261–270 of 401 posts
Personally I never stopped using AWStats to process my nginx access logs. Its appearance is "rustic" for sure, but it provides every statistic I care about: https://www.awstats.org/
Google can't entice me enough to bother adding load to my sites.
Google analytics is great. It has its issues, but overall 1. They've built a working product that is easy to connect and use 2. It fits to a lot of use cases and barely has issues 3. Easy to start using, no engineering overhead 4. I don't understand what the author trying to say. Should google be a charity? Or should they stop making good product? Or does the author want to cover the cost of all the other product tha…
I don’t think anyone is disputing the greatness of Google Analytics on a functional level. The problem is that indeed Google isn’t a charity and will not give away such a powerful tool for free without getting something in return. That return is the privilege of stalking all your website’s visitors, which are often not aware of the tracking and have no say in the matter. Furthermore it would be against the GDPR if it…
That website uses Google Analytics!
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> Don't use analytics at all but focus on your product. Huh? Analytics is how you focus on your product. By instrumenting your product with analytics, you can find out if customers are using your new useful feature or if they can't find it. If they're performing a task quickly because it's easy, or slowly because they're struggling with the UX. And you find out that customers on a certain mobile device are suffering…
> Huh? Analytics is how you focus on your product. For the first decade of my career, I really believed this, and spent a lot of time doing split tests, and studying analytics, and trying to "make things better" by understanding the numbers as they were given to me. This was a mistake. I've since learned that these numbers will rarely help me make meaningful improvements to my product, and my business. Sure, they can…
The funny thing is that this is essentially a giant ad for this person's business, and their website uses GA (lol). I've noticed this is an increasingly popular tactic on Reddit and HN. You clickbait people to an article backed with no data that you know will tickle people's emotions. Then at the end you include a call to action to use their service because it will save the world. I used to hate GA as well as ads in…
I don't think there's a problem with posting not-very-substantive articles like this on HN - it's a forum, not just a link aggregator. They often serve as good jumping off points for discussion, especially opinions to the contrary like yours (which I am glad to have read).
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I echo your sentiments on Costco but this is an argument for different metrics, not an argument against analytics. There is no chance that Costco doesn't use analytics. They might not A/B test their online button colors for highest conversion rate, but I'd bet they have their own set of analytics to determine product quality, sales, returns, viability, etc.
This, thank you. I feel like people are making big assumptions about what "analytics" are that don't even begin to cover the whole spectrum of analytics.
If someone says "I hate traffic," you probably wouldn't assume they're talking about the entire spectrum of traffic.
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 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…
> Don't use analytics at all but focus on your product. Huh? Analytics is how you focus on your product. By instrumenting your product with analytics, you can find out if customers are using your new useful feature or if they can't find it. If they're performing a task quickly because it's easy, or slowly because they're struggling with the UX. And you find out that customers on a certain mobile device are suffering…
Earlier quoted context omitted.
> Huh? Analytics is how you focus on your product. For the first decade of my career, I really believed this, and spent a lot of time doing split tests, and studying analytics, and trying to "make things better" by understanding the numbers as they were given to me. This was a mistake. I've since learned that these numbers will rarely help me make meaningful improvements to my product, and my business. Sure, they can…
> but they simply aren't going to show me how to create an ingenious idea that takes things to the next level. Of course not. There's no substitute for straight-up creativity and deep thinking. But once you have your ingenious idea, you still have to design it, make sure it's clear to users, that they find it and can use it effectively. Your "ingenious idea" may turn out to be largely sabotaged if a button you though…
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 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…
100% agree. I used to be a very "analytics focused" product manager until I joined an enterprise software company that hardly uses them and is wildly successful. We're succesful because we talk to our users about everything. I spend most of my time talking to customers and watching them use the software. We occasionally use analytics to help us validate hypotheses or assumptions, but that's always complimented with a…