Tuesday Oct 09, 2007
Tuesday Oct 09, 2007
(Charles Bridge, Prague)
This past week I visited one of our web teams in Prague. This trip was very crucial as it marked the first process-driven attempt at developing web analytics strategy within our organization. You can see a flowchart of the process I am promoting within our organization. It is based on information provided throughout the web analytics community and is no industry secret.
The web team in Prague executed it almost flawlessly. Our schedule consisted of two parts - web analytics strategy development and Omniture SiteCatalyst training. The only struggle that ensued was upon their learning of the vast reporting capabilities of Omniture SiteCatalyst. Here's how it happened. On day one I started with a presentation providing motivation for and an outline of the process. They readily committed to the process and quickly narrowed down their three priorities. They were also able to define their first priority KPIs that day. On day two they requested Omniture SiteCatalyst training to begin before we went further. They understood how to execute the process and wanted to ensure understanding of how the tool worked. This is where the proverbial wheels started coming loose. As I mentioned before, Omniture SiteCatalyst provides a deluge of reports. At this point they began requesting that we add a handful of these reports. We were able to make a compromise after I reminded them of the motivation for the process. In the words of Albert Einstein, "Not everthing that can be counted counts..."
The remainder of the training and KPI selection went smoothly. The crucial rule that I learned is this - "Don't reveal reporting capabilities until KPIs are selected." I know many of you will say, "Having an exhaustive list or at least a peek at what can be tracked is important." Here's my response: Don't underestimate the knowledge of your web team and don't forget why you are directing the process - you are the expert.
Interesting experience, Dustin. I'm curious what KPIs were proposed (if any) that were not measures of Web activity of some type. In other words, what off-line, or non direct Web KPIs came up? I often find that Web Analysts get too myopic about typical Web Analytics data which only covers part of the whole business picture. Not "revealing" what KPIs the tool can measure, although frustrating to the participant, could force broader thinking.
Posted by Paul Strupp on October 09, 2007 at 11:43 AM PDT #
Because I was working with the web team, the focus was narrowed to web activity. We will soon be going through this process with a services website that will definitely involve some offline KPIs because not all sales (especially large contracts) are made online.
This is an important pursuit, but definitely geared for a higher level of management. So here's my question: At what point is a web analyst not doing web analytics? Should a web analyst reach beyond the web or is this responsibility reserved for a higher level "business" analyst to bring different forms of analytics together for upper management?
I think a true web analyst grasps the skills and concepts necessary for bringing together company-wide analytics. It definitely provides more value and I am seeing more and more that this process should be done at a higher level and not be restricted to web activity. Perhaps, the web analyst is only a player in this higher level process or should strive to become an all-encompassing business analyst.
The web analyst of the future needs to decide if he/she will restrict their analysis to web behavior or will work to encompass all company analytics. I prefer the latter, as I'm sure it provides more value and a larger paycheck ;) It will become harder and harder to be a pure web analyst as companies will want someone who can "do it all".
Posted by Dustin Wallace on October 09, 2007 at 12:05 PM PDT #
Thanks Dustin for coming out to see us. I think we're just starting, but the focus on the KPIs was strong. I think it's a natural process that you look at everything that can be tracked and go, ooooh, I want that in my dashboard. It only takes a couple of weeks at looking at the dashboards to figure out... hmmm... can't really do much with that data :-)
Anyways, still a long way to go. But at least we got the process going.
Posted by John Ceccarelli on October 16, 2007 at 06:31 AM PDT #
Dustin, This flowchart is good. But a very basic model. Any extended model which you implemented that you can share? You haven't yet explained about the KPIs which would be interesting to note. Also the process varies for one organization to the other. What analytical tools do you use?
Regards,
Dan
Posted by Danny on December 14, 2008 at 10:36 PM PST #
Hi Danny,
Thanks for the comment.
Discussions on KPIs are on just about every web analyst's blog. I would suggest the blogs and books of Eric Peterson (http://webanalyticsdemystified.com) and Avinash Kaushik (http://kaushik.net/avinash).
We use Omniture and a little bit of Google Analytics. Although any tool has pros and cons, so "What I want to measure" has to meet "What I can measure" at some point. Most of the time, tool preference isn't ours so we do the best we can with what we have knowing our limitations.
I think you've stirred up my mind to revisit this flowchart piece by piece. Stay tuned.
Dustin Wallace
Posted by Dustin Wallace on December 19, 2008 at 05:28 PM PST #