Web analytics strategy

Installing the tags on a site is only the start for using analytics to make a difference. We believe you need to create a performance management system in the organisation which will help drive results by defining the right:

• People – to manage, interpret and most importantly take actions
• Process  - the process of report and alert distribution is key
• Tools – choosing the right analytics tools and integrating the data
• Measures – information overload is the challenge – finding the right measures to use in dashboards, alerts and for optimization is needed to get the most from analytics

The Web Analytics Assocation defines web analytics as:

Web Analytics is the measurement, collection, analysis and reporting of Internet data for the purposes of understanding and optimizing Web usage.

You can see this does the job as a “catch-all” definition. We think it could be improved to reference the commercial aims of optimization and reference the measurement of multichannel usage including offline, mobile and social channels – the emphasis still seems on the traditional website.

• Avinash Kaushik’s Occam Razor – A “must-read” showing how organisations can get the most from web analytics
• Web analytics capability models of Stephane Hamel have some of the best resources on creating a web analytics strategy.
• Web Analytics Association - Annual outlook report is useful for looking at reasons behing adoption of web analytics
• Neil Mason’s web analytics articles on ClickZ – Neil writes a regular column which is one of the best on the web covering web analytics strategy
• Marketing Experiments (www.marketingexperiments.com) Summarises approaches to testing to improve website marketing effectiveness.

• Web Analytics Demystified (www.webanalyticsdemystified.com). A site to support Eric Petersen’s books with a range of research and whitepapers on web analytics adoption.