Web analytics : an hour a day

Foreword

Introduction

1: Web Analytics-Present And Future

Brief history of Web analytics

Current landscape and challenges

Traditional web analytics is dead

What web analytics should be

Measuring both the what and the why

Trinity: a mindset and a strategic approach

2: Data Collection-Importance And Options

Understanding the data landscape

Clickstream data

Web logs

Web beacons

JavaScript tags

Packet sniffing

Outcomes data

E-commerce

Lead generation

Brand/advocacy and support

Research data

Mindset

Organizational structure

Timing

Competitive data

Panel-based measurement

ISP-based measurement

Search engine data

3: Overview Of Qualitative Analysis

Essence of customer centricity

Lab usability testing

Conducting a test

Benefits of lab usability tests

Things to watch for

Heuristic evaluations

Conducting a heuristic evaluation

Benefits of heuristic evaluations

Things to watch for

Site visits (follow-me-home studies)

Conducting a site visit

Benefits of site visits

Things to watch for

Surveys (questionnaires)

Website surveys

Post-visit surveys

Creating and running a survey

Benefits of surveys

Things to watch for

Summary

4: Critical Components Of A Successful Web Analytics Strategy?

Focus on customer centricity

Solve for business questions

Follow the 10/90 rule

Hire great Web analysts

Identify optimal organizational structure and responsibilities

Centralization

Decentralization

Centralized decentralization

5: Web Analytics Fundamentals

Capturing data: Web logs or JavaScript tags?

Separating data serving and data capture

Type and size of data

Innovation

Integration

Selecting your optimal Web analytics tool

Old way

New way

Understanding clickstream data quality

Implementing best practices

Tag all your pages

Make sure tags go last (customers come first!)

Tags should be inline

Identify your unique page definition

Use cookies intelligently

Consider link-coding issues

Be aware of redirects

Validate that data is being captured correctly

Correctly encode your your Website rich media

Apply the "three layers of so what" test

Key Performance Indicator: Percent of repeat visitors

Key Performance Indicator: Top exit pages on the Website

Key Performance Indicator: Conversion rate for top search keywords

6: Month 1: Diving Deep Into Core Web Analytics Concepts

Week 1: Preparing to understand the basics

Monday and Tuesday: URLs

Wednesday: URL parameters

Thursday and Friday: Cookies

Week 2: Revisiting foundational metrics

Monday: Visits and visitors

Tuesday and Wednesday: Time on site

Thursday and Friday: Page views

Week 3: Understanding standard reports

Monday and Tuesday: Bounce rate

Wednesday through Friday: Referrers-sources and search key phrases

Week 4: Using Website content quality and navigation reports

Monday and Tuesday: Top pages-most viewed, top entry, top exit

Wednesday: Top destinations (exit links)

Thursday and Friday: Site overlay (click density analysis)

7: Month 2: Jump-Start Your Web Data Analysis

Prerequisites and framing

Week 1: Creating foundational reports

Monday: Top referring URLs and top key phrases

Tuesday: Site content popularity and home page visits

Wednesday and Thursday: Click density, or site overlay

Friday: Site bounce rate

E-commerce Website jump-start guide

Week 2: Measuring business outcomes

Week 3: Indexing performance and measuring merchandizing

Effectiveness and customer satisfaction

Support Website jump-start guide

Week 2: Walking in the customer's shoes and measuring offline impact

Week 3: Measuring success by using VOC or customer ratings (at a site and page level)

Blog measurement jump-start guide

Week 2: Overcoming complexity to measure the fundamentals (by using new metrics)

Week 3: Competitive benchmarking and measuring cost and ROI

Week 4: Reflections and wrap-up. 8: Month 3: Search Analytics-Internal Search, SEO, And PPC

Week 1: Performing internal site search analytics

Monday: Understand the value of the internal search

Tuesday: Spot internal search trends

Wednesday: Analyze click density by using the site overlay report

Thursday: Measure effectiveness of actual search results

Friday: Measure outcome metrics for internal searches

Week 2: Beginning search engine optimization

Monday: Understand the impact of, and optimize, links

Tuesday: Link to press releases and social sites

Wednesday and Thursday: Optimize Web page tags and content

Friday: Provide guidance for search robots

Week 3: Measuring SEO efforts

Monday: Check how well your site is indexed

Tuesday: Track inbound links and top keywords

Wednesday: Split organic referrals from PPC

Thursday: Measure the value of organic referrals

Friday: Measure optimization for top pages

Week 4: Analyzing pay per click effectiveness

Monday: Understand PPC basics

Tuesday: Measure search engine bib-related metrics

Wednesday: Define critical bottom-line-impacting metrics

Thursday: Measure unique visitors

Friday: Learn PPC reporting best practices

9: Month 4: Measuring Email And Multichannel Marketing

Week 1: Email marketing fundamentals and a bit more

Monday: Understand email marketing fundamentals

Tuesday and Wednesday: Measure basic response metrics

Thursday and Friday: Measure outcome metrics

Week 2: Email marketing-advanced tracking

Monday and Tuesday: Measure Website effectiveness

Wednesday: Avoid email analytics pitfalls

Thursday and Friday: Integrate your email campaign with your Web analytics tools

Weeks 3 and 4: Multichannel marketing, tracking, and analysis

Week 3: Understanding multichannel marketing, and tracking offline-to-online campaigns

Week 4: Tracking and analyzing multichannel marketing

10: Month 5: Website Experimentation And Testing-Shifting The Power To Customers And Achieving Significant Outcomes

Weeks 1 and 2: Why test and what are your options?

Week 1: Preparations and A/B testing

Week 2: Moving beyond A/B testing

Week 3: What to test-specific options and ideas

Monday: Test important pages and calls to action

Tuesday: Focus on search traffic

Wednesday: Test content and creatives

Thursday: Test price and promotions

Friday: Test direct marketing campaigns

Week 4: Build a great experimentation and testing program

Monday: Hypothesize and set goals

Tuesday: Test and validate for multiple goals

Wednesday: Start simple and then scale and have fun

Thursday: Focus on Evangelism and expertise

Friday: Implement the two key ingredients for every testing program

11: Month 6: Three Secrets Behind Making Web Analytics Actionable

Week 1: Leveraging benchmarks and goals in driving action

Monday and Tuesday: Understand the importance of benchmarks and setting goals

Wednesday: Leverage external benchmarking

Thursday: Leverage internal benchmarking

Friday: Encourage and create goals

Week 2: Creating high impact executive dashboards

Monday: Provide context-benchmark, segment, and trend

Tuesday: Isolate your critical few metrics

Wednesday: Don't stop at metrics-include insights

Thursday: Limit your dashboard to a single page

Friday: Know that appearance matters

Week 3: Using best practices for creating effective dashboard programs

Monday: Create trinity metrics that have a clear line of sight

Tuesday: Create relevant dashboards

Wednesday: One metric, one owner

Thursday: Walk the talk

Friday: Measure the effectiveness of your dashboards

Week 4: Applying Six Sigma or process excellence to Web analytics

Monday: Everything's a process

Tuesday through Thursday: Apply the DMAIC process

Friday: Reflect on what you've learned

12: Month 7: Competitive Intelligence And Web 2-0 Analytics

Competitive intelligence analytics

Week 1: Competitive traffic reports

Week 2: Search engine reports

Web 2-0 analytics

Week 3: Measuring the success of Rich Interactive Applications (RIAs)

Week 4: Measuring the success of RSS

13: Month 8 And Beyond: Shattering The Myths Of Web Analytics

Path analysis: What is it good for? Absolutely nothing

Challenges with path analysis

Alternative: funnel report

Conversion rate: Unworthy obsession

Problems with conversion rate

Alternative: task completion rate by primary purpose

Perfection: Perfection is dead, long live perfection

Perfect data

Web at the speed of Web

Fractured multisource data

Real-time data: it's not really relevant, and it's expensive to boot

Results of getting real-time data

Checklist for real-time data readiness

Standard KPIs: Less relevant than you think. 14: Advanced Analytics Concepts-Turbocharge Your Web Analytics

Unlock the power of statistical significance

Use the amazing power of segmentation

Segmenting by bounce

Segmenting by search

Combining search and bounce

Trending segmented data

Make your analysis and reports "connectable"

Using pretty pictures

Using connectable language

Use conversion rate best practices

Forget about overall site conversion rate

Trend over time and don't forget seasonality

Understand your Website's/company's acquisition strategy

Measure conversion rate by the top five referring URLs

Don't measure conversion rate by page or link

Segment like crazy

Always show revenue next to conversion rate

Measure conversion rate with a goal in mind

Elevate your search engine marketing/pay per click analysis

Measure your bounce rate (in aggregate and by top key phrases)

Audit your vendors/agencies

Measure PPC campaigns cannibalization rate (vs organic)

Aggressively push for testing and experimentation

Strive for multigoal understanding of visitors

Measure the adorable site abandonment rate metric

Using segmentation with abandonment rate

Finding actionable insights and taking action

Measure days and visits to purchase

How to measure the KPIs

Finding actionable insights and taking action

Leverage statistical control limits

Calculating control limits

Practical example of using control limits

Measure the real size of your convertible "opportunity pie"

Use bounce rate

Filter out search bots, image requests, 404 errors, Website-monitoring software "visits"

Use customer intent

Take action

15: Creating A Data-Driven Culture-Practical Steps And Best Practices

Key skills to look for in a Web analytics manager/leader

Deep passion for the job

Loves change, owns change

Questions data to the point of being rude

CDI baby, CDI (customer driven innovation)

Not really good "numbers Gods"

Raw business savvy and acumen

Impressive people skills

When and how to hire consultants or in-house experts

Stage 1: Birth

Stage 2: Toddler to early teens

Stage 3: Wild youth

Stage 4: Maturity-you are 30+

Seven steps to creating a data-driven decision-making culture

Go for the bottom line first (outcomes)

Remember that reporting is not analysis, and encourage the latter

Depersonalize decision making

Be proactive rather than reactive

Empower your analysts

Solve for the trinity

Got process?

Index