IBM Expands Cloud Based Analytics for Smarter Commerce

Paul Lima     

I think it’s neat to see how companies are getting together in a consortium, if you will through IBM’s Coremetrics product.  Collectively, they allow any client that opts-into the program to view the aggregate averages within their industry.  Summary information is now being picked up in the press as an indication of how Black Friday went.  Pretty cool if you don’t have to share your information.  And that’s where the IBM Acquisition of DemandTek comes into play.

A sample dashboard from DemandTec

So this type of thinking helps companies competing in the digital marketplace to adapt to changes in consumer demands as they occur.  Companies that can quickly and effectively adjust their price points and product mixes in response to ever-shifting customer buying patterns will have a key competitive advantage in the era of mobile and social networks.

That’s why IBM’s acquisition of DemandTec this past Thursday will make the  Smarter Commerce initiative even more valuable to retailers and manufacturers of packaged consumer goods.  The San Mateo, California based DemandTec develops cloud-based analytics software that allows businesses to examine consumer buying data mined from both online and in-store sales.  DemandTec customers can use that information to quickly and accurately identify consumer trends, helping  them make better price, promotion, and assortment decisions.  And because DemandTec’s software is cloud-based, retailers and manufacturers can collaborate to make time-sensitive business decisions instantaneously.

A sample Coremetrics Dashboard

read more

10 Most Common Web Analytics Mistakes

Paul Lima     

So you want to know the most frequent questions I get about web analytics and online marketing? I’ve tried to present them here and answer a few of them so maybe I can save you, my clients and future prospects some time so we can get onto executing profitable campaigns.

1) Free analytics are good for my business and are just as good as paid ones

Coremetrics Platform offers more than Google Analytics

First, let me say, I like Google Analytics and Yahoo’s Analytics solutions. But Google Analytics was built for Google. It serves their interest, not yours.

This might be the most common myth out there, and possibly one of the most dangerous. First and foremost, to directly dispel this rumor, the truth is that enterprise analytics solutions offer levels of detail and capabilities that free solutions such as Google Analytics don’t. Although free solutions can be hacked to a certain extent to extend their capabilities, at the end of the day they fall far short of the paid solutions in providing meaningful reports to a diversified group of stakeholders. If for example you had any interest in tracking the video drop off rates, or immediately integrating custom analytics events, records or values with a recommendations engines, you can’t.

The Omniture Online Marketing Suite offers a platform to manage the online marketing discipline for sophisticated digital marketers.

Beyond capabilities alone, you also get a lot of important side benefits as well. First amongst them is accountability and support. With free solutions you’re not paying for anything, so you get a community of blogs and consultants, which we belong to actually. If you’re paying for a solution, and if for any reason it has a problem, we’ve got help from the analytics provider to get the job done.

With paid solutions you own your data and can integrate it seamlessly with PPC bid management platforms, multi-variate testing platforms, and a host of other add-ons and integrations like Salesforce, NetSuite, SugarCRM, email marketing solutions, ad-server networks and more.

The future of analytics is in an analytics suite approach, not in point solutions. Of course, if you want to own your own data from Google Analytics, they offer a license to purchase Urchin for approximately $3,400 (the company that Google acquired in 2004 that is today known as Google Analytics). The future of analytics isn’t more data, but instead the ability to act upon that data in an a fast, efficient, and measurable way. Free solutions will never offer the level of integrated optimization that paid solutions do, and due to the great competitive advantage that such features offer, a business should be wary of the risk that going “free” might entail. Bottom line: If your business relies on the internet, you should investigate using a paid analytics platform. I have seen cases where the answer is to stay on a free solution, but more often than not, it’s time to increase conversions and there’s too much at stake to penny pinch.

read more

Google Announces Analytics Premium

Paul Lima     

Google developed Google Analytics Premium around these pillars: more data, advanced tools, dedicated support and guarantees. Here’s a summary of what that covers:

• Extra processing power – increased data collection, more custom variables and downloadable, unsampled reports
• Advanced analysis – attribution modeling tools that allow you to test different models for assigning credit to conversions
• Service and support – experts to guide customized installation, and dedicated account management on call – all backed by 24/7 support
• Guarantees - service level agreements for data collection, processing and reporting

Introducing Google Analytics Premium

How much does Google Analytics Premium Cost?

About $150,000 according to sources close to the product.  It is a fixed annual fee and at the launch of the product can only be purchased in the United States, Canada and the UK.

Will Google Analytics stop improving the free version?

I think that every enhancement to the free version will be more closely reviewed and categorized as something that goes into the free vs the paid version.  So if I were the product manager at GA, I would really assess the ROI for various features and of course I would probably be prioritizing the technology roadmap on the product that’s getting the traction and resulting in revenues.  It’s my belief that Google Analytics data is used in assessing the cost of that company’s Price Per Click.  Those websites with the best conversion rates and lowest bounce rates are more likely to be rewarded with lower costs per click.  In other words, the assessment about where to place the efforts for feature enhancements may not be purely based on the revenue opportunity from GA Premium so it won’t be an easy decision for the Product Development teams about where to put their energy.

Will Google Analytics Premium really provide competition to Coremetrics and Adobe?

For some clients that don’t need a platform, it may, but for clients that need an online marketing platform, it shouldn’t.  Both the Coremetrics and Omniture platforms have a recommendations engine, integration with all of the pay per click platforms (not just the Google Adwords platform), integration with dozens (if not close to 100 now) email marketing vendors, CRM systems, landing page optimization platforms, ad-serving networks and many other solutions that sophisticated digital marketers need to acquire visitors, convert visitors and engage visitors.

Coremetrics purchased by IBM puts Web Analytics in the mainstream

Paul Lima      adobe, analytics, coremetrics, digital strategies, digital strategy consulting, emarketing, ibm, omniture, online marketing, online marketing consulting, online strategy

As I am out and about in front of big and small companies alike, I sometimes feel like it’s necessary to explain to even sophisticated marketers the importance of measuring the Return on Ad Spend (ROAS) using software tools such as Omniture’s Site Catalyst, or Google Analytics.  The recent Adobe acquisition of Omniture seemed to make my story more believable since a known name legitimized the market leader by rolling them into their core offering.  I’m excited to see how Adobe integrates the Omniture suite deeper into it’s product lineup.

And the consolidation continues.  IBM wants to get into the analytics game.  Accenture already has.  The IBM product called WebSphere is really a set of software tools that can be configured to put together highly personalized online user experiences.  Many if not all of the WebSphere websites are generally e-commerce websites and organizations that generally have enough inventory where business process and supply chain management are supported through sophisticated automation.   Coremetrics complements IBM’s existing software and services portfolio of offerings from WebSphere, information management and business analytics and optimization.  Coremetrics has about 230 employees and IBM agreed to maintain them, as was the case with the Omniture-Adobe acquisition.   read more