There’s gold in those Referring Sites figures! You can find it in Google Analytics under Traffic Sources and then “Referring Sites”. You have the topline pronouncement: “Referring sites sent X Visits via Y Sources”. (Search Engines don’t appear to count as a ‘referring site’, though, you’ll see “google.com” sometimes listed under referring sites. Not sure what that’s about.) The most basic questions to ask are: “what’s X, what’s Y?” Next, you should ask: “How does that compare to all my other sources?” Then you get a figure – % of traffic from Referring Sites (under the “Overview” Tab). Then, you should ask: “Is it good?” And the reply, maddeningly, is: “It depends”. The default answer delves into the Comparative Benchmarking[…]
Patrick is putting on a very good Web Analytics Wednesday this Wednesday at Bar Wellington. It will be very worth while, and I’m sorry I can’t make it out this time. I’m in Chicago working on secret stuffs. (I’m buying me an ATV)
I knew there was mud ahead, but I had expected it to be frozen. After all, it was -36c when I started in – hell having been recently frozen over and all. Boy, did it thaw ever quickly! We’re all guilty of spinning the wheels once or twice, with just enough torque that you figure that you can get out of it. Nope. Stuck. Insanity is to cling to the drivers seat – spinning and spinning – expecting a different outcome. Now, you can be the do-it-yourselfer…get out, grab two 2 by 4’s, wedge those suckers under the tires, and try to get some traction that way. You call the CAA or, AMA, and get that tow truck to pull[…]
I’ve been lucky to be able to snag a week off for some reading and reflection. On the reading list – “Canada and the United States: differences that count” – which came on the recommendation of Joseph Carrabis. It’s a very good book. I trolled “Competing on Analytics” and “Supercrunchers” for golden lines that might resonate with non-scientists. And, on the back end, I want to finish “The Volatility Surface” and “Computability, Complexity and Constructivity in Economic Analysis”. I’m happy to read that others are having the same problems I am. “False Induction” is one, especially when you’re dealing with volatile data like web analytics. How do you quantify the rate of uncertainty once you’ve observed a pattern? Can you[…]
I had a very good conversation today. We talked about how data is not only completely silo’d in most organizations, but it’s also in very different formats. So, when it comes to unifying data for the purposes of extracting better insights from it – it’s a slog. Therein lies the problem. People don’t want to hear that it’s a slog. Take, for instance, the variety of ways that a phone number can be captured. In North America, I can think of five formats off the top of my head: (212) 555 5555212-555-5555212 555 55551-212-555-55551 212 555 5555 Is it all in the same field? Sometimes the country code is stored in a different field from the area code. The router[…]
Consider the following commercial: Did it resonate with you? If it did, chances are you’re a male, aged 18 to 29, with a fairly poor driving record. No, that’s not an insult – it’s simply that these Vern Fonk commercials (and the one featured above) happen to resonate with that audience. Because that’s their target. When it comes to Vern Fonk though, the content is widely shared. Will it Blend is another example of doing social right: Putting out these little videos on youtube and letting people comment and talk about it. It’s important to use material that your target demographic is going to want to share. And you’ll want to measure it. YouTube has good analytics open for all[…]
Bless you business guys on business trips. (DOT COM!) Companies are certainly imploding right, left, and center. The big guys going down hard are taking out quite a few little guys. People who don’t deserve to get taken out are getting taken out, and the guys who caused this are not. Such is economic justice. Productivity per hour should be going up though. I’m making a few changes. For one, I’m changing the way that I do email. Hamel rightly pointed out that it takes a knowledge worker 45 minutes to get back up to speed after having their attention broken, so, I’m only checking email twice a day going forward. We’ll see how far I get with that, but[…]
Why does every action need a deliverable? Alright – there’s documentation. If the goal of a long discussion with somebody is a short list of KPIs, then the ‘deliverable’ ought to be a two page PDF – a cover page, and a short list of KPIs, with footnotes on the exact definitions of what we’re talking about. Simple. If I’m talking to 10 stakeholders – do I need to spend 4 hours after each discussion to put together an ‘echo-deliverable’? Or, is it sufficient to parrot back what I heard from the stakeholder what I heard them say? Isn’t that just 40 hours – an entire week of concentrated effort – on a throwaway document? Moreover, does the echo-deliverable help[…]
I’ve had a few days to think about Petersen’s post on Recession Proof Analytics. First a summary. Then a summary of some of the comments. Then a reflection. Then an invite for comments or cross-blog talking.He cites two arguments in as many months about the importance of analytics in a downturn, and goes onto to argue that it’s not quite that rosy. He rightly points out a development at eMetrics DC – specifically – a quote from Liz Miller that many CMO’s are many years away from understanding the true value of analytics. Petersen goes on to cite 5 things we can do: 1. Focus on Increasing Profits, not Minimizing Spend2. Don’t be a report monkey3. Start watching job boards4.[…]
http://blog.webanalyticsdemystified.com/weblog/2008/11/web-analytics-is-recession-proof.html Petersen’s posting is actually really awesome on the recession and web analytics. We have to get really good at telling people who don’t know the value of real web analytics, the value of real web analytics.