precipice of greatness. Certainly the big thinkers, practitioners and attendees of eMetrics agreed. I applaud Jim Sterne and his capable team for delivering on yet another educational and inspirational eMetrics conference.

Google Analytics and the Chocolate Factory

2008-10-23T23:43:00.002-04:00

A friend of mine commented that he envisioned the GooglePlex resembling Willy Wonka’s Chocolate Factory, with gum drop trees and candy coated sidewalks. I was there a few weeks ago to preview yesterday’s announcement of the Google Analytics upgrade and my friend wasn’t too far off.

The full sized dinosaur, beach volleyball game, groovy red couches and delicious food as far as the eye can see looked pretty cool to me. And, the new GA tool may just have the staying power of an everlasting gobstopper.

Jeff Gillis provides the official blog post about the upgrade and Justin Cutroni of EpikOne added his live from the eMetrics hotel room video of the impressive new features. Yet, Avinash’s delivery of the upgrades was truly enthusiastic.

Here’s my take on the upgrade:

New Interface – a new and fresh look is always a good thing, but the tabbed browsing of reports is both contemporary and useful. They also added the ability to monitor multiple accounts within a combined dashboard that provides comparable metrics right up front. This view will be great for organizations managing multiple web sites or those that want to extract a snapshot of multi-site data to push out tailored reports to executives, directors or others within their organizations.

AdSense Integration (private beta) – revenue, impressions, click throughs and more. AdSense info will be accessible within the GA interface under a dedicated AdSense link in the nav structure. Publishers will be invited to try out the new method for digging data on a roll-out basis as they ramp up to scale and it eventually becomes available to the masses. This should present opportunities for publishers to advertise more effectively.

Custom Reporting – now here is where things start getting fun… The upgrade provides the ability to drag metrics such as visits, conversions and revenue and drop them into the custom report creator. Then users can select dimensions like keywords, content or campaigns to evaluate against the metrics. The tool is color coded such that blue represents metrics that form columns and green boxes are dimensions depicted in rows. Each custom report can be saved, shared or edited. Imagine creating multiple reports for stakeholders based on their needs and having them accessible as tabs across the custom reporting interface.

Advanced Segmentation – segmentation is the lifeblood of Web analytics and now Google just provided a transfusion. Choose from a list of predefined segments, with multi-select capability or drag and drop into your own advanced segments and slice and dice to your hearts content. Segments can be used to glean insight on real-time info or saved and applied to historic data as far back as necessary. Further, they can be created using “and” “or” statements to refine or expand data sets. All segments can be tested in preview mode to determine if the sample is acceptable, then saved for use against any data or in conjunction with other segments.

Data Visualization – originally dubbed the Trendalyzer (by the Swedish statistical analysis tool GOOG picked up in ’07), Motion Charts provide data visualization across 5 (count ‘em, five) dimensions. X axis, Y axis, color, size, and time. Time is probably the coolest dimension as you get to see where keywords, revenue, or other metrics perform over time. By linking to charts, saved reports can be played back repeatedly or saved and shared via URLs that can be applied to any GA account on their own data. For GAACs this is a powerful feature that can be used to generate reports that scale across multiple clients.

Open API (private beta) – perhaps the pinnacle of free, the highly anticipated, much appreciated Google API now exists. While this feature is dependent on your imagination and that of thousands of global developers, the API makes Google Analytics truly extensible. Expect to see Google Analytics data in more permeations than you ever imagined. I foresee an infiltration of GA data into progressive organizations of all sizes; providing indispensable value for users that never have, and perhaps will never need to, log into the interface.

If you’ve got an existing GA account, request the upgrade asap so you too can acquire a golden ticket and gain access to the chocolate factory.

Omniture Acquires Mercado for a Song

2008-10-14T16:58:00.003-04:00

Almost exactly one month after Omniture released its re-branded Site Search solution (formerly Atomz) to the market, they announced last night the acquisition of long-time site search entity Mercado. This acquisition, following on the heels of the previous announcement tells me that this was a somewhat opportunistic move and based primarily on the deal price of Mercado.

Frankly, it’s disappointing to me that Mercado only drew $6.5M for “certain assets” which apparently contain “additional technology and expertise” and “certain…intellectual property and business assets” depending on how you interpret the press release. As a long time follower and fan of Mercado’s search technology, it’s too bad that the deal price was so low that it could have been a Friday afternoon tin-cup exercise across departments at Omniture. None the less, Omniture just added a best-in-class search solution to its Marketing Optimization platform, moving it that much closer to amassing its Coup de grace for the Online Marketing Suite category.

Mercado has built up a substantial business catering to the eCommerce market since its launch over a decade ago with a competitive search solution. Customers currently utilize the solution in both hosted and licensed versions and marquee clients include Macy’s, Sears and REI. Last spring, Mercado underwent a rebranding exercise and debuted a new logo that symbolized the customer journey through the 3 lifecycle phases (acquire, convert and retain). Their goal was to promote dynamic commerce through search using rich attributes and social data. I have a ton of respect for the Marketing team at Mercado and truly believe that they were onto something with their vision of improving the online shopping experience. They felt that the traditional eCommerce paradigm created tunnel vision for consumers and that sites must find a way to deliver the peripheral vision obtained in the offline world into online commerce.

Yet, yesterday’s acquisition brings several questions to mind, including:

• How many of Mercado’s (approximately 200) customers are also Omniture clients?
• Will the addition of a site search solution really affect new prospective customers for Omniture?
• Is this acquisition aimed squarely at retailers in an attempt to gain more market share within that vertical?

Neither Omniture nor Mercado were immediately available for comment, so I suppose my questions will have to wait. What do you think of this news…?

Web Analytics Movers & Shakers: Yahoo!, Coremetrics

2008-10-09T16:58:00.007-04:00

A few flurries of activity within the Web analytics community surfaced this week including the launch of Coremetrics 2009, a hearty product upgrade, and Yahoo! Web Analytics’ official coming out party.

I’ll begin with the Coremetrics upgrades which are focused around the theme of “Know Your Visitors”. A longstanding tenet for Coremetrics, they believe that Web analytics clients are interested in people and the ability to identify and understand as many unique individuals as possible. This knowledge can be used to target offerings at both the individual and segment level creating a better experience from both an online and offline perspective. Coremetrics makes this possible through their LIVE (Lifetime Individual Visitor Experience) Profile database which essentially creates an analyst’s playground of customer insight.

The Coremetrics 2009 release (publicly available for clients as of 10/6), features: enhanced benchmarking, new charting capabilities and drill-down functionality (within their visualization platform), and mobile analytics. Coremetrics and Google Analytics are the only two offerings currently providing benchmarking capabilities, so if you’re looking for competitive intel, you know where to find it. Both tools provide key comparative data allowing you to understand metrics such as visits, bounce rates, page view and time on site in the context of your site against a competitive set. At this time, Coremetrics offers more benchmarking reports and ones that are specialized for verticals (e.g., retail, publishing). Coremetrics' new Relational Zoom tool allows clients of their Explore product to identify relationships within categories and apply them to segments for heavy duty analysis. And finally, the mobile analytics solution sheds some much desired insight into how visitors on the move are connecting and what they do via mobile devices vs. sedentary laptops and desktop machines.

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Yahoo!’s news revealed that final integration steps are complete after just 5 months from the acquisition of IndexTools. Users of the updated tool will be able to access the interface through a single sign-on via standard Yahoo! accounts (existing IndexTools clients will use a backdoor login to the legacy interface). The official launch does not provide open access to Web analytics for the masses (which was originally speculated by some in-the-know), but according to Dennis Mortensen, the new product genuinely isn’t designed to compete head to head with products already on the market. With so many underutilized analytics solutions out there today, Yahoo! is taking a strategic approach by allowing an initial wave of 15,000 Yahoo! Store owners access to the tool. For these lucky store owners (and yes, there is already a waiting list as requests were rolling in every second of the day yesterday!), this is a huge win providing key insight into their pages and carts to understand what’s happening with customer visits leading up to the holiday shopping season. These 15 thousand Yahoo! Store owners can now enable analytics with the flip of a switch that automatically tags pages at runtime. Nice!

Further, the standard installation will deliver with preformatted reports (much like Coremetrics’ approach), designed to key in on important eCommerce variables, with the goal of providing instant insight. Advanced users will still be able to customize reports within the Yahoo! interface, create dashboards and tag to suit their more complex needs. Roll-outs will continue throughout Q4 and extend into next year ultimately providing access to tens of thousands of additional Yahoo! customers over time. Support will be offered through existing Yahoo!’s Store resources with additional backup coming from their partner network for professional services. Dennis wrote up an enthusiastic post with tons of great screenshots, so check it out if you want to see more.

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In summary, October is shaping up to be a big month for Web analytics activity and we haven’t even hit eMetrics yet. I anticipate more big news from vendors at this event, so if you’re on the fence about heading to DC for the industry’s marquee event, then get over it! I’ll be there, so please track me down if you want to talk analytics, testing, targeting or anything else for that matter.

Cheers,
John

Escaping Web Analytics Hell

2008-10-01T01:43:00.018-04:00

At the Shop.org annual summit in Vegas, I presented Escaping Web Analytics Hell: A Strategy for Attaining Paradise by Avoiding Eternal Damnation. Based on a strong response from the crowd and numerous follow-up questions, I decided to share some of my insights from this presentation here on my blog. I originally delivered a version of “Web Analytics Hell” at eMetrics in San Francisco, but modified the Shop.org one to include commentary from Brain Elliott from Albris and John Lazarchic from Petco. I’m told that the full replay of the presentation will be available for download on the Shop.org site soon.

The concept draws on my literary background, which I exercised by extending an analogy for Web analytics that parallels Dante’s Divine Comedy. The Divine Comedy is a trilogy written in the 14th century describing the horror and punishment delivered in hell (Inferno), enduring penance in Purgatory (Purgatorio), and the ascension into Paradise (Paradiso) for the truly virtuous. Playing the part of Virgil (Dante’s guide through the underworld and purgatory), I began by describing for my audience how the depths of Inferno align with common challenges for Web analytics practitioners and their organizations. Consequently, climbing from the depths of Hell requires strong Web analytics practices and only truly evolved analytics tactics will lead you to Paradiso. The following is what I relayed to the audience:

Dante’s Nine Stages of Inferno and the Corresponding Analytics Resolve

Stage 1) Limbo:

Web analytics limbo exists when sites have unclear goals, poorly defined measurement practices or no analytics evangelist/champion within the organization. Nothing truly gets accomplished and Web analytics data often suffers from neglect.

Sites that escape Limbo are those that establish process within their organizations as it relates to Web analytics. This involves several components including:
• Strategic resources to define business objectives and establish data collection needs
• Analytical team to train end users, build reports – dashboards and KPI’s – and most importantly, automate reporting
• Tactical support to react to analytics reports, implement changes and build a process of continuous improvement through measuring the effects of change

Stage 2) Lust:

Web analytics lust occurs when practitioners begin to question whether an alternative tool would perform better for their organization. If only we had [insert Web analytics vendor name here] we could achieve so much more. This fallacy perpetuates when Web analytics is viewed as the resolution to a problem rather than a diagnostic tool. Analytics tools are a starting point and not a means to an end.

Sites that overcome Lust cultivate expertise internally and seek resources to improve their analytical capabilities. Often times, these resources come from external sources in the form of vendors, authorized consultants or marketing strategists. While in-house expertise may be difficult to acquire, the analytics consulting industry is burgeoning and contains plentiful help in technical and strategic support. Yet, the overarching objective must be to nurture in-house talent to attain a sustainable program of analytics.

Stage 3) Gluttony:

Online marketers currently exist in a rampant state of Data Gluttony. This is exemplified by the fact that 39 percent of site operators measure multiple aspects of online visitor behavior, but do not use this data in any way. Data gluttony is a travesty of resources enabled by readily available analytics solutions and a dearth of actionable insight. Organizations must resist the urge to consume all data without cause or purpose.

Defeating Gluttony requires managing data intake and aligning business objectives with measurement goals. Sound logical? Ironically, many sites simply collect data without acknowledgement of how that information will be used or leveraged to improve business initiatives. Not that each measure must have immediate impact, rather sites should understand their data needs and how they might effectively collect and analyze data so that it contributes to overarching goals.

Stage 4) Avarice:

Also known as Greed, Avarice (in analytics terms), is the failure to disseminate information for fear of misinterpretation or misrepresentation of the data. Often times analytics data is not shared across organizations and insight and intelligence remain siloed in disparate parts of the organization. The inability or unwillingness to disseminate data profoundly limits a holistic view of behavior and performance. The antithesis of Avarice is distributing too much data, such that reports are meaningless and recipients fail to identify or take note of important information.

Site operators that quell Avarice learn to delegate data responsibilities throughout their organizations. This includes distribution of information in an efficient and responsible manner (i.e., multiple report formats distributed to different stakeholders). Further, reporting that is inclusive of analysis is exponentially more valuable than raw metrics. The opportunity to include analyst insight within reports empowers those closest to the data to identify meaningful opportunities and forewarn dangers. Further, annotations within reporting minimize misinterpretation of data and align recipients.

Stage 5) Wrath:

When translated to analytics-speak, Wrath equates to an inability to take action from data. This can result from a lack of unified efforts, when goals or KPI’s go unchecked or when data is simply ignored or devalued within an organization. The wrathful are a dangerous bunch because despite their efforts no results evolve. Sites with wrathful analytics practitioners should heed this warning; fear the loss of your valuable analysts for they will soon flee for organizations that value their work.

Empowered analytics practitioners are happy practitioners and empowerment is achieved within data driven organizations. Although using data to drive change is no easy task and one that requires commitment from the top echelons of an organization. A strong foundation for data comprehension and analysis therein lies. Only then can analytics data be used to drive rules-based processes, automate content delivery and dynamically effect change. Sites that overcome wrath are using data from multiple campaigns and opportunities to fuel optimization in other parts of their organizations. Learnings from the online channel, email or search efforts can be harnessed for new initiatives.

Stage 6) Heresy:

Within web analytics heresy killed the HiPPO by challenging the status quo. Effective marketers are open to change and do not remain content once they think they know their customers. In reality customer behavior, attitudes and opinions shift rapidly and relying on static marketing tactics is a flawed strategy. Challenging preconceived notions of who target customers are, where they come from and how they behave on sites and within campaigns is infinitely traceable using Web analytics. Sites that don’t challenge conventional wisdom risk customer abandonment.

Respectful Heresy can be accomplished through A/B and multivariate testing. Using technologies fueled by analytics data, site operators can effectively test ideas, concepts and designs using widely available testing technologies. These processes are a logical extension to Web analytics data collection and segue to more sophisticated analytical practices. While too few sites are currently utilizing testing, this is the next frontier for achieving incremental optimization with clearly demonstrable results. Sites that aren’t performing tests to identify optimization opportunities should question why they don’t have a program in place.

Stage 7) Violence:

Analytics data should unite organizations rather than cause conflict between them. However, often times data resides in silos making it challenging to access or share data between business units. According to 27 percent of executives surveyed, one of their greatest challenges for their organizations is that data use and analysis is conducted independently within different business units. Disjointed analysis of this nature has the potential to influence flawed assumptions and misguided strategies, which could escalate to violent situations.

The solution to mitigating violence caused by siloed analysis of analytics data is to democratize access to Web analytics tools and provide various levels of access to individuals within your organization. By enabling all interested parties access to data, information has a much greater opportunity to provide a foundation for the data driven organization. Yet, not all stakeholders will show interest or have the inclination to access primary tools via an interface and therefore data must be socialized throughout the organization in reports customized for individual stakeholders.

Stages 8 & 9) Fraud:

The eighth and ninth stages of the Inferno represent the worst offenders in the category of Fraud. These carnal sinners include: Panderers, Seducers and Traitors. The corresponding offenses for analytics practitioners can be aligned to those introducing doubt regarding data accuracy concerns, those seduced by multiple tools resulting in double tagging of pages and finally, no single version of truth or loyalty to metrics which diminishes the ability to make data driven decisions.

Fraud can be overcome by instilling a process for measurement and communication of information as it relates specifically to business goals. This requires a commitment from multiple levels within an organization and often times trickles down from the top in large companies. Yet, the reality is that over one quarter of executives reported that Web analytics are not ingrained within their corporate cultures and even more distressing is that these individuals feel that analytics is something that they could do without. A travesty!

If you made it through my extended analogy either you’re a curious literature buff in a quandary over my stretched analogy, an analytics aficionado looking to glean a gem or idea, or simply a glutton for punishment. In any case, I’d love to hear your thoughts on ways to get into analytics hell, or better yet, methods to get out.

Stay tuned for my next post…Attaining Web Analytics Paradise (Methods for Attaining Paradise by Avoiding Eternal Damnation).

Web Analytics Strategies webcast

2008-10-01T01:22:00.005-04:00

There was a great deal of press around this one. Unica drew nearly 800 registrants and 428 listeners in on the call to hear about our Web Analytics Constellation and from customers Coastal Contacts and The Hartford Group.

Here's the deck.

Conscientiously Objecting to Twitter

2008-10-01T01:20:00.000-04:00

Since many of my peers are jumping onboard, I’ll offer a contrarian’s opinion and my rant about Twitter. Someone asked me recently if they could follow me on Twitter and my response was an emphatic No! Admittedly, I’ve checked on Twitter to see what individuals are up to – or even last week, while at Shop.org, I navigated through the event links leading to Twitter to check the buzz about the event. But I can’t say that any of these experiences has provided any real value for me. Sure, Twittering your way out of an Egyptian jail is a good trick, but I’ve managed to stay out of the pokey thus far just fine without Twitter.

Even my vanity (as a now-Forrester analyst) does not predispose me to presume that anyone cares one iota what I have to Tweet about. If anyone’s really interested, they can visit my blogs here or here and read a full text version of my thoughts rather than the truncated 140 character set. If they’re actually one of my “friends” they can check on my Facebook page that’s infrequently updated with status alerts. Or better yet, when someone really needs to know that I’ve arrived safely on the plane, then I actually call my wife and tell her. Beyond that, I just can’t fathom what’s so important that anyone needs to spend their time waxing poetic in microblog format.

Yes, this is directed @you, so Twitterers, please enlighten me on the value and I’ll keep on open mind.

Meeting of the Minds at X Change

2008-09-19T14:43:00.002-04:00

The Web Analytics X Change conference hosted jointly this year by Semphonic and Web Analytics Demystified was by far the most thought provoking conference I’ve attended in 2008. To call it a conference is actually a misnomer, since it’s really more of an un-conference with the intentionally intimate group of 100 practitioners, industry leaders and analytics visionaries talking to each other rather than having presenters talking at them, We were encouraged to tackle the biggest issues facing Web analytics and identify key questions, challenges, and opportunities. I was invited to participate in the keynote presentation as well as lead two of the “Huddles” where our goal was to identify issues and work toward some level of resolve.

The keynote panel consisted of Megan Burns from Forrester Research, Bill Gassman from Gartner and me representing Jupiter Research. In atypical keynote style, we were asked to address questions submitted by the audience in advance which consisted of topics such as what impact will dynamic content have on measurement tactics and where’s the ROI in Web analytics. We each addressed topics based on our respective expertise and all managed to interject at least one take-away sound bite. Bill offered that analysts must "let chaos reign" within their organizations and leverage the mayhem to illustrate that analytics can resolve issues. Megan quipped that crediting Web analytics for solving an organization's problems was akin to congratulating the thermometer for curing the common cold. And I contributed that Web analytics are the gateway drug of marketing technologies because they are cheap, widely available and lead to harder stuff.

The Huddles that I led included Industry Standards or Lack Thereof… and Data Integration: Myths and Realities. Within the Standards session we acknowledged that no single set of standards exists nor do common definitions for basic metrics like page views or visits. We joked that the good thing about standards is that there are so many to choose from. Some proposed a consistent schema that would enable coherent measurement and allow marketers to align metrics across disparate applications and mediums, Yet, others criticized that aligning metrics in attempt to achieve identical numbers is a fool’s game. We agreed that we exist in a time where change happens so rapidly that there is no latitude for waiting for standards to evolve. Metrics commonly used to track and report against such as the page view are now obsolete due to evolving technologies and presentation methods. Collectively we’re doing a better job of tracking than historic processes like panels used to measure television, yet we’re still attempting to fudge old metrics to fit a new world. If standards will emerge, they will provide financial benefit (or at minimum, incentive) for vendor compliance and will be native to digital solutions.

The second huddle I had the privilege to lead was on Data Integration and proved to be a lively discussion starting with concerns over obtaining a 360 degree view of customers using both qualitative and quantitative data sources; “joining” multiple data sets to glean insight that wasn’t available on an individual level; and mapping the flow and path of data (across different media) to place the “why” with the “what” of Web analytics information. Governance also surfaced as a key consideration factor because in many cases there is an implied assumption that it is acceptable to integrate data where regulatory and privacy concerns may actually not allow it. We identified an opportunity for a federated database approach that would enable a free flow of data into and out of applications used for data collection and analysis. Closing thoughts reflected that no single solution is ever going to meet all needs. While many instances call for integration, existing tools require complex integration or modified solutions to enable a fluid transfer of information required for collection, analysis, reporting and action.

Collectively, we didn’t solve the problems plaguing Web analytics during this two day event. We did however, push the envelope by asking the brightest minds in Web analytics to explore the possibilities for growth and acceleration into the most sophisticated recesses of data collection, analysis and actionability. By no means was this a conference for the casual user. If you’re looking to tap into mindshare that is intimately anointed with all things analytics, then I highly recommend X Change as a must attend event. Summaries from all huddles discussed this year should be available soon at no charge for all interested parties.

Will Google Chrome Rock Your World?

2008-09-02T10:13:00.003-04:00

Google’s at it again, although this time someone ripped the covers off the beta a bit early. The Google Chrome Web browser hasn’t hit the public Web yet, but hopes are high that today will be the day. My first thought on the news brought to mind the Wilco song; Hell is Chrome, and perhaps that’s just what Microsoft and Internet Explorer creators are thinking. The lyrics begin: “When the devil came, he was not red. He was chrome…”

My second thought meandered to the privacy considerations that will be built into the new browser. According to early reports, it will allow standard cookies to be dropped on machines via the browser and opt out capacity is possible, much like today’s standard browsers. Each downloaded browser will maintain a unique ID and if users elect to send usage reports to Google, the browser will send crash reports and unfound URL’s to debug and learn more. Additionally, opt-in users will benefit from URL suggestions when typing into the browser bar based on Google’s search query knowledge and provide shortcuts to commonly visited sites (i.e., type “c” return; and frequently visited cnn.com renders). “Incognito” mode allows users to surf anonymously without transmitting any pre-existing cookies to sites. New cookies will be accepted in incognito mode, yet deleted upon terminating the browser session or returning to normal mode. It will be interesting to see how many users actually exercise this function (insert devious thoughts here). For me, I will likely give it a try just to see if behaviorally targeted ads and content change when I’m running stealth.

At the time of this posting, the browser is not yet available, but stay tuned for updates. With Google’s success and widespread consumer adoption of products delivered in search, email, and analytics among others, my take is that this browser will be widely adopted. Surely that’s what GOOG is hoping and perhaps with growing familiarity of all things Google on the Web, the close of Wilco’s Hell is Chrome lyrics will be apt for many consumers using the new Chrome browser: “And I felt like I belonged. Come with me…”.

When Baseball Parallels Technology

2008-08-28T10:18:00.005-04:00

This morning I was listening to Red Sox CEO Larry Luchino speak on a local Boston radio show and I realized that there are some distinct parallels between baseball and technology. I’ve written before on analytics use within baseball and the science of Sabermetrics, but today I was thinking more of baseball as a business. If you live in a sports town like Boston, New York or Chicago, you already know that sports is big business and that’s particularly true with baseball, where players can reign in up to $20M in annual contracts and ballbarks are erected with reckless disregard for expense. Yet, the non-baseball research I’m currently conducting centers around acquiring new technology – more specifically: whether to build, buy or assemble? – which has some eerie similarities to baseball.

On the radio this morning, Luchino was asked about the recent trade of Manny Ramirez, (which one reported describes as “the cataclysmic deal that sent Manny Ramirez to baseball Siberia”) and the success that the Red Sox have had with young players on their roster like Dustin Pedroia, Jacoby Ellsbury, Jon Lester and Jed Lowrie. Sure, relative unknowns to most, but pure gold to the Boston faithful. Anyway, the way I see it, teams can buy big talent like Manny and take their chances; they can nurture players from within their organizations and produce “home grown” (Larry’s words) talent; or they can acquire position players to fill specific needs in their roster. This got me thinking about considerations for purchasing technology to build and manage Web sites.

Here are just a few considerations for buying new technology and their parallels to baseball:
• Integration – A huge factor in determining how a new technology will interact with existing platforms, legacy systems and the entire technology stack.
o Baseball Parallel – If acquiring a big star, will he mix well with the existing clubhouse? Does he have a history with other players or coaches in the organization? Will he require his own Lazy-Boy chair next to his locker? Each of these factors determines how well a new player will integrate within an existing ecosystem or upset the delicate balance.

• Performance – Technology performance can dictate how well a solution works straight out of the box. Is it fast and reliable? Does it do everything the vendor promised it would? Or does it slow down the entire system? Perhaps it requires extensive customization to make it work properly with other solutions?
o Baseball Parallel – Okay, you probably see where I’m headed with this one… Can you expect out of the box numbers on RBI’s, homeruns and OBP? Will there be significant ramp up time involved? Will production be equivalent to the player’s previous numbers? All big questions in the game of baseball.

• Scalability – The ability to evolve with the needs of the business as goals, objectives and priorities shift. Can a technology grow to accommodate the changing needs of an organization?
o Baseball Parallel – When a big star is acquired, can they adapt? A-rod is probably the perfect example here: a long time short stop, he moved over to third base when acquired by the Yankees to allow Jeter to continue on in his favored position. Red Sox closer, Jonathan Papelbon adapted to a role as a closer from his normal routine as a starting pitcher (that worked out well for Sox fans). Bottom line is that the ability to scale allows an organization to grow.

In contrast to these considerations for buying technology [players], building from within precludes many of these challenges. Integration is not a factor because the player has always been a part of the organization. Performance is a known quantity because it has been nurtured all along. And scalability is minimized because with a new player the entire process is about growing them from within the organization. However, with technology (and baseball), homegrown solutions require foresight, time and resources. For organizations that have these luxuries, building homegrown can be an extremely viable option.

This brings me to the last point on acquiring position players, which I align to technology point solutions. Typically these are solutions acquired (compromises considered) that serve to fill a need. In technology, a best of breed approach is generally preferred where expectations of how well a solution will integrate with existing technologies and what the performance will be are usually sorted out ahead of time. These acquisitions can provide immediate lift to an organization (i.e., Jason Bay traded for Manny – Bay drove in 4 runs against the Yankees last night and is batting .347 with 24 RBI’s in just 23 games since the trade).

So, if you’ve stuck with me this far into the extended analogy, you’re probably a baseball fan too. Let me know what you think and share any parallels you’ve observed between baseball and technology.

Measuring the Olympics

2008-08-06T17:41:00.001-04:00

As the world prepares to watch the games of the XXIX Olympiad, NBC is preparing to watch the world. The research team at NBC Universal is well aware that TV’s, laptops and cell phones across the globe will be tuned into Olympics news and coverage and their intention is to measure viewers and their behavior.

It’s a huge endeavor that no single company has yet solved and therefore, NBC created its own calculation called Total Audience Measurement Index (TAMI) that seeks to quantify viewership across mediums. The index will draw TV viewership data from Nielsen, Video on Demand from Rentrak, Internet audience data from Quantcast and on-site metrics from Omniture. If they succeed in producing valuable data, the index may establish a new standard for understanding advertising reach across a multi-device environment.

This fusion of measurement tools will undoubtedly provide an interesting picture of impressions, yet the problem of tying these metrics together still exists. Each of these tools reaches out to disparate groups within the population (i.e., Nielson’s panel, Quantcast’s members, Web site viewers) without the ability to tie them together to glean patterns of multimedia use on the part of individuals or segments. Our research shows that 66 percent of adults interested in interactive TV are online and watching TV simultaneously, which brings the quality of impression or “attention” of the viewer into question. But I suppose that brand advertisers deal with this all the time. To their credit, NBC is attempting to quantify individual behavior through a small panel of (privacy adverse) users carrying Integrated Media Measurement devices that will pick up TV, audio, mobile, and Internet signals. (I’d like to see that gadget). Yet, the larger sample will still be a composite metric that serves as a proxy for a true measurement industry standard.

Shortfalls notwithstanding, kudos to NBC’s research team for pioneering total event impact measurement. I for one will be watching the TAMI stats between rounds of table tennis.

At Omniture it's Academic

2008-07-22T09:39:00.000-04:00

Bravo to Omniture for its academic initiative to get college students trained in Web analytics. There is currently a dearth of qualified Web analysts on the market as indicated by the nearly 1,500 open Web Analytics job requirements listed on Monster.com.

By enabling students to gain hands on experience with today’s leading tools, we’re sure to see a new crop of practitioners with fresh ideas and innovative tactics. It’s good to see that Analytics University is still alive and well.

Marketing on Nostradamus’ Tightrope

2008-07-22T08:53:00.004-04:00

Threads from the OMMA conference on Behavioral Targeting are beginning to leak into the news and indicate that BT is looking very promising as a mainstream advertising tactic. Although the conference was a bit niche to justify my travel, I’m watching from afar. Despite that advertising falls outside of my direct research coverage area, the Behavioral Targeting wave extends to site operations as well so I have a vested interest. And, the advertising world, with their deep pockets and liberal creative, often serve as a bellwether for on-site tactics.

Dave Morgan, former CEO of Tacoda, forecast that the Behavioral Targeting market will grow from $700 million in 2007 to almost $10 billion by 2012. Of course, he’s betting on the evolution on IPTV to weigh in on the BT game and sink some serious cash into the biz.

I love this one from Dave Martin, Director of interactive media for Ignited…”It’s only going to get creepier”. He’s predicting pushed outdoor ads for everyone based on RFID chips embedded within credit cards.

While I’m a huge fan of targeting, the show stopper for these technologies is consumer privacy. My research shows that consumers do want some targeted ads, but there’s still a strong undercurrent of “not on my computer you don’t” among the masses. You’ve heard me riff on relevance, context and opt-in before, so I’ll save you the recall…but IMHO that’s where targeting is at.

It’s not the Tools, It’s the Craftsman

2008-07-16T08:40:00.001-04:00

It turns out that IndexTools does have nearly 80 percent of Omniture’s standard off-the-shelf functionality (77 percent to be exact). Yet, so does almost everyone else. Google Analytics has 64 percent of the standard features (excludes premium and custom features) offered by Omniture. And Coremetrics, Unica and WebTrends all deliver more standard features out of the box than Omniture. Our recently published Web Analytics Buyer’s Guide reveals that the functionality gap between Web analytics tools is narrow and differentiators will surface in flexibility and data integration capabilities. Only one-third of analytics clients surveyed listed standard features and functionality as a priority when selecting vendors. Flexibility of reporting, ability to service business needs and accuracy of information all outweigh features in the buying deliberation process.

As far as tools go, there’s not a huge difference in the tools that a carpenter would pull together to frame a house and the set that my three year old uses. He’s got a hammer, tape measure, level and a saw and walks around with them in a backpack like he’s ready to conquer the world. Despite the fact that these plastic tools will only get him so far in framing out a new house, they represent all the necessary components to do so. Yet, even with equivalent tools we all know that while one carpenter may be capable of building a magnificent abode, another might struggle with a birdhouse. Thus, today’s tools have less to do with how far an organization can go with Web analytics because other factors have significantly more impact. The ability to leverage data through unlimited segmentation, blended analysis, and capture/reporting of custom elements is becoming increasingly important as web analysts grow more sophisticated. Further, the ability to integrate multiple data sources into an analytics solution to obtain a holistic picture of business performance is a differentiating factor for data-driven organizations. Solutions that are leading the enterprise-class constellation from Omniture, Coremetrics and Unica are facilitating these complex tasks. And the others are not too far behind.

I’d like to congratulate all of the leaders in this year’s enterprise and SMB constellations and give a hearty thanks to all who participated. This report was about five months in the making and required significant help and cooperation from numerous individuals. One thing I realized in the process is that there is an analytics vendor out there for every business. I demo’ed some great tools and each one of them had at least one eye-opening quality demonstrating true innovation. Yet, attempting to definitively state which is best in the market requires understanding the unique needs of an organization. JupiterResearch reports (especially Buyer's Guides), are meant to initiate dialogue between analysts and our clients. While the report stands on its own, it is meant to be directional in nature and the insight that clients receive by understanding the content with respect to their unique businesses is invaluable. Thus, I welcome any questions or inquiries if you’d like to learn more about the method behind the report or how it applies to your business.

Relaxed & Recharged

2008-07-15T09:22:00.004-04:00

There’s nothing like a week at the beach to recharge the intellectual batteries. Although gone are the days of chilling with a good book while the gentle waves lap my feet. Now, it’s all about chasing kids, skim boarding and building sandcastles. However, I’m feeling fully refreshed after some good family fun, several great fishing trips (including one epic day with a 35” striper on the flyrod), and just generally taking it easy. Ahhh…summertime.

Widespread Panic, Boston - 7/10/08

2008-07-11T07:40:00.003-04:00

So, I'll fill you in on a little known fun fact... I have a penchant for live music. Especially Jam Bands. Widespread riped it up tonight. Certainly the best touring jam band of this time. David Schools held it down with an insane base line that cemented the groove to the floor, while Jimmy took to noodling on the high end with some twisty riffs. In between, there was a cacouphony of brilliance that JB wandered through as if he knew exactly where he was going. A truely remarkable performance.

Resurgence of Searchandising Lingo

2008-07-01T17:17:00.002-04:00

I stumbled across several citations of the term “searchandising” recently, indicating that this term is rearing its head once again.

Here’s a June 30th quote from an SLI-Systems press release: "We're pleased that the new console provides us the tools needed to match our customers' needs with our business goals through more flexible 'searchandising'."

Earlier in June, several mainstream news sites including CNN Money, DM News and Click Z picked up on a multi-vendor PR push featuring Overstock that announced: “Omniture, Inc. (NASDAQ: OMTR), Bazaarvoice and Mercado today announced that Overstock.com is using integrated solutions from the three companies through Omniture Genesis to employ a strategy called "searchandising" -- the utilizing of on-site search terms, user-generated product reviews and analytics to optimize product merchandising and relevance.”

Coincidentally, I just spoke with Geoff Atkinson of Overstock, who upon prompting, commented that they started integrating data from all three sources to remove as much guess work as possible from their merchandising tactics. Their ultimate goal is to automate the process and dynamically generate as much content as possible. He went on to say that all three vendors are great partners for Overstock and have never said no to any of their ideas, allowing them to pioneer new opportunities.

Finally, an interview with the eCommerce Director of Vermont Teddy Bear in early June 2008 also featured use of searchandising in paraphrase format by eM+c Magazine: “Since deploying SLI Systems [the searchandising solution provider Vermont Teddy Bear chose for its site], we have seen an increase in traffic to all three of our sites and have improved customer service because site visitors can now easily find what they're looking for.”

I published the term back in March of 2007 in an eCommerce Times article and was issued a friendly cease and desist letter from Offermatica that turned out not to hold water. Despite the fact that my article still ranks highest on Google's SERP for the keyword “searchandising", it appears that Mercado filed for a trademark on the buzzy little term on July 9th, 2007.

So, is the term “searchandizing” just more marketing-speak or does the term resonate with you?

More Domain Names...?

2008-06-26T09:43:00.004-04:00

The ICANN votes today in Paris on whether or not to approve new domain name extensions from .com and .net to dot anything. Both CNN and the BBC are following the story, but I’m wondering if this will really be a benefit to consumers. Sure brands will be able to buy out their names (at highway robbery prices) and use them as extensions, but in a world where most people have to look at their cell phones to rattle off any number other than their home or next of kin; won’t this just confuse the issue? If this goes through, I see a boom in linking services, search engines and bookmarking tools.

Another issue is lack of space to accommodate the massive growth of the Web, which expanded by 3.9 million domain names just this month according to Netcraft. It’s tough to argue with finding space for all the new bloggers, printers and VoIP phones on the block, but currently there’s 4,294,967,296 available IP addresses. This data, reported by the Korea Times (talk about sourcing fringe news), indicates that there are only 0.7 available IP addresses for each person on earth. The new system would accommodate 340 trillion trillion trillion new addresses. Now that's a lot of growth.

Chasing Technology

2008-06-20T15:19:00.002-04:00

So I’ve got a vision for the Internet where my Web is different from yours. We may visit the same sites, but the experience in terms of the content we see and the objects we’re served will vary based on: clickstream, history, intent and other factors that constitute the context of our visits. Of course, this is already happening today, but I envision a much more sophisticated delivery vehicle that perceives what I want based on my behavior and is able to enhance the experience in a way that is meaningful for me.

I’ve described this vision to a few very intelligent individuals and some have pushed back stating that my ideas were too far ahead of adoption and that the market wasn’t ready to handle these solutions. This made me stop and think. I’ve even uttered these words myself…The market isn’t ready for it…This technology is great, but no one will know what to do with it…It’s an idea that is ahead of its time… But why do we make excuses for the “market’s” inability to adopt technology? If technology wasn’t ahead of the market, then we would exist in a state of insanely boring un-change. It’s the good ideas that transcend mediocrity and technology that enables change.

A few technologies are currently playing with the capabilities I described, which manifest in some amalgamation of analytics, multivariate delivery [explicitly not testing], and behavioral targeting. Magnify360 is one technology that’s pushing the envelope on this hyped up form of delivering content on the Web. NextStage Evolution is another that’s tackling the challenge in another way. Both combine elements of cognitive behavioral recognition to pick up on emotion, intent and human psychology to deliver pages in a way that is best suited for an individual. If you’re curious, check out NextStage’s game (I only got to page seven). Although it won’t tell you how it works, your way of thinking will become part of the knowledge base. You’ve heard that multiple learning styles exist; some people are visual learners and others logical. These technologies have the ability to pick up on those different styles and present information in corresponding formats. It’s my vision that the Web at large adopts these practices to place information at our fingertips in such a way that is most consumable by us. And delivers content and information that is relevant to not only to our historic profiles, but within the context of our visits. Granted, this is not easy to do and content creation (something I spoke on earlier this week at WebContent2008) requires resources and is often a formidable challenge. So if you’re a technologist; how do you enlist participation and if you’re a practitioner; how do you begin to leverage these revolutionary technologies?

Technology Creators:
One school of thought says that you simply wait for practitioners to accept your technology. In the meantime, show your [insert time-machine-esque technology solution here] to a few innovators, allow them to stumble through the crawl-walk-run stages of development and then spotlight their success as proof of concept. Yet, this method requires the patience to wait years in an age where behavior can advance at the speed of a commercial on Tivo. The innovative few who represent the early adopters however, have a substantial leg up on the competition.

Alternatively, provide some bite-sized access to the solution so that adopters aren’t taking a leap of faith off an uncharted cliff. This has proven out well in other technologies with managed service models. In this way, a slow leak of functionality doesn’t scare away the customer and sets a foundation for further development.

Technology Implementers and Practitioners:
Early technology adopters may tend to view new initiatives as monumental projects that require hundreds of development hours and ongoing management. This mentality fosters a state of paralysis and inaction because of the implications of such an endeavor. Technology adoption can (and does) often happen under duress which usually crescendos after consumers (or senior management) scream for change – or – the Web takes a left turn and alters course (as it’s done with user generated content) forcing compliance. Yet, hasty reactions can make for failed endeavors.

Start somewhere and keep your eye on the deep end. An appetizer perhaps, before eating the entire elephant? Others may leapfrog this stage and go straight to mind-boggling innovation, yet there’s room for many models. Getting your house in order requires looking toward the future. Technology will facilitate the future of Web evolution and if your organization isn’t thinking about how these percipient means of delivering content will come to fruition, then you’re already lagging.

What do you think? Have you ever turned your back on technology because you weren’t ready for it? Are some technologies too far out there?

Buying Offline, Virtually

2008-06-17T06:58:00.004-04:00

So I was on my way to the airport and had about 30 minutes to spare. In need of a new book, I stopped into the closest bookstore (a Barnes & Nobles) and decided to treat the experience as an offline rendition of an online exercise. I marched straight to the help desk as if it were the search bar on the homepage. The friendly clerk found my book (Everything is Miscellaneous by David Weinberger) within about 30 seconds and kindly asked me to follow him to Business Technology / Social Sciences bookracks. Hmmm…I never would have found this on my own…I pondered, following my searchers lead to the back of the store.

He whisked me past the coffee bar area, where a community of folks shared tables, presumably chatting about literature and noble worldly issues. Looked inviting, but I was on a mission. To the racks, my guide quickly located the book in my query, good fortune I thought, as he grabbed the last copy from the shelf. I viewed this book online at both Amazon and Borders.com, so recognized the cover in an instant. I thanked him for his help and briskly proceeded to the checkout. I weaved between the tables of discounted books as I navigated my way to the checkout counter.

The line was just long enough for me to pick up a strategically placed book near the point of sale, which I abandoned upon the startling “next” call and walked to the register. The clerk adeptly processed my transaction and without needing a bag, I was off and running. Not too dissimilar from an online experience, I was in and out of the store in just under 10 minutes. Off to the airport and nestled into my exit row, I was into chapter one. I tell you this because as much as online attempts to mirror offline, sometimes you can treat an offline experience with the blatant efficiency of an online transaction. Am I nuts or has this ever happened to you?

JupiterResearch Facts:
• 42% of all retail sales in 2008 will occur online or be influenced by the online channel.
• 71% of online buyers visit the site of purchase multiple times prior to purchasing.
• 56% of online buyers visited multiple different Web sites prior to purchasing.

Multivariate Testing Moves Further Upstream

2008-06-13T17:40:00.004-04:00

Two press releases crossed my inbox yesterday that made me smile. The first was from Clickability, a hosted Web Content Management solution and the second was from Google. The information was largely the same, announcing Google’s Website Optimizer Technology Partner program, where they’ve made their testing solution widely available to content creators using Content Management Systems (CMS). Partnering CMS providers can automate page tagging enabling more testing and easy setup.

These releases made me smile because I’ve been preaching the merits of moving testing upstream in the Web site optimization process for a while now. All too often, multivariate and A/B tests are performed as a means to identify problems and address issues, rather than a method to create better pages from the start. Interwoven was the first company to key into this potential and snatched up industry leader Optimost back in October of last year. They’re doing a great job of promoting the benefits of multivariate testing and including testing as a part of the content creation process. The caveat here is that testing should not impede progress. Even for sites that do move testing upstream, testing should start after a control page (build on best practices of course) has launched. This will establish a baseline for optimizing and ensure that sites get to market with something, rather than testing themselves into oblivion.

I had the pleasure of speaking with Tom Leung of Google Website Optimizer this afternoon who reiterated the synergies between testing and content management. We both pondered on why all content management companies don’t offer testing capabilities? When I asked about the basis for the new partner program he referenced Marqui as the company who really drove the project based on the initiative they took on integrating Website Optimizer into their own platform. They leveraged the IT Guy link to parse tags for clients and get them started with testing online advertisements. The idea snowballed and with Marqui’s initiative and Google supporting the effort, the partner program was born. Different levels of the partnership exist from simply certifying that the CMS and Website Optimizer systems are compatible and won’t break each other to automated implementations that permeate across an entire CMS solution. Down the road some partners will likely make the integration even more seamless to achieve one-click testing and optimization nirvana.

Tom agreed with the upstream concept and took it even further to state that testing shouldn’t be a big deal to set up. In fact, his vision is that testing becomes inherent to content creation and as ubiquitous as spellchecker or print preview. As with Google’s Analytics tool, Website Optimizer is free and their mission is to raise awareness of testing and make it available to the masses. The key takeaway here is that testing shouldn’t be something on your long term roadmap. The tools are here and there are increasing resources ready to help you get up and running.

eMetrics Wrap-Up

2008-05-09T21:24:00.002-04:00

I’m on the plane returning from the eMetrics Marketing Optimization summit in San Francisco. Rather than blogging live from the event, I decided to post a retrospective, allowing my thoughts to congeal. Here are a few of my takeaways.

It’s About Relationships and Experiences
Event organizer Jim Sterne added an Industry Insights day to this year’s event and invited a small group to bring their biggest and most forward thinking ideas to the table for discussion. I shared my thoughts on the fact that the traditional customer lifecycle: Acquire, Convert and Retain is defunct. I supported this with Jupiter research demonstrating that customers no longer traverse the Web in linear fashion (if they ever did), from consideration to purchase. They’re bombarded by choice, assaulted by advertising and rarely pay attention. Consumers are visiting multiple sites, multiple times prior to purchase and are twice as likely to value the advice and opinions of “friends” over brand driven content. All of these factors contribute to a fragmented online experience, where content is consumed in snack-size pieces and picked up from convenient locations across the web. To quantify this behavior and glean some semblance of understanding from erratic consumers, I proposed a new method for measurement based on Relationships and Experiences. Simply put, by quantifying these two aspects of customer interaction, you can enhance, improve and optimize the digital channel. I’ve built out a framework for quantifying these characteristics, so stay tuned for more on this topic in upcoming research.

All Business is Becoming eBusiness
One topic that surfaced on several occasions was that eBusiness and Web metrics are finally taking a seat at the boardroom table. Organizations are dissolving the silos that sequestered the online channel from the rest of the business and allowing these metrics to permeate throughout the enterprise. This is due largely to the accountability that Web analytics delivers to business metrics. The Web is infinitely measurable and now more than ever we have data to support our marketing assumptions. Although this data represents only 5% of all spending, it’s a start. Although the truly data driven organization is still a distant hope for many, we have reached the point where Web analytics has entered the lexicon of even the largest HiPPOs. At the Insights day, we discussed analytics moving from tactics to strategies and that the importance of metrics is growing throughout most organizations. The conversations about Web analytics are also moving through a maturity cycle. Originally only the CIO was interested, then CMO’s took notice and most recently the CFO is asking the questions. The value of analytics is working its way upstream.

Old Concept, New Yardstick: Attribution
Creating the perfect marketing mix is nothing new, but attribution has emerged as a method for quantifying customer touch points throughout a given campaign to allocate credit across initiatives. Historically, the last click gets all the credit for an online conversion, which is often the branded keyword or direct navigation resulting after much research and previous impressions. Web analytics tools are well suited to quantify the multiple marketing endeavors leading to conversion and use a weighted methodology to give credit where it’s due. Stay tuned for more on this as well since Jupiter will publish on this topic in coming months.

Mindreading Technology?
One of the most remarkable presentations delivered at the summit was an addendum added for Joseph Carrabis, who never got a chance to deliver his slides on Sunday because we assaulted him with questions. Joseph’s recently patented technology can really read your mind. He is a behavioral anthropologist that applied the insights of psychology and sociology to a technology solution. It works by embedding a standard javascript tag onto a page that tracks all mouse movements and clickstream activity throughout a session. The tool can determine gender in a matter of seconds and knows when you’re happy or sad. As unbelievable as this may sound, the accuracy has been proven out at 87% and although appealed originally by the US Patent office, it won their approval last month. The creator is brilliant, but you may need an interpreter to know what he’s talking about. Not because he’s speaking Gaelic (which he’s apt to do), but because his concepts are mind boggling. Although when pressed to explain his technology, he asks simple questions that shed light: Do men and women think the same? No, well he can discern that by the way the mouse moves on the page. Are you excited? Your mouse will react differently than when sad. The technology takes all this in and is able to produce actionable recommendations to enhance the way that visitors experience your web site. By using this technology and its neurological insight, the tool does know what you’re thinking. It’s a bit Orwellian, but likely to pervade Web site technologies everywhere. This topic and the NextStage Evolution technology deserve a full write-up on their own, so stay tuned on this one as well.

In all the event lived up to its reputation as the must attend show for Web analytics. I’ll close with a few notable quotes that I jotted down throughout the four days of the conference. These are snippets and paraphrases that capture great Web analytics insight:

~ If you’re explaining, you’re losing. Bob Page, Yahoo!
~ New roles are emerging: Brand Behavioralists and Dialogue Designers. Ryan Warren, Exact Target
~ The executive is the new customer, so don’t show up with a bus full of ideas; deliver a solution. Anonymous
~ The planets are aligned for Web analytics. Tom Davenport, Competing on Analytics
~ Ever see what happens when you try to push on a rope? Bryan Eisenberg, Future Now
~ Join PALM: People Against Lowly Metrics. Avinash Kaushik, ZQ Insights
~ We’re moving from Web metrics to business metrics. Embrace the “marchitecture” (marketing and architecture). Tim Goudie, Coca-Cola
~ Asking users to predict future behavior just doesn’t work. Jacob Nielson, Nielson Norman Group
Finally the most heard question: See you in the Lobby Bar?

Free to Be...You and Me

2008-04-15T11:52:00.002-04:00

It just keeps getting better. Today, Dennis Mortensen of IndexTools announced that Yahoo! will be offering the Web analytics services for FREE. There’s an agreement that will go out to existing partners and clients regarding the change in service level, but they will have exclusive access while Yahoo! prepares for the next rollout.

For those of you who recall 1970’s pop culture, one of my favorite Free to Be…You and Me skits involved the voices of Marlo Thomas and Mel Brooks as two bald babies trying to figure out their identities. Well, it didn’t take long for the babies to figure out who they were and apparently “Yahoo! Tools” didn’t spend much time deliberating either. The new alliance will threaten Google Analytics’ substantial market share as the current free tool on the market – AND – challenge commercial analytics offerings from larger vendors such as Omniture, WebTrends and Coremetrics.

I am truly excited to be engulfed in JupiterResearch’s 2008 Web Analytics Constellation report. IndexTools agreed to participate in this year’s review back in February, providing me the opportunity to assess the marketplace of free and commercial analytics tools on a level playing field. The completed study is scheduled to publish this summer and will include an evaluation of the following vendors: Coremetrics, Google Analytics, IndexTools, Lyris HQ ClickTracks, Nedstat, Omniture, Unica, WebTrends and WebAbacus.

This is an exciting time for Web analytics and I welcome your comments or questions about the direction of our evolving marketplace.

Yahoo! Analytics

2008-04-09T17:39:00.001-04:00

I received a short note in my inbox this morning from Dennis Mortensen, COO of IndexTools. We spoke last week about the solution capabilities, flexibility and future direction of the product, but he must have been grinning all the while. Today he provided a link to his blog announcing that IndexTools would be acquired by Yahoo! Just a small tidbit of juicy information, I’d say.

The financials of the deal were not disclosed, but the bigger question burning up the analytics blogosphere is; What does this acquisition mean to the Web analytics world? First, the IndexTools solution is a robust analytics platform that has been build from the ground up for flexibility and sheer analysis horsepower. Dennis describes the beauty of the tool by stating that it offers less canned analysis, which in turn requires analysts to think more about their data, facilitating discovery. Many argue that IndexTools v9.0 rivals Omniture’s SiteCatalyst at a fraction of the cost. And speculation abounds regarding how Yahoo! will bring this tool to market. My guess is that Y! will devise a “Freemium” solution, where some functionality is offered to small and mid-sized businesses at no cost and incremental services (like the v10.0 Rubix visualization tool) will be available at a premium.

Competition
News of this pending deal will undoubtedly attract the attention of free analytics providers, Google Analytics and Microsoft’s AdCenter. But rather than attempting to undercut their market share by providing yet another free tool for widespread usage, Y!’s Michael Wexler, unofficially states that they’re approaching the market from a different angle. The goal, he describes, is to enable users of Yahoo! products, (development, advertiser, shopping, and end user products) to analyze usage data in a comprehensive way to derive optimal use. He goes on to compliment Google Analytics’ success as a basic tool, but criticizes that it’s not designed for people that “really want to understand their data, nor is it aimed at the variety of ways people can work with Google (it ignores all that API stuff, for example).” Wexler views IndexTools as “the foundational start to understanding not just marketing and its impact on site behavior, but how to understand you online site usage to achieve your goals…”

Ahh, look out Omniture, eh? Despite the indication that Y! is not going after the free market, if this solution is available to any part of the market for free, it will undercut the market share of Google Analytics and MS AdCenter. However, it will not displace the need for enterprise solutions like Omniture, Coremetrics and WebTrends. These companies are building out their marketing optimization platforms, with a key focus on integration. Without buying into the vendor hype about “optimization”, the industry leaders have demonstrated that Web analytics can reside at the center of data analysis for marketing functions. Y! statements from Wexler (although unofficial), make it sound like they may be eyeing the integration component, if only for it’s own services. Other vendors in the marketplace will be forced to keep up in a Web analytics feature arms race or be absorbed and rolled into larger enterprise marketing solutions. But, we’re already seeing this with tools like ClickTracks as integrated solutions within Lyris’ entire marketing suite. And Unica has taken a similar approach by integrating NetInsight analytics with its other enterprise marketing products. The Web analytics industry is evolving, but that does not spell the demise of stand-alone enterprise analytics.

Market Impact
Despite my respect for Eric Peterson, I’m inclined to disagree with his take on the pending acquisition. I do not believe that this will be a “permanent game changer” for Web analytics. Disruptive, yes – but permanently altering no. [For the sake of brevity I’m purposefully ignoring the MS/Yahoo! option.] In the free tool scenario, there’s no historic precedent (with the exception of some general open source examples: e.g., apache, MYSQL, etc) that free tools will displace commercial vendor analytics solutions. If anything, free tools will continue to be utilized concurrently with commercial alternatives for trend verification and specialized uses. Yahoo’s Wexler even confirmed this with his statement about using IndexTools to gain greater perspective on Yahoo! products. There’s nothing to indicate that a Fortune 1000 enterprise would abandon their paid vendor analytics relationship for free tools on the marketplace. If Y! decides not to make the IndexTools solution available for free, then they will certainly make a run at the larger players in the market. But competition is good for all of us and it won’t be anything we haven’t seen before.

I do believe that the availability of free or “Freemium” tools places pressure on existing analytics companies to raise the bar on functionality, usability and actionability of their data. While the free tools will help to spread the ubiquity of analytics data, the ability to correlate, analyze and take action on it will continue to be a driving factor. Here, I agree with Eric that the GAAC (Google's consultant network) will serve to perform this analysis and provides a stellar prospect list for Yahoo! Analytics, but IndexTools already works with over 200 agencies globally to analyze data and take action on it. If anything, the increase of free tools will amplify the opportunity for the prosperous analytics consulting industry and provide plenty of work for all.

In the end, I believe that the impact of this acquisition on the analytics industry will play out as follows:

These are exciting times for the Web analytics industry. Lots of changes…lots of controversy…and lots to talk about. My sincere congratulations go out to Dennis and his team at IndexTools, as well as to the beneficiaries at Yahoo!. I believe that this acquisition is a testament to the capabilities of the IndexTools solution and I for one am extremely excited to see how this one plays out.

If I were holding the checkbook...

2008-04-04T10:35:00.005-04:00

I’m no equity analyst, nor do I want to play one on TV…so I’ll speculate on what I think Coremetrics should do with their new $60M in series E funding. (If you want the equity take, here’s a post from the Deal.com.)

Shout from the Rooftops
Coremetrics maintains widespread notoriety among analytics pros, yet there’s a big wide Web out there just entering the shallow end of the analytics pool. Coremetrics should invest in marketing programs to increase awareness and position themselves as the next step in Web analytics solutions.

Take on the Jolly Green Giant
While the green glow of Omniture will be tough to shadow, competition is good for everyone. Omniture has been the Web analytics powerhouse of 2007, but if anyone has the chops to make a run at them – Coremetrics is poised to do so. As a smaller and potentially nimbler organization, Coremetrics has a chance to shine on service, support and [retail] vertical expertise.

Shopping Spree
Well, not really a spree since $60M ain’t what it used to be, but perhaps an acquisition. Adding multivariate testing capabilities or fortifying their search marketing solutions wouldn’t hurt. Coremetrics has been successful at creating tools for the marketer and should look to acquire technologies that make it increasingly easy to execute on strategic functions without technical intervention. The greatest opportunities may be around optimizing search and ad spending.

Continued Commitment to Development
Glimpses of the Coremetrics’ 2008 roadmap foreshadow significant improvements. Enabling the data to work for their clients by providing greater access and visualization is a priority, but embracing the reality of increased consumer control is a necessity. Social networks, UGC and the voice of the customer are creating a cacophony of insight. Someone needs to figure out how to make sense of it all and convert data into action.

Good One Google

2008-04-01T10:36:00.004-04:00

Anyone else do a double take as they logged into a Gmail account today? They spoofed Gmail “Custom Time” allowing users to change the time of sent emails to delude recipients of the fact that you’re actually late on e-mailings. Gmail uses an e-flux capacitor to make the whole thing work. The purported functionality even makes it appear that the recipient opened the email placing fault into their hands. Brilliant! My deliverables are no longer past due!

Beta User Testimonials…

"The entire concept of 'late' no longer exists for me. That's pretty cool. Thanks Gmail!" Miriam S., Delivery girl

"I used to be an honest person; but now I don't have to be. It's just so much easier this way. I've gained a lot of productivity by not having to think about doing the 'right' thing." Todd J., Investment Banker

Nice one Google, you had me for a second there...

Has Phorm Gone Too Far?

2008-03-25T13:50:00.001-04:00

So what happens when your ISP realizes that the information it’s carrying from Web servers to end users is inherently valuable? UK based Phorm recently revealed products enabling ISPs to capitalize on their respective goldmines of consumer data by selling it to advertisers for behavioral targeting purposes. They succeeded in negotiating deals with three of Britain’s’ largest ISPs (BT, Carphone Warehouse and Virgin Media), which effectively provide broadband service to 70% of all British households. While Phorm maintains that consumer privacy is protected and their service has provisions for end-users to opt out; journalists, bloggers and satirists are voicing their concerns.

My previous posts indicate that I am a strong proponent of onsite tracking and the ability to create greater relevance and a stronger user experience for Web site visitors based on clickstream data. The key emphasis here is greater benefits for the end user. These benefits include:

JupiterResearch shows that consumers explicitly stated they do not want more advertising. This sentiment exposes a distinction between onsite targeting specific to user actions and behavioral targeting at large, generally used for advertising purposes. The realist in me concedes that I am powerless to stop advertising, so it might as well be targeted for me based on my online actions. Yet, I do feel as if I have some control over what ads I see based on the Web sites I choose to visit, knowing that they are monitoring my actions.

I believe that Phorm is overstepping it bounds by using infrastructure to capture everything that users do online and selling that information for a profit to anyone who cares to target them. In my mind, the frightening precedent-setting issue is that infrastructure companies will now have the ability to alter the experience for end users. In this way, sites that subscribe to the Phorm technology can use completely unrelated information about my online habits in attempts to sell me products or services online. Or worse yet, find out things about me that no single site would ever know and draw conclusions about my personal life.

Examples abound in the medical world, and potential exposure from security breaches or misuse of data could threaten job seekers or public figures. Creator of the World Wide Web, Sir Tim Berners-Lee told BBC News that he did not want his ISP to track which websites he visited.

"I want to know if I look up a whole lot of books about some form of cancer that that's not going to get to my insurance company and I'm going to find my insurance premium is going to go up by 5% because they've figured I'm looking at those books,"

I agree that ISP should not have the right to mine customers’ clickstream data, create a comprehensive picture of their actions, preferences and behavior and profit from it in ways that the consumer doesn’t condone or even have any awareness about.

This analogy may be a bit of a stretch, but imagine what could happen when infrastructure monitoring is extended to the offline world. Will the bundled services provider I use which brings Internet, telephone and TV to my home started mining my personal data? Perhaps I make a number of calls to Florida in a given month, will I begin seeing advertisements on TV promoting travel to Florida? What if one infrastructure company starts selling my data to another? Will we get to a point where I flip a light switch in my home and must wait for a pre-roll advertisement to play for low-cost airfare to Florida before I can see well enough to find the toothpaste? What if when I flush my toilet an audio ad for Charmin plays over my home sound system that is delivered wirelessly through my network? These examples may be far-fetched, but they are not too far outside the realm of possibility.

So what’s the solution? I’ll reiterate what I’ve stated in the past regarding personalization and privacy: consumers must be given a choice. Controls need to be in place to enable consumers to opt out of targeting tactics, stop unwanted solicitations and control the information that sites have about them. Consumer privacy is a delicate issue and we’re living in an age where dubious privacy practices abound. It will only take a single breach of online privacy to send the advocates, bloggers and satirists into a tirade. For now, I’d like to help educate the masses about the benefits and realities of targeting and empower consumers to make their own choices.

Behavioral Targeting Does Attract Attention

2008-03-20T15:53:00.001-04:00

The New York Times published a second article today regarding pending legislation to regulate tracking of online behavior using analytics tools. The story centered on a bill submitted by a NY assemblyman, and suggested “there ought to be a law…that would make it a crime for certain Web companies to use personal information about consumers for advertising without their consent”. This sentiment runs parallel with the previous story (by the same reporter) that cited 9 customer advocacy groups petitioning for Do Not Track lists.

So, lawmakers are now playing catch-up to Internet practices that have been in place for years. The unfounded fear is that ‘you know too much about me and will entice me to spend money on your products’. C’mon. In essence, haven’t salesmen and marketers been attempting to do this for the last century? Size up your customer and sell them what you can. The Web allows us to interact with an environment that is infinitely measurable…And now you want to take that away? Privacy concerns considered, I think these legislatures have an uphill battle in front of them. Advertising has always been an intrusive process. Stop people from what they’re doing, get their attention and say something memorable. If tracking enables that in a more relevant manner, I say -- good for advertising. If you don’t like it, ignore the ads (and don't worry…they’re used to it).

A Do Not Track List?

2008-03-11T13:55:00.003-04:00

Yesterday’s New York Times article and subsequent banter regarding heightened privacy concerns over Web analytics monitoring indicated that nine groups have petitioned the FTC to implement “Do Not Track” (DNT) lists. What ever happened to deleting cookies? Wait, what about simply blocking sites from dropping a cookie with your Web browser? But I question what these nine groups are so worried about anyway. The benefits of Web analytics tracking are widely appreciated by consumers, yet the collection process gives them the creeps. What’s that…You want your cake and would like to eat it too?

For all those groups wanting DNT lists, do you also take offense when your local shopkeeper greets you by name and asks if you would like “the usual”? Or informs you that the blueberry muffins just came out of the oven and are still warm? Do you scour when your local bank teller welcomes you back by name and asks if you’re having a good day? I don’t know about you, but I visit my local bank’s Web site 10-times more frequently than I walk into a branch. If the site is able to make my life easier by anticipating my needs and providing relevant offers for me, which in turn saves me time, I say bring it on. I can still choose to ignore it if I like, but thanks for keeping it relevant. Further, I have my bank Web site, news sites, weather info and frequently visited pages all customized the way I like them. I can consume information faster and more efficiently than ever before thanks to analytics tracking. And just maybe those ads served with some semblance of my interests will alert me to something that I wasn’t aware of previously.

We live in a society where advertising is a constant droll in the background. You can tune in if you like or allow it to fade to white noise. In my experience, I tune in when something is relevant to me and that’s good for advertising. There are plenty of online habits that foster and even encourage dubious privacy practices (think Facebook, MySpace, Flickr, etc), behavioral targeting isn’t going to ruin the Internet. I posted in jest “Should I be Worried” because Google knows too much about me. But until the privacy can-o-worms is opened through some sort of “Digital Chernobyl”, whereby an individual is denied service, rights, or entitlement due to his/her Internet habits, I think we’re all safe for the moment.

PS> Your visit to this site was tracked, aggregated, recorded and preserved for all time using Web analytics software ;)

From the Campfire to the Rave

2008-03-10T23:11:00.002-04:00

I’ve been on the road for the last two weeks attending what could be considered the pinnacle of the Web analytics universe. Coremetrics kicked off in Fort Worth Texas and then most recently Omniture held its client summit in Salt Lake City. The Coremetrics client summit was a full cowboy affair, complete with faux campfires, classic cowboy western video clips and line dancing (for those inclined) at Billy Bob’s bar & grill. The following week, Omniture had an entirely different thematic approach, which felt more like a rave branded in Omniture green. Prior to the opening keynote, attendees were ushered into the massive ballroom with flashing lights, a stainless steel art deco stage and full blaring rave music [check out Manoj’s pictures and video posted on WebAnalyticsWorld]. It was quite a contrast to Coremetrics event, yet there were some striking similarities between the two events. I feel extremely fortunate to have been invited to attend each one and am inclined to share my perspective on these dueling rivals in the evolving Web analytics marketplace.

Training & Education:
On the day preceding the summit, Omniture held educational sessions for newly acquired Visual Sciences customers by enlightening them on transitioning to SiteCatalyst and Discover. Participating clients that I talked to anticipated a laid back casual approach, but instead encountered a rigorous roll-up-your-sleeves intensive training session. Throughout the three days of the Omniture event, they had pros on hand to answer technical questions and aid in real-time implementation issues. They set up “Hot Labs”, for account managers to work with clients on any topic and by my observation they were well attended.

Coremetrics held its formal Coremetrics University training on the day following its summit and although I didn’t get to inquire about the results of the training sessions, numerous clients were looking forward to a comprehensive experience. Coremetrics also had pros on hand throughout the event to answer technical questions and tackle real-time problem solving. Every exec I spoke with challenged attendees to stump the experts on the floor and if my inquisitions were any indication, they were doing a solid job.

Keynotes & Presentations:
Coremetrics opened with a Wild West skit that depicted “Dusty” cowboys dependent on the digital world. A fitting analogy for the chasm that is the digital divide and a graceful segue to Joe Davis’ keynote on How the Web Was Won – or – at least continues to evolve. Laura Evans, from Resource Interactive, followed with her presentation on the Open Brand and John Squire delivered “Got Marketing?” solutions which included Coremetrics’ 2008 updates on Search, Intelligent Offer, LiveMail and Coremetrics Connect. Day two featured an in depth look at the product roadmap and a glimpse of the new toys within the interface. John Payne’s enthusiasm was unfettered as he demonstrated the new Explore data visualization tool. Eric Peterson from Web Analytics Demystified followed by walking attendees through a captivating presentation on measuring visitor engagement, his delivery continues to evolve as Eric delves deeper into the metrics and process. Coremetrics closed with a short-and-sweet message delivered by Joe Davis and a highlight reel of images and video captured throughout the event.

Omniture delivered on their promise of a mix of entertainment and education. Josh James kicked things off by illustrating the new composition of Omniture after its 2007 acquisition rampage. CTO, Brett Error then walked attendees through the SiteCatalyst v14 enhancements and other features on the development front. Peter Kim of Forrester delivered a presentation on Marketing and purportedly challenged other analyst firms to a basketball game on the premise that they could win based on more players (I think we could take ‘em shorthanded). Day one closed with Lance Armstrong’s emotional story of overcoming cancer, where he encouraged us to believe in a cause and take affirmative action. Day two began with Seth Godin’s highly entertaining presentation, first flattering the crowd by touting them as the smartest marketing minds in the universe, then challenging them to create something remarkable and break the constraints of mediocrity. Omniture closed with Brett’s summary recap, a look ahead and a lively interactive feedback session of how to improve on their solutions. He took copious notes and demonstrated Omnitures’ devotion to customer driven development.

Both companies ran multiple simultaneous tracks throughout their client summits making for tough decisions on where to focus. I found the content delivered by each vendor to be compelling, technical and highly educational. I’ll go so far as to say that the topics delivered and ensuing discussions were at a sophistication level beyond many other analytics events I’ve attended.

Breaking News & Product Releases:
Coremetrics came out of the gate with announcement of their new integration platform, Coremetrics Connect. While it’s largely a catch-up move to Genesis and even WebTrends’ Open Exchange, their documentation process and integration guidance is well-considered. John Squire delivered a message of acquisition, conversion and retention and rounded out the product enhancements (i.e., custom report templates, key segments, export builder) around these principles. The flex-based Explore product (widely available in the spring 2008 release) is a data visualization tool that quickly renders dynamic charts and enables analysts to “interrogate the data”.

Omniture’s 2008 product mix equates to 50% Web analytics solutions (comprised of SiteCatalyst, Discover On-Demand & On-Premise and Genesis integrations), 25% is Search Center and the remaining 25% is the new Test & Target combination of Offermatica and Touch Clarity. The SiteCatalyst user interface went through a dramatic redesign from v13.5 with applause-worthy menu improvements, single sign-on, video measurement, intelligent help and Web services APIs. Search Center v3 also debuted with integration capabilities that enable centralized control over multiple keyword bidding and monitoring solutions, scaleability to manage 50 million keywords and automated optimization.

Entertainment:
While this category bears no reflection on the product offerings of each vendor, Omniture was over the top. Lance Armstrong was inspirational, but the rave party with neon green light sticks, fresh sushi and Grammy award winning Flight of the Conchords was truly entertaining. Bret and Jermaine act exactly as they do on the HBO series and showcased their genuine musical abilities. The armadillo racing in Fort Worth Texas never stood a chance. I’ll admit that Billy Bob’s was a place like none other, but line dancing and bull rides do not compare. My bias for skiing over golf favored Omniture who sponsored a day at Snowbird, while Coremetrics golf enthusiasts teed up in Texas. I opted to stay in Utah for an extra day which paid off with over six inches of fresh snow and an epic day of Utah powder.

Summary:
Both vendors succeeded in showing their clients a good time, educating them on the new features and demonstrating forward-looking vision. These companies are driving the Web analytics industry forward. I expect that 2008 will be a banner year for both Coremetrics and Omniture and their rivals in the marketplace have a high bar set before them.

Connecting with Coremetrics

2008-02-26T19:44:00.000-05:00

Here in Fort Worth, Texas at Coremetrics’ “How the Web Was Won” client summit, the theme is all Western. The keynote featured some Cowboy fun along with classic Clint Eastwood and Robert Redford video clips. But yesterday, the company was all business, announcing the introduction of their new technology integration platform, called Coremetrics Connect. While some may view this as playing catch-up to Omniture’s Genesis program and WebTrends’ Open Exchange, data integration is not something to rush into.

The platform was built on four tenets of closed loop marketing, which include: Extensible data delivery, Core APIs, Flexible reporting and Integration Wizards. Perhaps the most novel concept of the integration partnerships are the clearly defined documentation processes, integration briefs, best practice examples and full disclosure on what the integrations entail. This level of detailed explanation will be available for all technologies included in Coremetrics Connect, making the qualification process stringent, with hopes that this will pay off for ease of integration for clients. There are currently 25 qualified participants in the program, and more on the way. The Integration wizards (available in the Spring 2008 release) will allow marketers to simply select certified technologies from a list within the user interface and walk through the set-up process.

Coremetrics is careful to point out that Connect is not just another partner program, but a process for marketers to acquire behavioral data from adjacent technology applications, analyze the data and make actionable decisions. However, the differentiators between Connect, Genesis and Open Exchange are subtle, and they are not likely to cause clients to jump ship for another web analytics vendor. Yet, there’s quite enough going on within the Web analytics market to cause anxiety among clients. Coremetrics just Cowboy’d up to the Optimization table with their own integrated Digital Marketing solution.

Oh Just Quit Twittering About....!

2008-02-19T21:52:00.003-05:00

I just don’t get it. I’ve tried to understand, but the whole Twitter concept escapes me. Why anyone would spend time updating their every move for all to see is beyond me. I acknowledge that the Internet is increasingly becoming a "lifestyle accessory" and escalating connectivity, which in turn fosters communication...but, please...I still don’t get it.

Long Live Independent Analytics!

2008-02-19T12:28:00.003-05:00

Ian Thomas of Microsoft posted a forward looking piece called Web Analytics is dead. Long live Web Analytics, on Web Analytics Demystified that I responded to. While I can agree with some of his prognostications, I find the bulk of them preposterous.

Check out the blog posting and subsequent comments for some food for thought.

New Web Analytics Playah?

2008-02-11T20:36:00.000-05:00

Web analytics may have a new kid on the block with the recent $3M in funding from WPP Group, that places NuConomy in the limelight. The company is a part of the Israeli Web Tour and has offices in Tel Aviv and San Francisco. Although their product is still in beta, the start-up is attempting to tackle some challenging analytics issues such as new media measurement and behavioral correlation. The reported killer feature is a two-way API enabling site operators to make changes automatically based on data generated by the tool.

Stay tuned for more on NuConomy…

Web Content Lifecycle On Demand

2008-02-11T11:22:00.000-05:00

Clickability is an On Demand Web Content Management (WCM) platform that announced today new services delivered via the SaaS model. Infrastructure, Innovation and Support delivered as a service. Hmmmm…maybe I missed something, but isn’t support always delivered as a service? Infrastructure as a service (i.e., hosting, security, storage) and innovation on demand (i.e., best practices, open API’s and benchmarking) are not new concepts, yet Clickability is the first to wrap these key components of site management into one complete package and deliver on demand. One of the company goals is to empower marketers to do more with their content management solutions, while minimizing involvement from IT – and this solution is a strong move toward accomplishing that objective.

The merits of SaaS, often viewed as a small-market solution, are working their way up-stream. JupiterResearch data from our recent report, Web Content Management: Maintaining Process amid Change, shows that 12 percent of the market is currently using WCM solutions delivered as SaaS. Clickability offers Express, Professional and Enterprise editions, and is demonstrating its SaaS appeal with big-brand sites like USA Today, Wall Street Journal, PGA.com, and Gray Television on their client roster. The competitive field of WCM on demand vendors is small with only CrownPeak, Clickability and Omniture Publish offering pure WCM as SaaS solutions. Other vendors (e.g., PaperThin, Hot Banana) currently offer hybrid solutions allowing customers to choose from hosted or licensed versions of their solutions.

In addition to forging ahead with its SaaS initiatives for productivity, Clickability is also tuned into the environment benefits of hosted solutions as well. The company produced a Green Manifesto, detailing ways to reduce an organizations’ carbon footprint by adopting SaaS. While some may argue the finer points of this manifesto, I applaud Clickability for its commitment to their SaaS platform and for promoting green initiatives within big business.

Aberdeen Group Under Fire from WSJ Reporter

2008-02-07T18:06:00.001-05:00

As a former Aberdeen Group employee and an industry analyst, I feel compelled to comment on the recent WSJ article by Lee Gomes criticizing Aberdeen’s integrity. The reporter challenged Aberdeen’s purported reformation from “pay-for-praise” to “sponsored research”, as relatively unchanged. While I don’t entirely disagree with Gomes’ claims, I take issue with the fact that his shortsighted article has the blogosphere questioning the merits of the entire technology research industry.

Aberdeen’s “fact-based” research is a thinly veiled ruse to provide vendors with third-party marketing collateral that supports their technology road maps and hidden sales agendas. This is no big secret, it's their business model! No vendor sponsors have direct input into the final documents and their names are not mentioned in the benchmark reports. Vendors do have an opportunity to weigh in on survey creation to potentially shape the direction of the findings, albeit subtle. Vendors are also encouraged to distribute the surveys to their customers to glean insight from their use of vendor technologies, which in turn serves to validate use of that technology. Yet, Aberdeen makes it abundantly clear that their research is distributed free of charge to all interested parties. The nothing-comes-for-free catch is fulfilled in the form of captured email address and a “lead” passed onto each vendor sponsor. While Aberdeen typically delivers nearly 1000 leads to each sponsor, the quality of these lists is dubious. Students, researchers, analysts and reporters consume research all day and would never be considered qualified prospects for any vendor sponsor. Numerous other consumers of this research may find value in the educational aspects, yet have no interest in a technology purchase. Aberdeen subjects recipients of its free research to email messages with near spam-like frequency. This is a fair-value trade for some, and minor annoyance for others. However, the lead generation aspects of the Aberdeen sponsorship programs are clearly and emphatically articulated to all prospects. This distinction separates Aberdeen’s model from all other subscription-based research firms.

So why did I leave the Aberdeen Group? I was conflicted by the sales emphasis placed on the research, which the company did not attempt to hide. An inter-office mantra was “What are you selling today?”, which applied equally to sales associates and analysts. This is one area where I took offense and felt compromised as an industry analyst. So much so, that I expressed my displeasure in the form of a resignation. As any analyst worth their salt will tell you, there is generally a separation between sales and research that is akin to church and state. This distinction did not exist at the Aberdeen Group during my tenure. In fact, analysts were encouraged to “sell” sponsorships and were accountable for sales numbers. Sales pressure was spread throughout the office on a constant basis extending beyond quarterly milestones, to monthly publication deadlines placed on the benchmark reports. If sponsors were not secured for reports they did not publish and quotas were missed, which held financial repercussions for sales and analysts alike. The sales tactics at Aberdeen were strong to say the least. As an analyst I was often embarrassed by the high pressure sales techniques. While not all sales executives practiced questionable tactics, my experience soured me.

To Aberdeen’s credit, they do have a robust methodology founded on strict Best-in-Class qualification criteria that was grilled into analysts by Aberdeen’s former CEO, Jamie Bedard. Unfortunately for them, 2006 and 2007 produced a revolving door of analyst departures due to sales pressures and strong-arm tactics. Since his appointment to President of the Aberdeen Group in June 2007, Steve Gold has made great strides to change the internal structure within Aberdeen. His retort to Lee Gomes was poignant and accurate. While I maintain a great deal of respect for the leaders and analysts at the Aberdeen Group, they do walk the fine line between white paper for hire company and industry analyst firm. Lee Gomes, however, appears to have discrediting Aberdeen on his agenda. While his own reputation as an instigator was established by criticizing the Long Tail theory, I won't hold my breath for an Aberdeen retraction.

This brings me to the degradation of industry analysts as a whole. While I do not purport to know more than many experts in their respective technology fields, I am diligent about the research I conduct and publish. This was true during my time at the Aberdeen Group and even more so now at JupiterResearch. From my vantage point as an industry analyst I have the good fortune to preview and evaluate many vendor technologies that enable me to identify industry trends. I take this responsibility very seriously. I also conduct formal consumer and executive surveys and talk to a wide variety of technology experts, users and developers. The research, both qualitative and quantitative, shapes my opinions and informs my writing. My internal publishing procedures are subject to critical data review, editorial fact-checking and rigorous peer review. Some may perceive industry analyst research as subjective. While I do not claim to produce empirical evidence of technology merits, I do help companies make informed decisions based on my deep understanding of technology producers and consumers. Research is created to inform and educate and these goals align with my own. So before damning the value of technology research consider the exertion required to collect, synthesize and articulately enlighten you with facts about technology that you seek to understand.

A Glimpse into the Crystal Ball

2008-01-30T21:18:00.002-05:00

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.

There Are No Online Coincidences

2008-01-28T09:51:00.000-05:00

I did some shopping this past weekend for flat screen teevees. Claiming ignorance on the entire television revolution, my main goal was to begin the research process and attain some education on what’s available. I visited my local electronics store to check out the picture quality and attempted to view multiple screens at once to determine which had superior colors and clarity. I was helped by a young but knowledgeable salesperson, who provided some basic information. Yet, the real research began at home when I visited numerous sites (e.g., Digital Advisor, Cnet, lcdbuyingguide.com, NewEgg.com) offering reviews, rankings and recommendations for my soon-to-be new household appliance.

The next day I logged into Facebook and was somewhat surprised to see a wall posting inviting me to sign up to win a 52” Samsung LCD tv. Samsung was one of the brands that I was considering but the big 52” was outside my budget, so I figured that I might as well sign up for the sweepstakes to see if could win one. I navigated from the landing page through the site to get more info and found myself trapped, with no navigation to the sweepstakes page and no back option. I revisited Facebook and clicked the link again only to have it timeout with a page failure. I repeated the process twice with recurring failures and noted that the page timed out because ads from DoubleClick failed to render. Despite the poor navigation and failed page loads, I still made my way back to the site to volunteer my personal information to Samsung on the thin hope that I might be the lucky winner of that teevee. They got me…but at a price that I was willing to pay for the promise of the teevee version of Ed McMahon knocking at my door.

So the behavioral targeting worked for me, but got me thinking that there are really no more coincidences on the Web. With ubiquitous technologies like Google and DoubleClick, all of my actions and behavior is catalogued and used – for me/against me; take your pick – at a later time. Despite the fact that this conjures up some irksome feelings of privacy invaded and innocence lost …the tactic worked. So like it or hate it, targeting is effective. But the next time someone tells you that they couldn’t believe what a coincidence it was that they discovered such-and-such online – you can offer a wry smile and enlighten them to the ways of the Web. It’s all planned and they’re working us like marionettes.

PostScript: stay tuned and I’ll tell you about the teevee we buy. Have you experienced any online “coincidences” as a result of behavioral targeting?

Accenture Buys Deeper Into the Marketing Services Game

2008-01-27T09:52:00.001-05:00

Accenture announced last week the pending acquisition of Web analytics data quality company Maxamine, and piggybacked news of their acquisition of multivariate testing company Memetrics, which closed on December 31, 2007. Both companies will be rolled under Accenture’s Marketing Sciences group and pricing was hush-hush as no terms were disclosed.

The acquisitions will fortify Accenture’s foray into digital marketing services, which I expect to be a lucrative field in 2008. Web analytics and multivariate testing technologies often require detailed analysis and expertise beyond what is commonly found within small to mid-sized organizations, thus the need for outside services.

Web analytics veterans will recognize Maxamine as a long-time participant in eMetric events and data quality evangelist. Their solution will meld nicely into Accenture’s services group because it can identify problems with analytics implementations and help optimize investments in enterprise analytics tools. Similarly, the Memetics solution provides optimization capabilities through its testing solution. The deal places a testing tool in the hands of consultants, who can leverage it to take the burden of potentially challenging test creation and analysis off of marketers and instead provide them with answers. This development pushes the managed testing scale (created in my Testing and Optimization Differentiators report, November 2007) to new lengths, by creating a let-us-do-it-for-you approach. Perhaps making a run to keep pace with Optimost and OTTO Digital services.

2008 is off to a brisk start with acquisitions aplenty. If this keeps up (and we expect that it will), I will have something to write about weekly and may need to rename this blog Web Site Technology Acquisitions & Alliances: A Marketer’s Frankenstein.

Wasting No Time

2008-01-18T16:12:00.000-05:00

The url’s have been redirected and the names have been changed. It’s official. Omniture completed its acquisition of Visual Sciences yesterday in just under three months – record time by anyone’s watch.

Here are some notable changes:

Omniture Discover OnPremise will utilize the Visual Sciences Platform 5 technology and page tags from VS can populate SiteCatalyst data, which will appear in the integrated interface. Omniture will maintain its legacy Omniture Discover (hosted) segmentation solution.

Omniture’s Search Center now appears under the header of Site Search and Content, where they wasted no time in incorporating Visual Sciences’ Publish Web Content Management Solution.

The popular HBX Analytics solution will be rebranded as Omniture SiteCatalyst HBX. Although HBX should be placed on an endangered species list, because the product will likely be phased out. Omniture states that HBX, “will continue to be supported until the key features have been integrated into Omniture SiteCatalyst”. HBX has had a long ride, from Hitbox to WebSideStory’s HBX, to Visual Sciences’ HBX and now Omniture. It looks like it’s finally time to retire the jersey and move on.

Visual Sciences customers are being well cared for as Omniture will launch a Customer Welcome Program on January 22 which will include training and information to ease the transition.

Several senior management executives from Visual Sciences were appointed to lead the Discover OnPremise, HBX Migration, and Omniture Site Search & Publish product lines. Also announced was the departure of Visual Sciences CEO, Jim MacIntyre, who will pursue other interests after assisting in the transition and integration period.

Microsoft Seeking FAST Entry to Enterprise Search

2008-01-09T16:10:00.000-05:00

The Redmond-based software giant offered to buy FAST Search & Transfer at a 42 percent premium above their current share price, for a total of $1.2 billion. The move is a validation of FAST’s technology and will propel Microsoft’s foray into enterprise search. Initial integration efforts will likely start with the MOSS 2007 (Microsoft Office SharePoint Server) group because the acquisition will fortify SharePoint’s fledgling search offering, by injecting FAST’s enterprise-class search capabilities, but don’t expect rapid results.

SharePoint’s inside the firewall content management and business collaboration capabilities will be greatly enhanced by FAST’s ability to search disparate databases to aid in information retrieval. These capabilities benefit a substantial portion of FAST’s current customer base, which is comprised of publishing companies such as Comtex News Network, MediaNews Group, NewsBank, Reed Business, and the Washington Post among others, where FAST has established its credibility for searching copious data sources. However, the long-term goldmine for Microsoft may be in the business intelligence capabilities inherent to the FAST solution, which could be incorporated into the SharePoint platform.

Additionally, Microsoft’s acquisition strategy may be an attempt to fend off Google’s growing reign in consumer search markets and entry into enterprise search. Although FAST’s business-to-consumer client base is proportionately smaller, they help companies such as BestBuy and AutoTrader to facilitate product search and discovery. The acquisition would expose FAST to a larger global market and potentially open the technology to new consumer-facing applications.

Yet, one potential downside is that FAST may be stifled by the 800 pound gorilla that is Microsoft and find that their development and small company mentality is well…not so fast anymore. The deal is expected to close sometime in the second quarter and integration could lag well behind that establishing a timeline that easily extends 12 to 18 months.

Should I be worried?

2007-12-20T23:11:00.000-05:00

Google knows a lot about me. Let’s start with the copious daily searches for everything from analytics research to stocking stuffers. I use Googlemaps for driving directions to every new location that I visit. My personal blogs are created and maintained on Blogger. They’re tagged with Google Analytics. My iGoogle tab opens each time I launch a new browser with content specific to my interests. My inbox buzzes hourly with Google Alerts on companies that I track. I’ve watched dozens of videos on YouTube. Several years worth of personal emails were sent and received via Gmail to friends, family, colleagues, and every word is archived for easy retrieval.

Now that the FTC approved Google’s acquisition of DoubleClick, will my digital world become a bullseye for targeted advertising?

WAW Boston

2007-12-19T09:40:00.001-05:00

Last evening the Boston Web Analytics Wednesday chapter held its monthly meeting. Eric Peterson was due to fly into town and dazzle the crowd, but was waylaid due to the storm on Sunday. I was invited to speak in his stead, (Eric’s stunt double as I like to call it). I presented the findings from a report that Jupiter will publish on the use of technology to improve website usability.

The key takeaway was that too few organizations are utilizing the technologies they already possess to improve the usability of their web properties. The challenge of improving usability repeatedly emerges as a top three objective for website decision makers, yet little definitive action is taken to affect change. Web analytics is the technology used most frequently as a quantitative measure for usability and it also proved to be most effective. I encouraged the web analysts in the room to take it upon themselves to think about their web analytics data from a strategic perspective and identify ways that the data can impact all facets of their sites, including usability. I also believe that the role of the web analyst is changing from tactical to strategic and those who create a data-driven organization with demonstrable results, will emerge as leaders.

Props go out to Judah Phillips for his undying enthusiasm towards web analytics and his efforts to pioneer the Boston WAW chapter. I am always impressed at the caliber of people that attend these events. From the BU college students who are way ahead of the curve in analytics knowledge, to the seasoned professionals, the conversation is always stimulating. If you are in the business of web analytics, be sure to attend a WAW event near you.

The Extinction of the Hippo

2007-12-11T09:30:00.000-05:00

Perhaps you’ve seen a Hippo wandering the halls of your organization? If you’re a web marketer with lofty aspirations, you may be thinking that its days are numbered. If not, you’re probably wondering what the heck I’m talking about. HiPPO is an acronym being bandied about in marketing circles that stands for the Highest Paid Person’s Opinion. However, the tools in the website operators’ toolbox are threatening the HiPPO’s reign and foreshadow its possible extinction.

Measurement technologies have changed the game for marketers operating in the digital world. Web analytics empower us to follow the steps of web site visitors and determine exactly what they do, when they do it, and whether or not their actions result in our desired outcomes. We can measure these interactions and are even getting crafty about placing value on the level of interaction visitors have with our websites to target the desirable ones and segment out the less profitable. Add to this the ability to apply predictive analysis, based on user profiles and affinity tactics, to know what customers are likely to do – even before they do. Finally, we can validate our predictions and hypotheses using testing tools to allow visitors to define the web in a method that works best for them. These actions are possible in a data-driven organization that makes decisions based on information rather than intuition.

Yet, beware the HiPPO. In the absence of data, the HiPPO thrives and will govern web pages with intuition and instinct. Your task is delicate, without angering the HiPPO, you must illustrate that the data-driven approach will enable the entire organization to prosper. Start slowly by introducing data to support the cause. Eagerly accept the opinions of the HiPPO, yet contrast them with alternatives that can be tested with tools. Use the outcome of testing as a win-win scenario. If the HiPPO was right – they are the smartest beast in the jungle; if wrong – demonstrate that the alternative got them closer to the website goals. By using data to validate your findings, you may notice that the HiPPO, (while maybe not destined for extinction) is certainly more open to ideas.

WCM and the promise of Web 2.0

2007-12-05T14:17:00.000-05:00

This week was Web Content Management (WCM) week in Boston, with a kick-off on Monday at the CM Pros conference, followed by two days of the Gilbane Conference & technology showcase. The general tenor of the event made for great networking and included interesting keynotes, lively vendor discussion and industry expert sessions. All of which included a healthy dose of forward-looking statements.

The widespread impact of Web 2.0, from both an end-user and user-contributor perspective, was a recurring theme throughout the conference. I took it upon myself to dig beyond the 2.0 buzz to determine the practical influence that new technologies will have on the user’s experience and the way content is delivered. Here is what I came up with…

Alerting – certainly a familiar technology today, which will increasingly be used in new and innovative ways. Take for example Facebook’s Beacon. A failed attempt, but nonetheless a feature that uses events as triggers to automate notification. Retailers are adopting alerts as merchandising tactics and we can only expect to see more as consumers are looking for a push of relevant information.

Community – the dependence on social networks is strengthening daily as users spend more time using the tools and features within their social arenas. Communities are important as social networks, but will also begin to permeate the workforce as collaboration tools. With a distributed workforce becoming the norm and growing familiarity with social networking tools, it’s not long before employees are asking for Facebook-style tools for internal collaboration. Organizations will be forced to embrace these technologies and build solutions around them – or risk losing their talent to those who do.

Open APIs – Google maps is certainly the most utilized API, since geography helps us to attach relevance to everything we do. Services like Zillow have brought the mash-up to new levels of usability and “coolness”, with a high functionality after bite. With mash-ups as a hot topic in many discussions at the conference, we can expect to see more of them. Yet, “openness” is a concept that 2.0 functionality is built upon and will maintain a key role in the ongoing development of cutting edge technology.

Relevance – don’t give me everything, just give me what I need – and hurry up. I don’t know about you, but my world is full of too much unwanted information. I’m willing to provide some details about my personal preferences in order to place filters on the information that comes my way. Web Content Management systems are doing their part by enabling dynamic content powered by behavioral targeting, analytics and community influences. While governance remains a critical component to my privacy (thanks Amazon for not giving up our purchase histories), predictive analysis and relevance will severely impact the way that we interact with the web.

WebTrends in the Spotlight…Again!

2007-11-16T16:52:00.000-05:00

My inbox buzzed with news alerts on WebTrends at least a dozen times in the last two weeks, but yesterday’s event nearly slipped under the radar.

Tim Kopp, the marketing visionary that WebTrends snatched from Coca-Cola less than a year ago has decided to leave the company to pursue other opportunities. His departure follows the dismissal of several other key management executives, which begs the question…What’s going on at WebTrends?

My sources at WebTrends informed me that Tim would remain actively involved with the company until the end of the year and that “he’s really quite involved with customer relations on a day-to-day basis”. Despite the recent changes, the company reports that the staff is excited to move forward and that they’ve received great response from customers and prospects on recent initiatives. Expect to see several press releases within the next 30 days announcing new customer wins in media and financial services industries. Additionally, the company reports several key renewals within the retail industry leading up to this year’s online holiday shopping season. Existing tier-one customers such as Kimberly-Clark and Dow Chemical have also recently agreed to conduct new business with WebTrends indicating optimism in their ongoing capabilities.

The internal shake-up in recent weeks is unfortunate for WebTrends because the company was (and perhaps still is) gaining momentum with their ML2 product suite. Their Score product attempts to quantify the elusive and increasingly popular customer engagement metric. They recently announced a partnership with email services provider SilverPop, which leverages WebTrends’ Open Exchange network by automating delivery of targeted emails based on integrated unique user profiles. And they’ve enabled measurement of Microsoft Silverlight to capture analytics within streaming video and other rich Internet applications built with Silverlight.

Despite these promising developments, skeptics may still be wary. I expect that WebTrends won’t have much to say publicly about Tim’s departure and that it will get rolled under the board’s “pursuit of accelerated growth” umbrella.

Analytics University

2007-11-09T08:12:00.000-05:00

I was "surfing" (if that exists anymore) the other day and happened to notice that a few bloggers referenced my reports on Analytics University a while back. For the sake of prosperity and the longevity of content, I decided to repost this work that I created in July 2007 while at the Aberdeen Group here on this blog.

The first brief, Analytics University: Part I, discusses the lack of qualified web analysts practicing today. Not that there aren't many brilliant web analysts currently working in the field, it's just that there aren't enough of them. I go on to describe vendor sponsored programs and the industry's self proclaimed academic accreditations such as Coremetrics University, Google’s Conversion University, Omniture University, Visual Science’s former Digital Marketing University. I also cite the work of Analytics Consultants, Blogs and Gurus Sessions.

The sequel, Analytics University: Part II, delves into Community Forums, Industry Associations and real academic programs. The eMetrics Fall event showcased how far the industry has come over a short period of time. With nearly 550 attendees, the conference was a hive of networking, information and excitement around analytics. This excitement is evident in the Web Analytics Forum at Yahoo! Groups as well, where I voluntarily receive a daily email summarizing the dozens of threads and fascinating conversations shared across the globe on an ongoing basis. And finally, the academics are ramping up to educate the next crop of web analysts on both the tactics and fundamentals of analyzing data in an infinitely quantifiable online society.

We are lucky enough to work in an industry that values shared knowledge and distributed information, so there is no shortage of prolific blogs to visit, gurus to talk to, or resources available. 2007 was the year that gurus hit the road: the WAA offered its Base Camp workshops in numerous cities and ZaaZ initiated their Marketing ROI Executive Workshops around the country as well. These endeavors and others like Gary Angel's Web Analytics Exchange, a non-traditional sit down of analytics professionals, spark creativity, shared ideas and plain old goodness throughout the industry. I for one am excited about my job every day and get jazzed about each new shred of news or acquisition that takes place in the market. I’m sure that many of you are there too – that’s what makes this so much fun.

Is WebTrends Next?

2007-11-01T13:21:00.000-04:00

As I wrote in my previous post…this will get interesting…apparently sooner than later.

Several key executives from WebTrends were quietly relieved of duty yesterday, including Greg Drew (CEO) and Jason Palmer (VP Product Marketing). A visit to the management page of the WebTrends site this morning shows a new face – Bruce T. Coleman as Chief Executive Officer.

Coleman serves as CEO of El Salto Advisors, an interim executive firm, and held short-term executive posts at Vernier Networks (2004), Stamps.com (2000-2001), Rogue Wave Software (1999 – 2000) and Websense (1998 – 1999) foreshadowing a short stay with WebTrends and a likely sale of the company.

Many eyes will turn to Omniture as a prime suspect to buy WebTrends and dominate the analytics market because of their recent acquisition of Visual Sciences, but that deal is scheduled to complete sometime in mid 2008, so they may have their hands full at the moment. Certainly Coremetrics and Unica are keenly watching the consolidation of their peers, yet a new entrant to the marketplace, (i.e., Content Management Vendor), would create an interesting challenge for the analytics incumbents.

The Web Analytics World is Shrinking

2007-10-27T13:20:00.000-04:00

The web analytics market just got a whole lot smaller with the news of Omniture’s intention to acquire Visual Sciences for $394 million. It was no secret that Visual Sciences was up for sale, yet speculators believed that a software goliath without a pre-existing analytics solution would enter the market with a quick pick-up of Visual Sciences. The convergence of these technologies will not happen overnight and integration may prove to be the lynchpin of this relationship.

Omniture’s acquisition strategy includes geographic expansion (Instadia), strategic technology additions (Touch Clarity and Offermatica) and domestic consolidation for financial leverage. This newest deal certainly strengthens the fulcrum for financial leverage and succeeds in enhancing the technology additions through the unique capabilities Visual Sciences brings to web analytics.

Considering Omniture’s expanding feature set of strategic technologies and its “Business Optimization” messaging, I question whether Omniture will become the marquee platform for digital marketers. Their analytics horsepower and growing internal capabilities notwithstanding, the burgeoning Genesis Network is seeding its alliances throughout the digital marketing technology landscape. As this evolving ecosystem takes shape, it will be interesting to witness conflicting forces of buy-in/rejection on the client side and dismissal/competition from vendors. Buckle up and stay tuned, because this will get interesting.

Rockies Make the First Error in World Series

2007-10-23T15:08:00.000-04:00

I can’t resist a blog posting on the World Series since my beloved Red Sox made it to the big show once again. I’ve written about the correlation between baseball’s Sabermetrics and web analytics in the past, but yesterday’s news of the site crash and unavailable tickets caused me to think about proper site planning and the repercussions of poor performance on the customer experience.

During the first 90 minutes of online ticket sales, 8.5 million page requests caused the Rockies ticket system to fail. A spokesman for the Colorado Rockies blamed the crash on an “external malicious attack”. Although automated bots present a significant problem for the online ticket industry, poor load balancing and insufficient server capacity is more likely the true cause of yesterday’s failure. Most eager fans received DNS errors, but slow-loading pages and cookie blocking also contributed to the problem. Both the RedSox.com and the ColoradoRockies.com sites are hosted and maintained by MLB.com, which was expected to handle the increased load. Yet, the Rockies failed to understand that their traffic was redirected to evenue.net severs managed by their external ticket vendor, Paciolan who also manages ticket sales for the Padres and the Denver Center for the Performing Arts.

Sites that offer sales exclusively through the online channel have justifiable cause for decreasing costs and maximizing efficiencies, yet the infrastructure must handle the task. Performance monitoring and load balancing services from companies like Keynote and Gomez alleviate many of these issues, but still don’t account for advanced preparation and a complete understanding of system operations and partner capabilities.

I won’t go so far as to say that the Rockies ticket error is a harbinger for things to come in this 2007 World Series, but it should serve as a wake up call for retailers or any site operators anticipating increased load on their pages this holiday season.

Acquisitions Continue in the Testing Market

2007-10-18T15:06:00.000-04:00

Interwoven announced yesterday its intentions to acquire Optimost for $52 million in cash, marking the second acquisition in the burgeoning multivariate testing market in just 45 days.

The acquisition capitalizes on resounding synergies between the Interwoven’s content management solution and Optimost’s multivariate testing capabilities. As the web shifts to an increasingly dynamic content delivery model, it makes perfect sense to interject a solution that determines which content is most effective using a testing methodology. This capability aligns with Interwoven’s segmentation and analytics solution by providing a vehicle to deliver content to specific segments and optimize the message to achieve the greatest relevance.

The companies stated their intentions to provide Optimost’s managed testing solution, (delivered as Software as a Service) independently, or in conjunction with Interwoven’s content management offerings. This news will have minimal impact on existing Optimost customers, except that for those currently shopping for a CMS, who may now narrowed their short list of vendors. Interwoven customers will have access to a testing solution that will presumably have the tightest integration with their CMS and may entice non-adopters to begin testing their sites.

With just a handful of private multivariate testing vendors left, expect to see the remaining solutions usurped by larger companies seeking to interject science into their conversions and content delivery processes.

Live From eMetrics

2007-10-16T15:05:00.000-04:00

The eMetrics Marketing Optimization Summit kicked off Monday, hosting approximately 550 marketing practitioners, vendors, analysts and gurus in Washington D.C. Some of the themes emerging from the event include measuring engagement, attribution and methods for capturing metrics on new mediums. Ian Thomas of Microsoft previewed the Gatineau tool, which is a free analytics measurement solution aimed at quantifying metrics critical to advertisers. The solution integrates with the MS advertiser toolset and enables segmentation, calculation of conversion values and visualization of behavioral data.

Avinash spoke on Bouncy, Bouncy, Bounce metrics stating that most search analytics metrics focus on the wrong issues and can be dramatically improved by finding out why customers who bounce “come to your site, puke and leave”.

Google spoke up on Day two with news of an upgrade to the Google Analytics product that includes site search analytics, event tracking and tagless link tracking. These developments expose users of GA to increased visibility into their customer on-site behavior and the ability to measure RIA’s using Flash, Flex, Ajax or Silverlight with strategic purpose. Brett Crosby outlined an event hierarchy that includes Objects, Actions and Labels, which are fully integrated with clickstream data within Google Analytics. Additionally, Google announced a long awaited update to its Urchin Software with a renewed pricing structure and added functionality.

Jim Sterne, the fearless leader of the Summit conducted an informal poll on Day 3 to determine exactly where web analytics and optimization attendees report within their organizations…Marketing, IT, Line of Business or Other. Results determined by my show of hands estimate showed that Marketing is leading and closely followed by the undefined Other group. IT departments had very few direct reports attending this event alluding to the fact that marketers are increasingly driving the business decisions with data collected using analytics tools.

With a half day still to go, everyone I’ve talked with seems to view the event as a great success in terms of information shared, value delivered and networking opportunities. Emetrics succeeds again in creating an environment for professionals who share a common passion for analytics, multivariate testing, optimization and the pursuit of knowledge through customer interactions.

My Computer Doesn’t Know Me Anymore

2007-10-05T15:03:00.000-04:00

So what happens when personalized web promotions or on-site behavioral targeting tactics miss the mark? Technologies designed to improve the online experience by making it more relevant based on user interactions and predictive modeling can have negative repercussions leading to frustration and abandonment when assumptions are false.

I started thinking about these technological miscalculations when my Uncle explained that his Netflix account persistently recommended foreign films based on selections he made upon initiating his membership. He likened the recommendations to unwanted advances from a foreign temptress and has been anonymously patronizing his local Blockbuster ever since. Granted, Netflix offers several methods for customers to refine preferences and continues to hone in on a users’ specific taste through ratings and explicit information requests. However, we as humans are inherently lazy, and often times a laborious process of correction is more than we wish to invest, especially for the casual user. While Netflix is arguably leading the market in terms of allowing users to refine their interests and making effective collaborative recommendations, other methods of targeting are more difficult to correct, especially for non-savvy web users.

Take for example my Mom; years ago she diligently researched her doctoral thesis on minorities in education by venturing to numerous online and offline sources covering diversity, multi-culturalism and blacks. After some time she began to receive emails offering Black Education Journals and other periodicals at no charge. In this case the targeting was correct in identifying her interests and she accepted the offers, but the implicit assumptions of my Mom’s ethnicity were wrong. So, when subsequent emails started to arrive inviting her to join black singles networks, the targeting couldn’t have been further off base. The problem was that my Mom had no recourse for correcting the profile of her online self and still receives off-target emails and misdirected online promotions to this day.

In my own experience, I was issued a company laptop that previously belonged to another employee. Upon my first several Google searches, I was puzzled by the fact that all of my results were coming up from the UK. I was accessing the site through a North American IP address, yet after numerous searches Google was determined to prioritize UK results. I attempted to correct the situation using Google’s interface, but at that time found no course of action to inform the site that I was in the US and seeking US-based information. Try as I might, there was no correcting the problem and eventually I deleted my cookies (against my analytics-induced nature) and acquiesced to starting anew.

So, the moral of this series of observations is that sites providing personalized or targeted content must also provide a way out. Do this by offering methods for visitors to explicitly state preferences and by empowering visitors with clear messaging on how to turn off or modify behavioral targeting. In an age where tuning out unwanted advertising and content is increasingly prevalent, don’t you want to accurately target those that are listening?

Serving Up Context with Analytics

2007-09-20T14:42:00.000-04:00

Coremetrics released the latest version of its digital marketing suite this week with a focus on “Powering Contextual Marketing”. Their solution keys in on behavioral patterns across the multi-channel environment to target customers through email, banner ads, organic search and web browsing to seize them during critical cycles within the buying and consideration process. The general idea is to place the right offer in front of the customer at the right time. They’re attempting this by taking behavioral information collected during online sessions and mapping it against the Coremetrics LIVE Profile database to develop more targeted segments and more relevant content for visitors.

The contextual marketing concept utilizes the behavioral information and extends that to include predictive modeling, which drives relevance. For example, information gained about customers such as; what they left in their shopping carts, what they purchased and additional products they browsed during a session is coupled with user profile database information. The contextual marketing solution indicates which products sold to other visitors with similar demographic characteristics who also viewed similar products. Using this knowledge, contextual messaging can be delivered to prospects via email or other channels to draw them back to the site.

Advanced segmentation is a hot topic among analytics vendors lately as WebTrends also recently announced their Visitor Intelligence for Commerce solution. Primarily for merchandising, the solution targets customers based on their demonstrated interactions and interests. Similar to the Coremetrics solution, the WebTrends Visitor Intelligence platform uses real-time clickstream data and has the ability to tie in aggregate customer information from their Marketing Warehouse to drive relevance and probable sales using a segmentation strategy. Both products are likely to be a hit with retailers struggling to provide targeted messaging and relevant promotions to customers. The differentiators for marketers and merchandisers applying these tactics will emerge in the level of automation of each solution and the ease of use within the respective user interfaces.

Closing the Loop on Art with Science

2007-09-12T15:37:00.000-04:00

Omniture and Salesforce.com recently announced a partnership to provide a Closed Loop Marketing service, available to joint clients, through Salesforce’s AppExchange. The solution was designed to measure Marketing’s overall contribution to the sales process by analyzing the impact of multiple campaigns through an attribution methodology. This helps to solve the age-old marketing problem, where the last touch historically received all the credit, by indicating which campaigns collectively contributed to the ultimate sale.

Although it’s too early to tell if the service will be highly effective, I like the concept because it incorporates measurement practices into shared responsibilities that were generally gauged on gut-feel in the past. With the proliferation of technologies such as analytics and multivariate testing, results are driving change. Much to the chagrin of the senior-most executive in the room, operational decisions facing web site managers are increasingly made based on the science of technology rather than the art of intuition.

Omniture Acquires Offermatica

2007-09-07T15:41:00.000-04:00

Thus Begins the Multivariate Testing Market Consolidation Phase

Web analytics provider Omniture announced today its plans to acquire multivariate testing company, Offermatica for $65 million in capital stock. The move comes as no surprise as the multivariate testing market grows in popularity and continues to demonstrate value in its ability to quantifiably deliver optimization. Omniture is poised for the acquisition and strategically building out their product set. Today’s news follows Omniture’s acquisition of Touch Clarity back in March of this year for its behavioral targeting capabilities. Omniture customers will now have the strength of a leading multivariate testing platform in its quiver of services.

Jupiter research shows that multivariate testing adoption is on the rise as 29% of executives recently said that they plan to deploy or upgrade their testing solutions within the next 12 months. This will add to the 20% of companies that currently use a multivariate testing application.

The importance of testing is so pronounced that folding this feature into a larger application like web analytics makes perfect sense. With only a few vendors providing multivariate testing to begin with, (i.e., Optimost, Sitespect, Widemile and Google Optimizer, to name a few), I expect that the market will continue to collapse and commoditize based on features. Yet, services will emerge as an essential component of an actionable testing strategy.

Jupiterize Me

2007-08-31T15:40:00.000-04:00

I spent this week in the Jupiter NYC offices getting indoctrinated to the JupiterResearch family. The process involved acclimating to the environment, meeting my new colleagues and getting right to work. I’m a strong believer in rolling up my sleeves and jumping right in and this week was no exception. Day one was consumed by HR paperwork, configuring laptops and meeting all the new faces. But by day two, I was participating in vendor briefings and collaborating on client inquiries. Later in the week, I fielded my first press inquiry as a JupiterResearch Analyst, began locking down the research calendar for the rest of the year and started on survey development for my upcoming research. No honeymoon period here – and that’s the way I like it.

I must admit that the onboarding process invigorated me. This place just oozes research. There’s an open exchange of ideas and an inescapable stream of information about what’s new in technology, what’s happening in the markets and how consumers are reacting to all of it. JupiterResearch has world-class talent across its entire organization, which ratchets the collective mindshare even higher than the brilliance of its individuals. I am very excited to be a part of this team and eager to start producing research under the JupiterResearch brand and methodology. Stay tuned for more from JupiterResearch’s new Site Technologies and Operations Sr. Analyst.

WAA Standards Announced!

2007-08-24T15:57:00.000-04:00

If you’ve been waiting since late 2006 for the publication of the WAA Standards definitions, yesterday’s announcement is big news. Yet for the majority of the world, this new set of standards will fly way under the radar. For those intimately involved, the definitions represent a milestone in the development of web analytics. For those who missed the news…well let’s just say they’re not going to lose any sleep over it. I commend the Standards Committee for pulling together this comprehensive list of 26 definitions, yet the terms and definitions are nothing new. What is new is the fact that the institution responsible for guiding the direction of web analytics agreed upon a set of common definitions to talk/measure/calculate web metrics. Although I believe that the real challenge lies in getting outsiders, new entrants and current users to adopt these common characterizations.

The thirty-four page report identifies the “Big 3” definitions most important to the industry as: Unique Visitors, Visits/Sessions and Page Views. These metrics comprise most web analytics definition roots and thereby needed to be standardized first in order to proceed from common ground.

I very much like the way that the report sets up the framework for its definitions by Type, Universe and Definition/Calculation. The report describes four metric Types as: counts, ratios, KPIs and Dimensions. The Universe is measured as the dynamic of visitors to the site such as: Aggregate, Segmented or Individual. Both of these classifications are used to define all metrics within the report.

The report is certainly worth a read, if only to reaffirm the definitions you are already using. It will also serve as a useful tool for educating co-workers and superiors to the inner workings of analytics and possibly provide them an introduction to your world.

Here’s a link to the full PDF containing all definitions: http://www.webanalyticsassociation.org/attachments/committees/5/WAA-Standards-Analytics-Definitions-Volume-I-20070816.pdf

WAA Base Camp – An Analysts' View

2007-08-23T10:43:00.000-04:00

I was lucky enough to win a complimentary entrée to this valuable event that was a hybrid interactive working session and web analytics conference. The morning format was logically divided into three working sessions which can be summarized as follows:

Intro to Web Analytics, led by Jennifer LeClaire, was designed to initiate users into the discipline of analytics with definitions, explanations and methods for getting off and running with analytics.
The next session, Online Marketing Campaign Measurement, was led by Anil Batra who educated participants on ways to lead visitors to their sites and how to effectively capture their hearts and minds.
Finally, Web Analytics for Site Optimization was led by June Li, who focused on site operations and the process of using analytics to create a more relevant and impactful user experience.

I attended the Site Optimization session and my only regret is that I couldn’t have been in more than one session at the same time!

In our morning session, June Li outlined some baseline information for us on page views, visits and sessions to ensure that we were all on the same page. This was followed by an engaging discussion on the use of personas and their value to site operators. We formed breakout groups and proceeded to develop our own personas with associated goals and measurable KPIs to track their progress. This exercise was extremely valuable because it forced a group of very different individuals to agree on common goals and a method to measure the success of these goals. Our group was challenged with some turbulence and a fair amount of animated discussion. I equate our experience to a realistic corporate exercise, where various stakeholders each have their own agendas and goals. For attendees taking this information back to their offices, it provided a valuable lesson of how to introduce concepts and effective ways of demonstrating the value of analytics as a site optimization tool to peers and superiors.

Lunch consisted of an intimate setting that was well suited for networking and getting acquainted with some truly expert analytics professionals and web analysts in the field. After lunch, we wrapped-up the individual sessions and the Base Camp attendees converged to learn from the Gurus of Marketing Optimization. The first presentation was delivered by Jim Sterne, arguably the Godfather of web analytics and the Grand Pu Bah of the WAA Base Camp tour. If you have never heard Jim Sterne speak, you are missing a very entertaining show and he did not fail to impress on this session as well.

Jim Novo dazzled the crowd with his presentation next through a combination of insight into his years of industry expertise and words of caution about getting too close to the data. He advocated seeking patterns in the data from a macro perspective and quoted a wise posting from a Yahoo! Forum that I will undoubtedly butcher in my paraphrasing, but here goes. When your data shows something revealing, don’t smash it with a hammer and shatter it into a million pieces looking for more, because it will fall into the dark corners and disappear revealing nothing.

The Guru Sessions closed with an entertaining and informative presentation by Jennifer Veesenmeyer called P.I.M.P. My Reports. I happened to miss this presentation at Emetrics in San Francisco this spring, so was glad to hear it at Base Camp and fortunate because Jennifer informed me that delivering the same presentation twice was against her nature, but she acquiesced to Jim Sterne’s influential plea. I walked away with actionable tactics for improving my charts and delivering more effective reports.

Overall the WAA Base Camp was an extremely worthwhile investment in time and education. The presentations were interactive, informative and entertaining - leaving me wanting more. I applaud Jim Sterne’s tireless efforts at organizing and providing access to the industry’s best and brightest stars of web analytics.

Segment v. Persona

2007-08-17T22:58:00.000-04:00

There is a great deal of ambiguity surrounding the definition of a segment in the industry today. In my most recent research on online personalization, I recognize a need to differentiate between a segment and a persona.

My method of describing a segment is a non-emotional characterization of a subset of site visitors. Examples include: gender, geography, IP address, new visitor, returning visitor, etc.

Alternatively, a persona implies a deeper understanding of the site visitor based on psychographic characteristics. These may include: likes and dislikes, preferences, affinity towards certain products, etc.

Stay tuned for more to follow on segments...

Better yet, what's your definition?

“Searchandising” Still Buzzy

2007-08-15T11:59:00.000-04:00

I first used the term serchandising in an article for eCommerce Times back in March, 2007 and promptly received a cease and desist notice from Offermatica. Their CEO, Matt Roche emailed to inform me that I was infringing on their trademark and that he needed to protect his IP. The letter actually opened the door to a great conversation with Matt, whom I’ve come to know quite a bit since then.

However, I responded to Matt by stating that I was surprised that I didn't come across their trademark registration. I did my diligence at the US Patent and Trademark office and did not see a registration for Offermatica, but rather an abandoned application for the term Searchandizing with a "z" from Fort Point Partners, Inc. He responded that Fort Point was acquired by Offermatica and after some checking by his attorney, finally acquiesced that they did not in fact hold a trademark on the term any longer. Since then, my friends over at ATG mentioned that they were pursuing the term, but that may still be under wraps.

Anyway, the term popped up again in the August issue of Entrepreneur Magazine, for which I was interviewed back in March as well. MSNBC also picked up the story and basically did a reprint of the Entrepreneur story.

The sound bites are as follows:

"It's no secret that e-commerce search and online merchandising have a magnetic attraction."

"These applications morphed into the e-commerce lexicon as searchandising, enabling merchants who integrate search and merchandising to realize higher levels of customer satisfaction and returns."

"Search and navigation are inextricably tied, to have an efficient search system, you [need] an effective navigation scheme. In short, if your site is unorganized, it makes information discovery difficult."

Here’s the full story: http://www.entrepreneur.com/magazine/entrepreneur/2007/august/181698.html

Online Content Speaks Volumes

2007-08-04T17:47:00.000-04:00

As published on the Aberdeen Group web site in June, 2007.

Online content is information delivered via the online channel to entice, educate and drive action on the part of consumers. Sixty-two percent of respondents deliver online content to specific market segments, compared to 34% that deliver to a general audience. That leaves only four percent that are tailoring content for unique individuals at this time. But as with all things Internet, expect change. Effective web content provides targeted messages to attract customers into a web site followed by consistent, timely and relevant information to guide them through the online experience. The goal of these actions is to culminate in a desired result such a sale, qualified lead or submitted application. The objective of this study is to explore methods that companies use to build the efficacy of their web content management and delivery efforts with the goal of increasing revenue, maximizing marketing effectiveness and delivering a better online customer experience.

Click here to view a PDF of the entire report.

Web Analytics: The Crystal Ball of Customer Behavior?

2007-08-03T17:39:00.000-04:00

As published on the Aberdeen Group web site in April, 2007.

Web analytics provides a window into customer behavior, actions and intentions that can be harnessed to improve the customer experience and impact revenue. Recent Aberdeen research revealed that the predominant strategy identified by 44% of all online web sites is to use web analytics to gauge customer behavior and drive operational changes throughout their organizations. These online merchants will use analytics to deliver more personalized services (identified by 47% of C-level executives surveyed in the upcoming Aberdeen Report as a top strategy for making the customer experience easier and more profitable) and improve performance across three specific areas of the customer lifecycle: Attract, Convert, and Retain.

Click here to access a complete PDF of the report.

Web Site Search: Revenue in the Results

2007-08-02T17:49:00.000-04:00

As published on the Aberdeen Group web site in April, 2007.

Web site search is a minimum competitive requirement for online commerce as indicated by the 96% of eCommerce web sites that currently have or will have a search tool in place in the next twenty-four months. Differentiation in search tools will surface among companies that focus on key customer service tools that make the online shopping experience more efficient and more gratifying. Eighty-six percent of companies achieving the highest returns from their web site search applications conduct moderate to extensive customizations to fit their specific products or services. The payoff in the eyes of 83% of leading online companies is a positive return on investment (ROI) from their web site search applications.

Click here to view a PDF of the entire report.

Clicks to Customers: The Real ROI in B2C eCommerce

2007-08-01T17:51:00.000-04:00

As published on the Aberdeen Group web site in December, 2006.

The online Business to Consumer (B2C) marketplace is increasingly impatient, which is a reflection on the pressures merchants feel from their customers. Online retailers expect their technology solutions to flex, bend and meet their complex needs and become prof-itable in short order. Rather than expecting to realize a return on investment over the course of time, retailers want instant gratification and Return on Investment (ROI) in typically less than six months. Twenty-one percent of retailers expect to see revenue results from their online tools (e.g., site search, interactive product imaging and Web 2.0 technologies) within weeks. Only 22% are willing to wait more than six months to realize a return on their online tools.

Click here to view a PDF of the complete report.

Webinar: 5 Ways to Avoid Customer Churn

2007-07-31T16:41:00.000-04:00

In my research, I’ve described web analytics as a technology that serves as a window into customer behavior. Peering through this window, companies are using analytics data to improve the relationships with their customers in many different ways, yet often get tripped up by common mistakes. I delivered findings on how to minimize these mistakes in a webinar hosted by Tealeaf, called 5 Ways to Avoid Customer Churn.

For those of you not investing the time to watch the webinar, here’s the synopsis:

Pitfall #1: Failure to Measure
Solution: Build a Process for Measurement

Pitfall #2: Lack of Visibility
Solution: Select Effective Tools

Pitfall #3: Time & Resource Constraints
Solution: Dedicate Resources

Pitfall #4: Hoarding the Data
Solution: Integrate Data Distribution Methods

Pitfall #5: Failure to Close the Loop
Solution: Enable Customer Interaction

The presentation was well received and I enjoyed delivering the data, but I did walk away with one key take-away.

Note to Self: Never perform a webinar from your desk in an open office environment.

If you listen closely, you’ll hear the decibel level in the background of my presentation gradually escalate until I excuse myself and go on mute from the presentation. I stood up in my office and screamed “I’m delivering a webinar here…” at the top of my lungs. A bit rattled, I rejoined the call and picked up where I left off.

Take a listen and let me know how you think I handled the pressure.

Entering the Bloggosphere Without Trepidation

2007-07-30T15:08:00.000-04:00

Some may say, "It's about time", others "Where have you been", but even more..."Who are you?".

I lunge headlong into the blogosphere just eight years into my analyst career. Mostly because I feel like I have something to say and what better venue than a blog to push my thoughts. I've been employed as a research analyst since 1999, beginning with my early days at Gomez.com, "the Dot.com that rates the Dot.coms". I watched the bubble grow and wither and managed to maintain my focus (except for that two-year gig as a boat captain), on what makes web sites tick and more importantly, what makes them succeed.

I welcome you to visit this blog to peruse my musings on web site technologies, analytics, site search, content management and endure the occasional fishing story. I look forward to writing often and hope that my efforts will educate, or at minimum, entertain.