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Show HN: Heap is a new approach to analytics. Just capture everything

heapanalytics.com

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Re: Show HN: Heap is a new approach to analytics. Just capture everything

#181

Post by DanBC »

huhtenberg wrote: post #165
cheald wrote: post #122

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That "purpose" is generally to help service providers understand you better so that they can provide a product that better serves your wants and needs, as their customer.

Say, you have a desktop client-server app. Outlook, for example. How would you feel if it were uploading every click on the menu and every mouse move (in the confines of its window, of course) to the server. Strictly to help the developer improve the product and make it better for you , their customer. This should be totally OK with you, right?

I'm fine if they tell me they're doing it, and what they're collecting, and giving me an option to turn it off.

Re: Show HN: Heap is a new approach to analytics. Just capture everything

#182

Post by goronbjorn »

samstave wrote: post #132
lucaspiller wrote: post #130

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My guess is that most products that do this aren't much further along than a weekend hack. It's pretty easy to throw up a marketing site, and it let's you quickly see if people are interested. Thing of it as a μMVP :D

They have a list of customers at the bottom of their splash - this looks like its more than a weekend hack... They may just not have the infrastructure to support a widely available service yet.

You might notice that those are all YC companies also ;)

Re: Show HN: Heap is a new approach to analytics. Just capture everything

#183

Post by mp3geek »

huhtenberg wrote: post #48

Welcome to the blacklist. I, for one, very much object to all my clicks and "activity" on a page being captured and streamed down some black hole for god knows what purposes. Not to worry though - you are in a good company with all other analytics services out there. The only difference is that you are far more open (and proud?) about how obscenely intrusive your service is, so you get an honorary 2nd spot, right aft…

Taken care of..

https://hg.adblockplus.org/easylist/rev/b9b1e238ce62

https://hg.fanboy.co.nz/rev/786329f3c981

Re: Show HN: Heap is a new approach to analytics. Just capture everything

#184

Post by samstave »

goronbjorn wrote: post #182
samstave wrote: post #132

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They have a list of customers at the bottom of their splash - this looks like its more than a weekend hack... They may just not have the infrastructure to support a widely available service yet.

You might notice that those are all YC companies also ;)

HA! - No, I didn't notice that at all...

Good point, thus those customers might be "load test" and "POC" and not necessarily paying...

Re: Show HN: Heap is a new approach to analytics. Just capture everything

#185

Post by Samuel_Michon »

orangethirty wrote: post #177
Samuel_Michon wrote: post #159

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think that depends on what kind of conversion you're after. If you just want to harvest email addresses, then sure. If you're looking for satisfied paying customers, this kind of trickery won't work. If you build a button that promises something for free, you need to give something for free — free tier, 30 day trial, ebook, screencast, etc. Having visitors fill out an account form is not a gift to them, it's a gift…

The issue here is that I'm sharing findings from my own data. This is not me making stuff up. I have actually used this very same button text to increase conversions (up by .04% on a site with thousands of visitors). It was not used to harvest emails. A practice that simply does not work, unless you plan on sending Viagra ads. I don't do such things. If you build a button that promises something for free, you need to…

Thanks for your explanation. I think we have different definitions of what an 'account' is. For me, an account is in which a user shares his contact information (maybe also business & payment info). That in itself doesn't add value.

From your last comment, I gather that (to you) 'account' surmounts to 'access to the service or product'. If so, we agree.

When you apply for Costco membership, you get something in return: the chance to buy products for less than they would normally cost. I don't see how that translates to the example provided.

NB: I'm a publisher, marketer, editor, and designer. I develop software, but I'm not a programmer.

Re: Show HN: Heap is a new approach to analytics. Just capture everything

#186

Post by darkxanthos »

pc86 wrote: post #52
DodgyEggplant wrote: post #12

Poor man's analytics: events, client side, server side, whatever. Set up a separate DB with one big table, many columns for properties. One server call to write an event (a row), one ajax call to write from the client, throw it wherever you need. A bit of good old simple SQL for queries and reporting, and you are done.

I've often wondered about the efficacy of having a simple catch-all script that just tracks everything a user does on the site. I would think it would pound the database relentlessly under even modest load.

One trick is to not use a database but a flat text file. You can optimize for querying nightly.

Re: Show HN: Heap is a new approach to analytics. Just capture everything

#187

Post by reddiric »

I'm obviously outside of the audience this is for, and probably most other commenters since only one other person mentioned performance.

Perf??

And of course, this follows the "include a script tag to our server" cloud product web API pattern. This isn't setting off giant alarm-bells for anyone else? This gets past the sniff test?

The fact that this doesn't fail the sniff test for most people is probably why most web-apps feel like most web-apps feel, instead of like http://prog21.dadgum.com/.

Re: Show HN: Heap is a new approach to analytics. Just capture everything

#189

Post by orangethirty »

Samuel_Michon wrote: post #185
orangethirty wrote: post #177

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The issue here is that I'm sharing findings from my own data. This is not me making stuff up. I have actually used this very same button text to increase conversions (up by .04% on a site with thousands of visitors). It was not used to harvest emails. A practice that simply does not work, unless you plan on sending Viagra ads. I don't do such things. If you build a button that promises something for free, you need to…

Thanks for your explanation. I think we have different definitions of what an 'account' is. For me, an account is in which a user shares his contact information (maybe also business & payment info). That in itself doesn't add value. From your last comment, I gather that (to you) 'account' surmounts to 'access to the service or product'. If so, we agree. When you apply for Costco membership, you get something in retur…

I'm happy to be talking to another business dev. Shoot me an email. I love sharing data with others.

Re: Show HN: Heap is a new approach to analytics. Just capture everything

#190

Post by matm »

spyder wrote: post #148
nostromo wrote: post #124

Why do a HN launch with "request an invite"? This seems like a common anti-pattern.

Especially when there are better and a little cheaper alternatives. For example I don't see mouse move and scroll events in their demo so it's not "capture everything". For example http://clicktale.com or http://mouseflow.com can record mouse movements too and has better visualization using heatmaps instead just the list of elements clicked.

It's quite different. Clicktale and Mouseflow capture a similarly large volume of user data, but they do it at the expense of flexibly quantifying that data.

Most of their visualizations - while useful in their own right - are pre-built reports that serve a different role than the flexible reporting capabilities in Heap (and Google Analytics et al).

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