L3 Analytics carries the tagline of “Making it simpler to understand and improve your online business performance” and I aim to live up to that objective.  I intend to work with companies of all sizes, focusing on recommending actions which directly add value to their business as well as giving them the tools and knowledge they need to get value from web analytics themselves.  I will also be happy to work with other agencies who are under resourced with their web analytics, either assisting in-house with their web analytics requirements or acting on their behalf with their clients.

I do intend to write on a more regular basis in the future but on the L3 Analytics blog, so please follow me over there to read more about my thoughts on web analytics and the online world.

The last 9 months with Logan Tod has been very interesting.  Learning how to use HBX and Omniture SiteCatalyst and increasing my knowledge of Google Analytics.  Focusing my attention on looking for insights in the data which can be used to recommend improvements to websites or marketing.  Broading my experience with the range of websites that I have worked on and the nature of the work.

I still like to keep it simple though.  I think with the vast amount of web analytics data available for any website, it is easy to get lost in it.  And if you dive in too deep too quickly, it can be difficult to find anything as you are surrounded by too many pieces of data.  I think it is best to start simple, with the key actions or conversion points on the site, the top line metrics.  An understanding of these will generally lead to fairly basic questions about the performance of the website.

But answering these questions will lead to more and increasingly more complex detailed questions about performance and an understanding of the factors that truly are impacting on the performance and success or otherwise of your website and business.  The data itself and an exploration of it can lead you to map out what is important to know in order to make improvements.

One of the more frustrating parts of learning HBX and SiteCatalyst was the discovery of the basic reports that I feel are missing.  In particular, there is not a simple report that gives visits (or even responses) by traffic source.  Having to try and pull data from various sources into a single excel report (as the alternative) is painful with question marks over the accuracy.  SiteCatalyst has the option of Unified Sources via a Vista Rule, this needs to be mandatory for anyone using SiteCatalyst and I wish it came out of the box.  While I have various workaround for HBX, I finally came up with a version using multiple segments where I am satisfied with the accuracy, but no where near the ideal solution.  All tools that I have used need to work harder on getting the balance right between reporting performance and allowing analysis.  I know analysis leads to insights leads to recommendations leads to improvements leads to more money but simple performance reporting highlights where and when the analysis should occur.

Anyway, likely more on that in the future.  I might need to be careful or it could be too easy to write about the philosophy of web analytics ahead of the practicalities of it.  And I need to get a new simple WordPress theme.

The next Monday I started my new life as a Customer Insight Consultant with Logan Tod.  Over the past two months I have been using Omniture (including Discover), HBX, Google Analytics and Sitestat as well as other online data tools.  Whatever the tool, the intention is always the same, to use the data to make better decisions, decisions that will lead to a more successful performance for the company.

I am working across a range of clients performing a range of tasks.  While part of my time is spent running your typical weekly reports, I am also working on some interesting projects, using my knowledge of web analytics to make recommendations for actions to take that will improve the performance of these websites and businesses.

I have been exposed to more e-commerce clients than in the past and have definitely already improved my understanding of what elements can reduce the conversion rate for a website.  The same principles can be applied to non e-commerce websites, looking at the conversion rates for these sites however the conversion is defined.

It is also interesting using a range of tools and getting to know the strengths and weaknesses of each. While all tools are using a similar methodology and reporting on similar metrics, it is surprising just how different they can be.  Early signs is that there is no best tool, rather that they are all good (and all frustrating) for different reasons.

I have also been busy learning how to be the President of my local Australian Rules Football team in London.  Recently this somehow meant I had to learn how to create websites – a week and a half of work later and I had put together the new Putney Magpies website.  Unfortunately it doesn’t appear to work as intended across all browsers and screen resolutions but it is a starting point.

Anyway, they may only be intentions at this point, but they are to write a post on web analytics (not website development) each week – hopefully more interesting and useful now given the experiences I am having.

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Perhaps unsurprisingly, they are facing many of the same issues as those reported by large organisations with e-commerce websites.  The key issues are:

• no clear objectives from stakeholders
• lack of time
• lack of support of internal stakeholders
• insufficient knowledge of how to use web analytics data to make business decisions.

Given this, I aimed my presentation at addressing these issues, hopefully providing practical suggestions for actions that can taken to make web analytics more actionable within their organisations.  This presentation that I gave can be found below.  While it was directed towards universities, I believe the suggestions would be relevant for any organisation.

One of the principles of BarCamp is that presentation slots cannot be claimed until the start of BarCamp when there is a slightly mad rush for the board.  My own presentation/s didn’t go so well in terms of attendance but I am going to blame that on other factors such as being up against very popular presentations at the same time, not selling the topic with a snappy enough title and web analytics still not on the radar for a lot of people.  But while I would have liked the opportunity and to have had more feedback on my ideas, I still managed to have a number of interesting discussions with various people.

Some of the interesting presentations I attended were concerning

• how the internet can be used to switch the current demand/supply equation so that events/products are created only when they is a demand for them
• evolving social networks in order to be able to filter the quantity of news down to managable levels
• sharing of knowledge between competitors so that both parties improve their websites and where the lines are drawn on what information can be exchanged
• creating situations where consumers can directly have a portion of their spending used on socially beneficial options – the Carrotmob
• blogging principles
• mass customisation (from someone who would know – one of the founders of mymuesli)

I was very impressed by a presentation on the mistakes that the individual has made in their work on various start-ups.  It is always nice to know the success stories and decisions made that were right, however you can learn a lot more from the mistakes that others have made and try to avoid them yourself in the future.  And it is rare to find someone with the honesty to admit they have made mistakes and to share their experiences with others.

Overall a very good experience and one that I would recommend to anyone with an interest in the internet.  My biggest regret, that I was distracted chatting to others and never got involved in a game of werewolf – next time.

While most of what I heard discussed was not that relevant to my own interests, I did at least get some satisfaction from knowing that web analytics is vital to most other areas. Everything that happens on the net can be measured (ok we are still trying to figure out exactly how in some cases) and this means that people can understand what works and what needs to be worked on.

This industry appears to be facing similar challenges to everyone else. There is a lot of new technology out there and it is difficult trying to understand what is useful and what is merely fun. There are internal battles, trying to get colleagues to appreciate that websites can make their life easier and are not just additional work. Privacy is a big issue, particularly given that this industry has access to a lot of personal details about students and staff. And of course, there is the eternal battle for sufficient resources.

In terms of web analytics, again like everywhere else, there appears to be varied usage. There is an initial time investment needed to set up web analytics and associated reports and it can be difficult can this to receive a high enough priority. Promisingly, people do appear to see the value of web analytics and want to be able to use the data to improve their websites, the content and experience they are providing. The question they are facing is how to use the data, how to transform it into actionable insights.

I managed to avoid getting dragged into the Scottish dancing (the conference is at the University of Aberdeen) and avoiding drinking any of the fine whiskey (it was an early flight this morning back to London). But I think i made some decent contacts, hopefully provided a couple of useful hints and I very much hope to be able to give more advice to some of the people I met via this blog in the near future.

But there was one question that I thought was quite interesting and where I think my response would have been equal to any that they came up with. The question was “What topic/theme do you think we will look back in 3 to 5 years and wonder why it was even a discussion point?”. While I can’t remember the exact responses given, clearly nothing was said to really impress me.

I believe that one thing the industry needs to move beyond is this concept of web 1.0, web 2.0 and now (thanks Eric) web 3.0. And related to these – web analytics 1.0, 2.0 and I am guessing 3.0. I think people are trying to differentiate when they just don’t need to. And in the process, using another set of buzzwords that are not clearly defined.

To me, what people call web 1.0 is a website where people have just transplanted offline media onto the internet and expected it to work. Smart people (with potentially more time/resources) recognise that the internet is a different medium and create content that uses the potential of this medium. So called web 2.0 features are still a waste of time if they are not appropriate to the website or audience.

I just plain disagree with the idea of mobile being web 3.0. It is still the internet via a smaller screen with people likely not at home or at work. Therefore yet another medium and again the smart people are the ones who create content appropriate to this medium, content that works within the limitations but uses the advantages.

I had written a couple of lines about how I find there to be minimal difference between web analytics 1.0 and web analytics 2.0. But these are now deleted as I have reread a post by Avinash (http://www.kaushik.net/avinash/2007/09/rethink-web-analytics-introducing-web-analytics-20.html) which does differentiate them quite nicely. I still don’t think they need to be called 1.0 and 2.0 though – it still seems to me as though 1.0 is just looking at numbers/data while web analytics 2.0 is focusing on customers and actually using your brain. It sounds a little similar to art vs science.

In 3 to 5 years time, I hope we will have got beyond this need for differentiation and be focussed on improving websites to meet customer needs, whatever they are and however this is best achieved.