FREEDyourMind

More Good News For Website Analytics

More evidence from Jim Sterne's eMetrics Marketing Optimization Summit that the down economy isn't negatively impacting members' online marketing budgets or interest and attention to web analytics.

65% of respondents said the state of the economy has no negative impact on their overall online marketing budgets. And while just over a third said it was negatively impacting budgets, only 15% plan to actually cut budgets.

More than 80% of respondents have seen increased interest in analytics from senior management within their companies. The report notes that this is usually a pain point for eMetrics attendees, and we certainly see it with out clients: getting management attention and buy-in is always a challenge.

But even more important that increased management attention: twice as many are increasing rather than decreasing their analytics budgets.

This is a powerful statement to the power of web analytics. As the report notes:

Web analytics helps us maximize the effectiveness of our shrinking marketing dollars by pointing out our strengths and weaknesses and providing an actionable roadmap to our most impactful ROI channels online. Tough times really do call for tough measures.

In a strong economy, anyone can succeed. When times are tight and competition is up, only the strong will survive.

What To Do Now (part 2).

About a month ago I shared some thoughts about what a VP of E-Commerce should be doing in these tough economic times.  In case you missed that post, the 5 items I listed were:

1. Be aggressive...and smart.
2. Focus on what matters most...your customers.
3. Measure what matters most...because you cannot manage what you cannot measure.
4. Accuracy, precision, reliability and validity of your measurements is critical to success.
5. Resist the urge to be penny wise and pound foolish.

Since then the markets have dropped over 20%, we have seen a huge number of companies announcing layoffs and losses.  So. lets continue the list.

6. Rely on metrics, not only on your expert opinions, your instincts and loud complainers.  In any times, but especially in tough times with limited budgets and resources, we need to make sure we are focused on improving the things that will have the most impact on our business.  Not on the things that have the loudest complainer or are an expert's favorite.

7. Make sure your metrics are valid.  They need to measure what is important.  Often measurements like conversion rate can be very misleading.  We need to understand what we are measuring and why it is important.

8. Make sure your metrics are sensitive.  They must be able to detect change.  Simple scales (such as 5 point scales) are often not sensitive enough to detect change.

9. Make sure your metrics are precise.  They must be exact.  When we are fighting for every visitor, every customer and every dollar, we need precision in our measurements.

10. Make sure your measurements are accurate.  Our measurements need to be correct.  Garbage in leads to garbage out.  Measurements that are not accurate can lead us down the wrong path with a false sense of security.

Oh, and I almost forgot.  Don't look at your 401k statement - it will make you sad.

Are Domain Names Not Intuitive Enough Already?

This is fascinating to me. Google has a tool in beta that allows you to see the top searches in the world (or by region) as well as which searches are gaining in popularity.

A few days ago I looked at the top 10 rising searches in the last 7 days? Eight of them are domain names:
1.       cnn          +50%
2.       you          +20%
3.       hi5           +20%
4.       google      +20%
5.       games      +20%
6.       firefox       +20%
7.       youtube    +10%
8.       you tube   +10%
9.       wikipedia  +10%
10.     orkut        +10%

Why would you go to www.google.com and then type in "google?" Why google "firefox" or "wikipedia" instead of just typing in "wikipedia" into your address bar?

I don't know what "you" is supposed to be. When I googled it, the sponsored result is YouTube. There's also a South African magazine called You. What caused the search term "you" to go up 20% in the last 7 days?

You can also search by region, so the top 10 news and current events search terms in the United States from the last 7 days are:

1.     news        
2.     msnbc    
3.     new york times    
4.     nbc    
5.     wall street journal    
6.     cnn    
7.     washington post        
8.     usa today        
9.     ny times        
10.     fox news

Again, all domain names that shouldn't need to be googled, except for the first one.

The top 10 searches in Michigan are:

1.     news    
2.     free press        
3.     detroit news        
4.     msnbc        
5.     free press detroit        
6.     freep        
7.     new york times        
8.     nbc        
9.     cnn        
10.     wall street journal

Whereas the too 10 searches from California are:

1.     news    
2.     msnbc    
3.     clarin    
4.     new york times    
5.     nbc    
6.     wall street journal    
7.     ole    
8.     noticias    
9.     la times    
10.     cnn    

What's interesting about the California list is that one (possibly two, I guess) of the top 10 search terms is in Spanish, which gives you a sense of just how many Spanish speakers there are in California.

I don't know what you actually DO with this tool other than play around with it. But it is interesting. I would have expected your average internet user to be savvy enough to type in msnbc.com instead of needing to do a google search for "msnbc." But I guess not.

Into the Wild: Web Analytics as a New Frontier

Into the Wild is a bestselling book by Jon Krakauer and a movie made last year by Sean Penn. It's about a young man named Chris McCandless who disappears into the wilderness of Alaska for a planned stay of several months. He had no compass and no map and his only food was a 10-lb bag of rice. McCandless died after a few months alone in a bus in the Alaskan bush; accounts differ on whether he died of starvation or because he was poisoned by some seeds he misidentified.

There are debates about whether McCandless was crazy or stupid or idealistic or heroic, but what seems clear is that he could have easily survived with a few more preparations and a better understanding of what he was getting into. Admirers and detractors alike agree that he didn't have the proper respect for the challenges he was about to face, and that he mistakenly trusted his own instincts above logic and facts.

Bear with me. I promise this is related to web analytics!

Just like hikers and mountain climbers talk about preparedness and proper tools and equipment, those of us working on making successful websites have our own tools and equipment. Using a website to foster online and offline sales, loyalty, and recommendations does not have to be a random attempt filled with educated guesses. There are proven, scientific tools to guide your choices and you can easily determine what kinds of metrics have the greatest ROI and which tools to use for which problems. As they say, when you have a hammer, every problem looks like a nail.

Somehow this all reminded me again of Eric Peterson's white paper about the ecosystem of web analytics and how to integrate various web metrics for maximum success. I guess the point is that you don't have to be going "into the wild" when you're running a website--you don't have to go out there without proper tools and protection and eqiupment. The right tools will equal success. McCandless would probably succeeded if he'd only had a map.

So while others debate about McCandless' mental health, you can question mine because everything makes me think of web analytics.

Rating of Site Survey Tools

Check out Rich Page's rating of site survey tools.

The tools he mentions really fall into two distinct categories: more robust tools and free/simple survey tools. It's great to see that there are so many more options available for Mom and Pop websites who can't afford a full-scale solution but that would still like to get some insights into their customers.

Keeping Web Analytics in Place Over Time

It's a pretty regular occurrence that I will talk to someone who wants to measure satisfaction for six months or a year and then stop, thinking they know what there is to know after short-term measurement. It seems like more people understand the case for long-term measurement now than they did seven years ago when we opened up shop, but it's still a pretty common misconception.

First of all, customer satisfaction as well as other attitudinal metrics are a moving target. Customer satisfaction can be defined as what you get plus what you expect, and customers' expectations are constantly changing based on what the leaders are doing, both in your industry and anywhere online. The issues deserving the most time and attention may (and almost certainly will) change over time.

Secondly, even if you are not in a seasonal business, there may still be seasonal factors that impact satisfaction year-over-year. Holiday sales, marketing and advertising programs, competitive initiatives and the like can all impact satisfaction year-over-year, as can major changes to the larger environment, like economic conditions, gas prices, legislation, etc.

You can't manage what you can't measure, and you need to be able to track these trends.

Interview with Omniture

We've been working with Omniture for a long time now, integrating our customer-satisfaction-based VOC data with their clickstream data to provide our joint clients (like the Atlanta Journal-Constitution) with deeper and more valuable insights into online behavior.

Chris Parkin interviewed me for his blog recently.

Customer 3.0 and Accelerated Darwinism

Harvard is doing a conference on Customer 3.0, which they describe like this:

"With a seemingly infinite array of options, customers now know that demand (theirs!) is in short supply. They dictate how they will consume—where, when, and how much – using a variety of community-based online tools. They are creating social networks, composed of the people they trust, that are rapidly becoming the significant channels of media distribution and capable of distributing marketing messages that surpass Madison Avenue in reach and impact."

This Marketwatch article describes Customers 1.0. 2.0, and 3.0. The way that they define Customer 3.0 actually sounds a heckuva lot like the way I defined Customer 2.0 in a white paper last year....we even did a Customer 2.0 private sector conference in September 2007 and a Customer 2.0 Public Sector conference in May of 2007.

But whatever you call it and wherever it came from, the concept is important: customers have a lot of power now, online more than anywhere. This has spurred what I have long called the Accelerated Darwinism effect: survival of the fittest and failure by the less than fit, faster than we've ever seen before. Since academic research has proven that customer satisfaction (when measured with a precise, accurate, actionable methodology) is a driver of future financial performance and stock prices at the company level, the conclusion is clear: only companies that truly satisfy their customers will survive. That's just regular business Darwinism. But it becomes Accelerated Darwinism online, where the competition is only a click away, barriers to switching are lower than ever, and companies are made and broken in a few months time.

In order to not only survive but to thrive in the age of online Accelerated Darwinism, e-businesses must harness the power of the customer to meet or exceed consumers' ever-changing expectations while also growing and sustaining a profitable business. The companies that can best enable the customer to flex his or her own increasing power are the ones that will prosper. Companies that fail to do so (as determined by their own customers, not by internal opinions and board meetings and self-proclaimed experts) cannot succeed.

Web Analytics in a Recession?

I'm just catching up on all the blog entries I wanted to write and never got to over the holiday weekend.

I liked the guest post over on Eric Peterson's blog by Corry Prohens of IQ Workforce. IQ Workforce is an online marketing and analytics recruitment firm that does a few surveys a year. Corry's latest survey, which he wrote about on Eric's blog, is a survey of web analytics professionals on how they think the recession will impact their job:

• 74% of practitioners expect that spending on web analytics will increase at their company during the recession (40% said it would increase a bit / 34% said it would increase significantly)
• 60% of practitioners said that the recession would either increase the likelihood of hiring additional web analytics resources or have no impact
• 17% said that their company was either somewhat or very likely to reduce web analytics headcount during the recession
• 2% thought that the recession would have a major negative impact on their career

These findings are in line with my instinct  (and experience, based on how business is going for us right now) that web analytics will be more important than ever in a down economy. When things are going well, a lot of companies can be successful. When consumers start to tighten their belts, companies will have to compete harder to earn their business, and that is where the web analytics come in.

An X Change with Eric Peterson: Come to His Web Analytics Conference!

My good friends Eric Peterson with Web Analytics Demystified and Gary Angel of Semphonics are sponsoring this year's X Change conference, to be held August 17-19 in San Francisco.

I can't believe I won't be able to make it this year, though Eric Head, our director of business development, will be there. In preparation for the conference, Eric Peterson answered a few of my burning questions.

LF: What is the objective of the X Change and how does it differ from other analytics conferences?

EP: The objective of X Change is to promote conversation, sharing of ideas, and peer-based education between expert users of web analytics and related technologies.  The conference differs from other analytics conferences because we eschew the traditional Conference 1.0 "Sit and Listen" format for a Conference 2.0 "Gather and Talk" format.  This format, facilitated by small group conversations on highly relevant topics, allows participants to learn directly from their peers and contribute in a way not possible at other conferences.

The conference format is a response to the tremendous body of knowledge on digital measurement that has built up in the expert user and practitioner community.  We learned last year at the first X Change that if you give exceptionally bright people a highly personalized venue to share their ideas, they will gladly do so.

LF: With a “total absence of sales messaging and sponsored talks”, who will pick up the bar tab?

EP: We do.  The X Change conference is run as a break-even proposition for Semphonic and Web Analytics Demystified, a decision that the team at Semphonic made early on to eliminate the vendor posturing that has become so common at conferences today.  No booths, no sponsored talks, no goodie bags full of stuff you don't really want ... just highest-quality content targeting people who are serious about web analytics.

It's not that we don't love the vendors --- you know I love you Larry!  But we've taken a different approach towards that segment of our community.  Semphonic and Web Analytics Demystified have personally invited a handful of recognized experts in the web analytics vendor community, people like Aaron Gray from WebTrends, Eric Hansen from SiteSpect, John Squire from Coremetrics, Eric Head from ForeSee Results, and around a dozen others.  By specifically inviting vendor thought leaders we're again able to increase the quality of content and conversation at X Change.

I suppose, as usual thanks to my participation in Web Analytics Wednesday, there will be some type of uber-analytics event held separate from the X Change on Tuesday, August 19th in San Francisco where I will (again) be cajoling the likes of you to help me pay for drinks --- it wouldn't be a web analytics conference if I wasn't asking my buddy Larry for money for drinks, would it?

LF:  Okay, assuming my readers are sold on the conference already, with or without an open bar on my dime, how can they get registered?

EP:  Thanks for asking!  Since the conference is designed to be very intimate we're only accepting 100 registrations.  Since we're well on our way to selling X Change 2008 out completely, your readers might want to head over to:

http://www.semphonic.com/conf/registration.asp

I am personally happy to take any of your readers questions about the conference, as are the folks at Semphonic.  You can reach me at eric@webanalyticsdemystified and Gary Angel at gangel@semphonic.com. 

LF: What are the expected outcomes or takeaways?

EP: The key takeaway that we hope to provide to all participants is a much refined sense of the state of the industry today and a personal sense of where their organization needs to be headed.  We have conversations planned on tons of important topics including mobile marketing and measurement, video, data integration, industry standards, process ... there are over 30 different topics for participants to join over the two day event.  Our hope is that every participant, regardless of experience level, will walk away from their conversations with action items they can take back to the office and integrate into their web analytics efforts.

Additionally, Semphonic and Web Analytics Demystified will be summarizing all of the conversations and producing a "Proceedings of the Second Annual X Change Conference" document that will be free to all participants.  We're doing this in recognition that A) conference attendees cannot join all of the conversations but they will surely benefit from knowing what was discusses and B) the outcomes from these conversations have tremendous potential to shape our industry moving forward.

LF: Is this conference only for advanced practitioners, or is there a way some of those earlier in their maturity in the web measurement field will be able to benefit?

EP: While we are certainly targeting more advanced practitioners, based on last year's conference I think that web analytics professionals of any level of experience will benefit from the X Change.  Several of the attendees from last year's conference who were newer to the field expressed to me that X Change was hugely valuable despite being somewhat of a fire-hose of information.  All that is required to benefit from the X Change is a profound interest in web analytics and a desire to know as much as possible about the whole process of measurement in the online world

LF: Explain the “huddles” and what attendees will get out of them.

EP: The "huddles" are our conversational format, the basis for the entire conference.  Rather than having a room of 300 people sit and listen to some expert pontificate, the X Change format has around 15 people around a table talking to each other about their experiences, challenges, and successes.  Facilitated by expert practitioners from companies like AOL, PayPal, Yahoo!, Avaya, Sony Pictures Imageworks Interactive, The Gap, Intuit, Turner Broadcasting, and a dozen others, this format is a refreshing change from Conference 1.0.  

The huddles target a certain type of individual in our industry --- someone with enough experience to know what they're talking about and are not afraid to share those experience.  Honestly this is really the only venue in our industry that I know of where people can share their experiences openly.  The Web Analytics Forum I founded in 2004 isn't really appropriate, other conferences have gotten pretty large, and the vendor events are, well, about the vendors.  But the format works, trust me, it works!

The best way to get a sense of what attendees will get out of the huddle format is to have a look at the 2008 Huddle Topics that we've put online. Here you can see exactly what we'll be talking about and make a list of the topics that most interest you personally.  

LF: What about this conference are you most looking forward to?

EP: Well, this is the first year that I've been a partner in the conference so personally I'm looking forward to everything!  Gary and Joel from Semphonic asked me to coordinate the huddle leaders and content for the event so I'm hugely excited to see the conversations in action.  Also, given the star talent that has already registered for the event --- industry rock stars like Jim Sterne and June Dershewitz from the Web Analytics Association, all three web analytics industry analysts (Megan Burns from Forrester, Bill Gassman from Gartner, and John Lovett from JupiterResearch), Josh Manion from Stratigent, Andy Fisher from Avenue A/Razorfish, and Aurelie Pols from Europe's LBi/OX2 --- I'm also looking forward to the side-conversations, the dinners, the Lobby Bar, and general networking we'll be doing.

Plus, did I mention that the conference will be held at San Francisco's Ritz Carlton hotel?  Gary and Joel really outdid themselves on the venue, booking this five star hotel and getting conference attendees a special rate.  A lot of us remember the "good old days" of Emetrics at Santa Barbara's gorgeous Four Seasons Biltmore hotel --- we hope that the Ritz will be our Biltmore.

The only thing I'm not looking forward to is sleeping.  I guess I will sleep on Wednesday when the conference is over.

LF: Tell me about last year’s conference. Any changes from last year to this year?

EP: The major change we made is that last year vendors and consultants led the conversations but this year all of the conversations are being led by end-user practitioners.  We made that decision for one major reason: At the end of the day, we believe the conference is about making things better for the people in our industry who are actually on the hook to produce results.  It is our belief that conversations led by expert users of analytics and joined by vendor thought leaders and some of the great consultants working in our industry will simply produce better sessions.

This was kind of a controversial decision to make, especially since we are consultants and it meant that even we wouldn't be able to lead huddles!  But by-and-large the vendors and consultants have been pretty understanding and have still signed up to attend the conference.  I think this speaks volumes to the quality and uniqueness of the conference --- we said, "Not only can you not lead a huddle but you also have to pay your own way to X Change" and still they are coming, how great is that!

Also new this year is the "Proceedings of the Second Annual X Change" document I described above which will be free to all conference attendees.  One of the few complaints about last year's event was basically "I wanted to attend all of the huddles!"  While we can't stop time, we can capture the essence of each of these huddles and document it such that every participant can see what the key questions and key insights were in each session.

Finally, did I mention the hotel?  I think I did.  Last year the location was nice (in Napa Valley) but I am personally expecting the Ritz to be a whole different experience.

Larry, thanks for interviewing me about the X Change.  I'm hugely bummed out that you personally cannot join us but I understand, family first.  It will be nice to see Eric Head from ForeSee playing the part of Larry Freed! Remember, we're limited to the first 100 people who sign up so if your readers are interested in the conference I encourage them to head over to:

http://www.semphonic.com/conf/registration.asp

Again, I am personally happy to take any of your readers questions about the conference, as are the folks at Semphonic.  You can reach me at eric@webanalyticsdemystified and Gary Angel at gangel@semphonic.com.