Web Analytics: An Hour a Day [With CDROM]

One of the first things that impressed me about this book was the fact that it went beyond what I was expecting to read: how to better read analytics dashboards. What I found was a sophisticated and marketing-oriented book that teaches how to use the available data to create a clear picture of return on investment in the online world. This is more than your typical programming book, this is a marketing book. Kaushik does a great job with the format. As is the fact with any subject you are committed to knowing, reading the information and applying it in small pieces is the best way to learn. The bulk of the content is arranged by subject and segmented into daily readings allowing you to focus and build upon the knowledge one brick at a time. The book is easy to read, full of practical application, and one that will be tattered, bookmarked, and referenced often.

Avinash Kaushik focuses on the key issue: the visitors. Learn what your visitors want and then give it to them. Use analytics, competitive intelligence, and user polls to find out. Many sites focus only on customers (the ones who actually buy) and pretty much ignore the remaining visitors (who make up 60-80% of the traffic). By looking at visitors, you can improve the overall experience, and very likely the conversion rate as well. Avinash's book is far away the best book on analytics. He has solid experience in using analytics tools at large companies. He also has a degree in engineering and an MBA, so he understands both the technical and the business aspects. The book is a solid presentation of how to use analytics to establish and reach business goals. As you've figured out by now, analytics is not about tracking URLs or auto-generated reports. It's business. For Kaushik, there are three main strategies: discover the visitors' intentions, compare your website against benchmarks, and use analytics. The first item is to understand your visitors. Learn what they want. Find out what they are seeking at your website. It's a mistake to focus on conversions; at best only 20-30% of your visitors will convert. If you concentrate on them, you're ignoring 70% of your visitors. To learn their intentions, ask them. Add polls and surveys at your site. Avinash offers several questions to ask your visitors: What are you looking for at our website? Were you able to complete your task? If you were unable to complete your task, please explain why. How can we improve our website to make it more useful for you? The second item is comparison with your competitors: how are you doing in your industry. It's very nice to say that you have two million monthly visitors, but... compared to your top competitors, is that low? If they're getting one to two million visitors per month, then you're fine. But if they're getting 50 million monthly visitors, you're in trouble. So, find out. Avinash describes two services for competitive information and the features of each. You can find out your competitor's traffic share, level of activity, conversion rates, demographics, and so on. Other tools let you compare the amount of traffic for you and your top competitors. It's all in the book. The third step is analytics. There is so much useful content in this book that I can't give a short summary. Avinash has solid experience in setting up KPIs and dashboards for dozens of companies and you'll learn how to do this. He describes what is useful, how it matters, and how to use it. He tells you why you should avoid real-time reporting. A major issue in analytics is the soft numbers. Computers and the web gave us the promise of fully-trackable activity. Web analytics itself implies accurate measurement of data. This turned out to be an illusion. Nearly all of our clients are unaware that the numbers are off by as much as 30%. This is caused by a number of factors: the various analy

We here at the ISG media & analytics team have been anxiously awaiting the publication of Avinash Kaushik's book, Web Analytics: An Hour A Day, since we first "met" Avinash at a webinar back in February. Avinash's passion for web analytics was evident throughout the webinar, and we've been subscribers to his blog, Occam's Razor, ever since. Web analytics is an important part of what we do at ISG. Years of experience in online marketing has reinforced the idea that there's no point in having a website, microsite, or campaign page if you have no idea how it's performing. That's why Avinash's book is a must read for anyone involved in Internet marketing. His book is a great read for anyone from the director of media & analytics to senior analyst to summer intern. Whether you are involved in complex decision-making and web strategies or are looking at conversion rates to provide actionable insights, this book is great for people of all levels of experience, while providing a fresh look at web analytics. The book is "a step-by-step guide to implementing a successful web analytics strategy." It is meant to be enjoyed over a span of eight months, but you can read it as quickly or slowly as you like. We here at ISG are sharing a couple of copies between us and are relishing each page as we read, so what follows is a summary of the book based on what we've read and reviewed so far. The book is divided into four parts: Part I: Foundation Part II: Trinity Approach Part III: Implementing Your Web Analytics Plan Part IV: Advanced Web Analytics "Data in your DNA" Part I gives a brief history of web analytics, which makes this book perfect for someone just starting out in the field. Avinash takes the time to describe all the metrics that can be analyzed, how they are derived, and how they are useful for web analytics. He focuses not only on the "what" but on the "why" and proposes a new framework called the Integrated Trinity Platform. Part I (19 pages in total) is chock full of information that will give you the background you need for starting your web analytics study or, if you are experienced in the field, propose a new way to think about the role your job plays in your company. There's also a bonus CD with 5+ hours of podcasts for your listening pleasure, a 45-minute video presentation, PowerPoint presentations, and other useful web analytics resources. And at the end of the book, Avinash directs the reader to two companion websites so that they may continue on their web analytics journey. The best part about this book is that it is written by someone who is so passionate about web analytics that he is voluntarily receiving no profit from his book: 100% of the proceeds will be donated to the Smile Train and Medecins Sans Frontieres (Doctors Without Borders).

Just received my copy. Having read many great books on web analytics in past years, it immediately jumped out at me how every single page in this book speaks to the fact that the author is a practitioner with direct responsibility for giving love and attention to metrics. Anyone who wants to put themselves into the shoes of a real web analyst will find 400+ pages of insights that can be turned into gold. For example, the "three layers of so what". As such the book is severely UNDERpriced. For just a handful of dollars the reader reaps the lifetime learnings that the author has accumulated from working the web analytics trenches. I whole heartedly recommend.

'Web Analytics: An Hour a Day' describes in an absorbing and insightful way the most important topics for a Web Analyst or any professional related to the management of a website. Topics covered include: basic terminology, tool selection/implementation, online segmentation, conversion rates improvement, competitive analysis, and many others. The Business trinity, created by Avinash, is a very powerful business process that can radically improve the performance of online efforts. It is also the spirit of the book. Avinash describes the trinity as follows: "The goal of the Trinity mindset is to power the generation of actionable insights. Its goal is not to do reporting. Its goal is not to figure out how to spam decision makers with data. Actionable Insights & Metrics are the uber-goal simply because they drive strategic differentiation and a sustainable competitive advantage (...) The Trinity mindset empowers you to Understand the customer experience so explicitly that you can influence the right customer behavior which will lead to win-win outcomes for the company and its customers." The book is indispensable to those who want to understand and practice the art and science of web analytics. It is organized in a very friendly way, turning the reading into a pleasant break amid the rush of day-to-day duties; like a challenging conversation. It is rich in examples, facilitating the understanding of the `what', `how', and `why' of online measurement strategies. I have profited from Avinash's writings in various situations; the practical advices given in the book are clear and bring great results. I warmly recommend reading this book and following the author's blog.