If website analytics are such powerful tools which reveal truth and/or insight into online marketing, why is everyone so reluctant and even resistant to using them as a central part of their daily routine? Why does using these tools feel like such a chore?
As something of an analytics nut, I’m in some ways amazed at how active online marketers seem to view and treat a dip into their analytics package with the zeal usually reserved for a trip to the dentist or doing your taxes. One would think that marketers couldn’t help but check these ‘scorecards’ nearly constantly to see how they’re doing, catch mistakes early, figure out how to improve, etc. But it seems that analytics are treated (in terms of actual use not conceptual approval) like a necessary evil rather than an exciting or empowering experience.
I’ve come to the conclusion that it’s because the marketers are process centered and the analytics tools are data centered. The marketers want a nice comfortable chair to sit in and the analytics software keeps handing them some sticks, a box of nails, a hammer and a roll of fabric. That may be ok if you have a carpenter (or an analyst) around, but it gets tiring when it happens every time you want to sit down.
There are too many levels of ‘translation’ necessary to get from the process I’m thinking about relative to my SEM campaign, website content update, or client segmentation issue to how the information in these reports tells me anything near a complete picture.
I want to know how the new SpiderMan-3 keywords are doing relative to our spidy-pajama bottoms and lunch boxes. As a product manager or marketer, or even a search marketer, this means what I’d like to see is a quick snapshot summary of the spend, traffic, and results for the related keywords, how these visitors used my site (consumed or interacted with pages and content), who they were (how many were first time visitors vs frequent buyers) and how purchasers really behaved (what else they bought in the same order, over time what they came back and bought later, how their basket size compared to other current product groups or promotions), and maybe a few more things. That’s a lot of stuff, but I spent some money, dedicated some time, and I want to know what happened.
Does a non-analytics-expert have any chance of getting the answers to those questions using today’s analytics software? Could even a moderately experienced analyst get the majority of these answers in less than 30 minutes?
PPC-tracking, path analysis, segmentation controls, lifetime value information, fallouts and revenue analysis are distinct in terms of how analytics software tracks data and present reports. Many of these data elements cannot be joined or cross-referenced in any way within the current interfaces. Analysts know and (begrudgingly) accept this. Non-analysts are surprised and appropriately befuddled by those facts.
PS: I’m heading out to emetrics.org in SF next week, where I look forward to righting all these wrongs with my vendor friends, and drinking to the challenges we must endure with the analysts.
While at the emetrics conference earlier this week I had the chance to sit down with Jeffrey Veen, just a few minutes after he unveiled Google Analytics Version 2 to the world. I recorded our conversation and am pleased to present our first PodCast™ below.