The author blames Google for the fact that recipe sites force you to wade through a long preamble before you get to the recipe. But if internet advertising didn't exist, then the recipe site would be charging him for the recipe. Recipe authors have to make a living somehow. If he doesn't want ads in his recipes, then he could always go out and buy a recipe book.
Google Analytics: Stop feeding the beast
161–170 of 401 posts
Re: Google Analytics: Stop feeding the beast
#162Earlier quoted context omitted.
You could talk to your users... (i.e. UX research), observe them using your website or product and ask them non leading probing questions to see what the intent is behind the behaviors affecting your bottom line. Qualitative research methods are a rich source of insight that is typically underinvested and underutilized. Analytics (quantitative data) can help you find areas of bottlenecks to explore further by doing q…
Users hate being bothered and hate taking surveys. Qualitative research isn't scientific anyway.
Well this is just untrue in my experience. I run a SaaS business and my customers love it when you ask for their opinions and insight.
Where are you getting your information from?
Re: Google Analytics: Stop feeding the beast
#163The author blames Google for the fact that recipe sites force you to wade through a long preamble before you get to the recipe. But if internet advertising didn't exist, then the recipe site would be charging him for the recipe. Recipe authors have to make a living somehow. If he doesn't want ads in his recipes, then he could always go out and buy a recipe book.
If internet advertising didn't exist then there would be only half a dozen recipes for scrambled eggs to be found, not the thousands there are now.
Re: Google Analytics: Stop feeding the beast
#164Earlier quoted context omitted.
I think you're being silly. As long as your product is good enough, no one needs a marketing budget or to measure if marketing is working. And everyone has the resources and time to make their own analytics tools, if they need it, instead of relying on existing solutions
I used to think that way. My customers liked my products, but I didn't really get many new customers. I doubled down on improving the technology. Then I ran out of money. "If you build it, they will come" is only very rarely true, and chances are there was some kind of submarine marketing going on anyway that you just didn't know about.
I wonder what makes nerds like us end up with that opinion.
Surely anyone that reaches adulthood ought to know that selling yourself well and having some damn good looks will bring your farther than just being the real deal?
It takes some huge lack of awareness of one's surrounding not to notice it
Re: Google Analytics: Stop feeding the beast
#165Time to reboot the internet
Re: Google Analytics: Stop feeding the beast
#166Earlier quoted context omitted.
I think you're being silly. As long as your product is good enough, no one needs a marketing budget or to measure if marketing is working. And everyone has the resources and time to make their own analytics tools, if they need it, instead of relying on existing solutions
>As long as your product is good enough, no one needs a marketing budget or to measure if marketing is working. Let's say you make an incredible mousetrap, better than any before. Then you tell some people about it, they buy it, and stop thinking about it because it isn't central to their existence. You've now saturated your market and have no ability to expand easily without putting effort into marketing or advertis…
Should've added /s instead of relying on sarcasm detection.
Re: Google Analytics: Stop feeding the beast
#167Earlier quoted context omitted.
> Here's a crazy idea: Don't use analytics at all but focus on your product. If your success relies solely on "improving conversions" by tracking your users and then changing the position and color of your "Checkout" button then maybe try setting yourself apart I am very much onboard with this idea. The notion that it is a requirement that businesses track individual customers’ actions in order to succeed is pervasiv…
> The notion that it is a requirement that businesses track individual customers’ actions in order to succeed How would a business use Google Analytics to track individual customers? The last time I checked, it was against the GA terms of service to do that. I know Google does have services to do that; I’m asking about GA specifically.
Tracking individual users is how Google Analytics works. Every hit has a "client ID" to tie together hits that came from the same browser. You can trace the actions of an individual in the "User Explorer Report." Although in practice, that's only useful for debugging.
The terms of service prevent you from putting PII into Google Analytics data. It is perfectly acceptable (and even encouraged) to put in an opaque identifier, which connects to PII stored in a different system. That is, for example, how you implement the official integration between Google Analytics and Salesforce CRM.
Re: Google Analytics: Stop feeding the beast
#168Here's a crazy idea: Don't use analytics at all but focus on your product. If your success relies solely on "improving conversions" by tracking your users and then changing the position and color of your "Checkout" button then maybe try setting yourself apart such that customers want to buy your product even despite an obnoxious purchasing flow. Only then start optimizing it. More serious thoughts: Google Analytics i…
Agreed. I'm building https://increment.me and we specifically avoid web analytics and 3rd party cookies entirely. We don't keep data that doesn't serve a purpose and don't sell our data to anyone. For feedback, we use Increment itself to gather feedback directly from customers.
Having customers directly give feedback is one great signal that really works, particularly when you demonstrate your commitment to action it. When you combine this with a 1st party view of how the product is used like from ephemeral log data, you can get a great pulse on how well you're helping your customers get the most value from you - and how you can adapt to help them more.
I wish every business I interacted with had the same philosophy in creating value for customers and building trust in every interaction.
Re: Google Analytics: Stop feeding the beast
#169The author blames Google for the fact that recipe sites force you to wade through a long preamble before you get to the recipe. But if internet advertising didn't exist, then the recipe site would be charging him for the recipe. Recipe authors have to make a living somehow. If he doesn't want ads in his recipes, then he could always go out and buy a recipe book.
If internet advertising didn't exist then there would be only half a dozen recipes for scrambled eggs to be found, not the thousands there are now.
... and probably not much else. I love the way I can type in whatever combination of ingredients I happen to have in my pantry, and get a bunch of free recipes with those ingredients. I doubt that would have happened without internet advertising.
Re: Google Analytics: Stop feeding the beast
#170Earlier quoted context omitted.
Let's think about it. Are games doing analytics? Games are essentially UIs that people pay for the privilege to use. Although I am sure that contemporary game makers use analytics to understand user behaviour and optimize for in game spending and engagement, at least in the bigger games probably the core experience comes from creative human processes. The more the analytics the further optimised the game would be tow…
A prime example of analytics driving games is Slay the Spire, where they would record every decision you made and outcomes in the game to better balance the experience and give the player interesting decisions. https://www.gamasutra.com/view/news/314975/How_Slay_the_Spir...
Slay the Spire does not have subscriptions, loot boxes, etc. so it can optimize for balance, instead of engagement or play time. It's very much the exception.
The risk of analytics is an erosion of your design and vision. You just do whatever makes the numbers go up in the short term.