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The scourge of web analytics

stavros.io

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Re: The scourge of web analytics

#71

Post by StavrosK »

jackgolding wrote: post #70
StavrosK wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What's the difference between the two in how they affect load times? As far as I know, there's no clear delineation.

Between analytics tools and marketing? You are right by name nothing, however in general if you look in the network tab some on content sites (especially crappy slow ones) you will see ads and other pixels being loaded onto the site as time goes on. Leave certain sites for an hour and they will make hundreds of extra requests.

Oh, by marketing you mean ads and things like that? I thought you meant optimization tools like A/B testing and similar services.

Re: The scourge of web analytics

#72

Post by JohnTHaller »

skinnymuch wrote: post #25
JohnTHaller wrote: post #13

You can have a static button for "Share" on Facebook. I'm currently using static image buttons that allow you to Share on Facebook, Tweet on Twitter, Share on Google+, Share on LinkedIn and Share on StumbleUpon (should probably remove that one) on my personal site: http://johnhaller.com/ The code for Share on Facebook is (hoping HN doesn't mangle this): https://www.facebook.com/" onclick="windowpop(' https://www.face…

Genuine question since you mentioned probably removing StumbleUpon. Does anyone share with Google+?

It depends on your audience. There are more tech communities on Google+ than any other in my experience.

Re: The scourge of web analytics

#73

Post by jackgolding »

ramblerman wrote: post #54
jackgolding wrote: post #47

I've worked in web analytics for the last 4 years. It's a bit annoying that OP doesn't differentiate "analytics tools" and "marketing tools", nearly every site I've worked on doubles the site load speed due to some arcane synchronous-only loading iFrame. Server side seems like a good idea until you realise how many bots there are on the internet (which the business doesn't care about), how hard it is to implement (on…

Not to be rude, as I am genuinely interested in this area. But is there much more to it than adding a GA tracker and setting up the dashboard?

Depends on the role, the bad roles generally are just that (report monkey and a bit of project management around implementation.) The tooling is either Adobe analytics or Google analytics at most companies. There are 3 specialisations as I see it: data, outbound marketing and inbound marketing.

Data is to do with the limitations of GA and Adobe. Businesses want to use hit or session level data for segmentation, retargeting, personalisation and all the fancy machine learning stuff. This isn't easy to achieve with out of the box analytics tools so it requires a bit more data processing.

Inbound marketing is to do with conversion rate optimisation, SEO and UX. Questions like "is our left hand navigation better or worse than it was before?" aren't super easy to answer in a commercial context.

Outbound marketing is to do with return on marketing investment for paid advertising. Attribution modelling is a huge space which is VERY hard to figure out for a business.

Re: The scourge of web analytics

#74

Post by spiderfarmer »

vmateixeira wrote: post #68
spiderfarmer wrote: post #3

I fully agree on the social buttons but Google Analytics is so much more than just a statcounter. Goal tracking and segmentation are invaluable tools that I believe no other tool provides. And before you complain that 'spying on your users isn't needed to make money', try working at a large corporation. Things just don't work the way you (ideally) want to. You can only say "no" so many times before someone else steps…

If spying on your users is needed for a company to make money... maybe that company should shut down as obviously their producs/services are not needed on socienty anymore? I mean, something else really wrong must have happened in core business for this to be an actual issue.

I did not imply that large corporations solely exist because of using Google Analytics to gain insight into the value of their marketing efforts.

My point is this. If your company spends a couple million on online marketing / year, your boss will want to know if you're spending it wisely. And if it's your job to spend it wisely, effectively and report the results, good luck doing so without using tools like Google Analytics.

But regarding your opinion: I happen to know a couple of SMB's that do rely on online marketing to sell things they would not sell otherwise. They are good businesses with great customer service and experts in their field, but without the reach of online marketing they would indeed cease to exist, as their local market is just too small and their margins are under pressure from large retailers like Amazon.

Their margins don't allow for ineffective marketing campaigns and without insight they would fly blind. Are you saying they should just give up and leave the market to behemoths like Amazon? That's just stupid.

Re: The scourge of web analytics

#75

Post by zichy »

JohnTHaller wrote: post #13

You can have a static button for "Share" on Facebook. I'm currently using static image buttons that allow you to Share on Facebook, Tweet on Twitter, Share on Google+, Share on LinkedIn and Share on StumbleUpon (should probably remove that one) on my personal site: http://johnhaller.com/ The code for Share on Facebook is (hoping HN doesn't mangle this): https://www.facebook.com/" onclick="windowpop(' https://www.face…

Pop-ups? Don't be this guy.

Re: The scourge of web analytics

#76

Post by soared »

gator-io wrote: post #30

I could never understand why any ecommerce company would use GA. They are collecting your user's data for ad targeting. Well, guess what? They target ads to your users for competitor's products. You browse a site that has GA on it looking to buy a bike, then that user get hit with bike ads on other sites that host Google ads. Almost every site owner I've spoken to about this issue was unaware of it. Server side analy…

The benefit from using GA is enormous and the cost to implement is near-zero (for the company). The benefits you get vastly outweigh any potentially lost revenue.

Re: The scourge of web analytics

#77

Post by soared »

vmateixeira wrote: post #68
spiderfarmer wrote: post #3

I fully agree on the social buttons but Google Analytics is so much more than just a statcounter. Goal tracking and segmentation are invaluable tools that I believe no other tool provides. And before you complain that 'spying on your users isn't needed to make money', try working at a large corporation. Things just don't work the way you (ideally) want to. You can only say "no" so many times before someone else steps…

If spying on your users is needed for a company to make money... maybe that company should shut down as obviously their producs/services are not needed on socienty anymore? I mean, something else really wrong must have happened in core business for this to be an actual issue.

Is GA 'spying on users'? If so.. you should never go anywhere in public, never go shopping at a grocery store, etc. They all record everything that happens and analyze it to get similar amounts of data. Your bank tracks you way more (and sells all your data!).

Re: The scourge of web analytics

#78

Post by vmateixeira »

spiderfarmer wrote: post #74
vmateixeira wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If spying on your users is needed for a company to make money... maybe that company should shut down as obviously their producs/services are not needed on socienty anymore? I mean, something else really wrong must have happened in core business for this to be an actual issue.

I did not imply that large corporations solely exist because of using Google Analytics to gain insight into the value of their marketing efforts. My point is this. If your company spends a couple million on online marketing / year, your boss will want to know if you're spending it wisely. And if it's your job to spend it wisely, effectively and report the results, good luck doing so without using tools like Google An…

I apreciate the fact that you clarified your point of view, I clearly misunderstood.

A few things I would disagree regarding SMB's behaviour you describe (and I know myself a few of those too).

I believe they shouldn't try to play the same championship as Amazon alike behemoths. As you correctly said, they are usually short on margins and consequently marketing budget. Investing and trusting in marketing, event though not blindly, may not be the best move as they probably will never be able to compete with behemoths price/services. Which means you're already targeting a different market anyway. Great customer service and being experts in their field is where they should probably bet first in order to differenciate: Big corps don't have this. And they don't event care. This will most likely contribute to sustainable growth.

This said, I think it's pretty clear now what I think about behemoths ;) (I liked the term)

And I have nothing agains GA too.

(Also, sorry for the delay on the reply)

Re: The scourge of web analytics

#79

Post by vmateixeira »

soared wrote: post #77
vmateixeira wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If spying on your users is needed for a company to make money... maybe that company should shut down as obviously their producs/services are not needed on socienty anymore? I mean, something else really wrong must have happened in core business for this to be an actual issue.

Is GA 'spying on users'? If so.. you should never go anywhere in public, never go shopping at a grocery store, etc. They all record everything that happens and analyze it to get similar amounts of data. Your bank tracks you way more (and sells all your data!).

Sorry but that's completely off topic.. I never said that.

And yes, I'm aware of all of those.

Re: The scourge of web analytics

#80

Post by ionised »

soared wrote: post #77
vmateixeira wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If spying on your users is needed for a company to make money... maybe that company should shut down as obviously their producs/services are not needed on socienty anymore? I mean, something else really wrong must have happened in core business for this to be an actual issue.

Is GA 'spying on users'? If so.. you should never go anywhere in public, never go shopping at a grocery store, etc. They all record everything that happens and analyze it to get similar amounts of data. Your bank tracks you way more (and sells all your data!).

> Your bank tracks you way more (and sells all your data!).

In the US they might. It's not true everywhere.

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