Digital Analytics for Marketing Professionals:

Marketing Analytics in Theory

Prof. Kevin Hartman

Module 2 ......................................................................................................................... 2

Lesson 2: The Basics Of Web Analytics, Part 1 .......................................................... 2

Lesson 2: The Basics Of Web Analytics, Part 2 .......................................................... 7

Lesson 3: An Introduction To Web Analytics Tools, Part 1 ........................................ 15

Lesson 3: An Introduction To Web Analytics Tools, Part 2 ........................................ 22

 Digital Analytics for Marketing Professionals:
Marketing Analytics in Theory
Prof. Kevin Hartman

Module 2
Lesson 2: The Basics Of Web Analytics, Part 1

All right, Lesson 2: "The Basics of Web Analytics". Here's what we'll see in this lesson
today. We will see that there are many sources of digital data today. We'll learn how
cookies and tags are used to collect and grab that information. We'll see that data
availability is inversely, unfortunately for us, related to, or correlated to the value of that
data. We'll also see that organizational size can really dictate what metrics and what
data is most appropriate for you in our marketing pursuits. And then finally, we will see
that data needs to be used responsibly during the analysis process.
 Digital Analytics for Marketing Professionals:
Marketing Analytics in Theory
Prof. Kevin Hartman

So what is web analytics? I love this quote from Eric Peterson. I love it for a number of
reasons, but here's a couple of those. In saying that web analytics is the assessment of
a variety of data to help create a generalized understanding of the visitor experience,
three things I want to call out. One is variety of data. As we are pursuing analytics, we
are not locking into a single data point. We are not locking into a single piece of
information and trying to make insights and decisions off of that. We are using a number
of data, a great store of information that we condense down certainly, but we are clearly
using a variety of data to get us to a decision point.

Second is a generalized understanding. No analyst, no matter how great, and no data,

no matter how wonderful it is, will give you a perfect complete understanding of a
situation or a consumer. You have to trust that the directional information that you are
getting is enough for you to make decisions on and that should be, for us, enough. And
then finally, is the use of visitor experience because at the end of the day that's what it's
all about, it is all about. Us and marketing, understanding that consumer, the experience
that they're having. Either that experience with a product of ours, interacting with the
brand that we own, or the experience that they're sharing with others, and getting an
understanding of what that is.
 Digital Analytics for Marketing Professionals:
Marketing Analytics in Theory
Prof. Kevin Hartman

The challenges that brands have are certainly many in web analytics. The primary one
though is managing and integrating data and that goes back to that definition, again a
variety of information. That is the most important piece of the things that we're doing
and integrated that certainly is a challenge in it's well reflected in this study by the
Aberdeen Group from just 2013.
 Digital Analytics for Marketing Professionals:
Marketing Analytics in Theory
Prof. Kevin Hartman

The sources of the information that we'll use are many, and Peterson does identify
several of them. Web traffic data reports, so reports on who's come to your website and
then what they've done in that online experience. Web server performance data, so just
volume of consumers that are coming in and reports on the server's ability to handle
that data. Web transactional report. So if you've got any commerce components,
certainly, as well as just any kind of actions that you want consumers to take on your
website, really do fit into this definition of transaction, and that's another source of data
for us. Usabilty studies.

So how consumers are interacting with your website, or how they're interacting with
your brand even offline, another very valuable source of information. And then finally,
what Peterson has called user-submitted information and related sources. Now this
definition, where he identified this type of data in 2004 as we saw from a previous
lesson, a lot has happened since that time. So this Information, this user submitted
information has grown to really include things like social media and other interactions
really rich vibrant pieces of data that are important for us that maybe in 2004 weren't so
much in the picture, but they certainly clearly are now.

How do brands, how do organizations collect Information, where there's really two
important actors. Cookies and tags. You've probably already head about these and I'm
just going to give you a pretty simple straightforward of what they are. Cookies are
basically a text file that sits on your desktop and allows a webpage to identify you. Think
of it as a name tag almost. It's something that says oh, I know who you are, and I can
use this piece of information to identify you. Tags, conversely, are pieces of code that
 Digital Analytics for Marketing Professionals:
Marketing Analytics in Theory
Prof. Kevin Hartman

do reach out and grab some information. There are ways that those tags can be
damaging, can be hurtful, and I think when people thing about different tags used in the
digital space. Those are some of the first things that come to mind, but rest assured that
tags are regulated. Tags are used by every organization out there collecting information
and it is a very valuable and vital way for marketers to learn about who a consumer is.

Think about you as a consumer with your online journey. As you move along you are
going to search sites you're looking at and maybe interacting with digital ads. You're
tapping into your social media group, all the while your whining up at websites. That's
really the different kind of social interactions or digital interactions that you're going to
have. Off of those interactions log files are created, and then that information is placed
into data bases, and then that's where people like you and me are able to make reports
from that data. As we've said, it's cookies and tags along the way that are collecting and
grabbing that information. You'll have cookies on your desktop when you first enter into
these, your online journey, and you're bringing that with you, but then the different
websites. Digital as you interact with, the different social media sites that you visit and
clearly the websites that you are on are using those cookies and tags to collect further
information and build their database understanding of who you are.
 Digital Analytics for Marketing Professionals:
Marketing Analytics in Theory
Prof. Kevin Hartman

Lesson 2: The Basics Of Web Analytics, Part 2

Peterson introduces a very interesting concept, and that's this pyramid model of web
data. And so basically what he said is at the bottom is availability, right, and that starts
with a great deal of availability, easy access to data, and then comes up to a pinnacle; a
very difficult to obtain, very more illusive information. Clearly as you move up that scale
from something that is very readily available to something that is much more exclusive
the value of that data becomes more and more and more, and some examples that he'll
use are hits, page views, visits kind of at the low to mid-range of increasing value up to
unique visitors, and then finally uniquely identified visitors as the most important piece
of data available to marketers.

This becomes very interesting when you layer in the different sources of data that we
just talked about a few slides ago, and you can get that same idea of availability and
value for those sources; it looks like this: Web traffic data, web server performance data
kind of at the bottom of the pyramid; very available to you, maybe not so insightful,
maybe not such valuable information. As you move up though into web transactional
data, usability studies, and then finally as we talked about this user submitted
information, related sources; that becomes very very valuable pieces of information for
you as a marketer. The problem for us is that it becomes harder and harder to find, but
what we'll be talking about in this course is sort of some of those approaches that let
you get to that data.
 Digital Analytics for Marketing Professionals:
Marketing Analytics in Theory
Prof. Kevin Hartman

One way that you can think about what information is important to me in my
organization is just to step back and look at your organizational size. The resources that
you have as well as the challenges, marketing challenges that you're going to face or
the opportunities that you had before you are probably dictated by the size of your
organization. If you're a small organization, you've got one set of challenges. As you
move through size and become a large organization those challenges are going to
change as well as the resources that you have available to invest in the collection and
analysis of information. So it only makes sense that the metrics that you're going to use
or find very important to you will change dependent upon what size your organization is.
 Digital Analytics for Marketing Professionals:
Marketing Analytics in Theory
Prof. Kevin Hartman

So let's take a quick look at some of those. A small organization probably most
concerned with acquisition, and here are three metrics important to measuring
acquisition. Cost per acquisition- So the cost that you are investing as a brand into the
digital programs you're creating divided by the number of new customers that you
actually acquire. A good measure of how efficient as well as how effective you are in
collecting new customers, click through rate- A pretty standard measure of the
effectiveness of web advertising; how many consumers actually see that. Either search
ads, search link, or display ad, and then click on it and do the actions that I want them
to; that's expressed as a percentage. Percent new visits- Is another very important
acquisition measure, and that's basically looking at of all the people showing up who are
showing up for the first time? Who are those people who are coming to my site who I
haven't had a relationship with, but I now have the ability to turn into customers for my
brand?
 Digital Analytics for Marketing Professionals:
Marketing Analytics in Theory
Prof. Kevin Hartman

As a medium-size business, you'll have another set of metrics that are important to you.
In here you're probably advancing on to consumer behavior and getting a better idea of
what that is. Bounce rate is one of those metrics, and it's basically looking at what
percent of consumers come to my site and then bounce right off of it. They don't
interact. They don't go to any other pages. They hit my web page and then they leave
right away and go off to something else. Page depth is the opposite of that. It's
measuring how deep consumers go through my web experience. How many pages did
they actually see, which is a good measure of how long they stayed with me in my
digital experience.

Loyalty another somewhat self-explanatory measure of how frequently are people

coming back to my site. How loyal are they to me and my brand. Events per visit, which
if you think about what you want consumers to do on your website you probably have a
number of actions that are good that you've identified as these are things I want
consumers to do. Events per visit basically measures how many of those they do in that
session in that time that they are with you. And then check out abandonment rate is
another very important measure of behavior, particularly for someone who's selling
things online; it's basically looking at what percent of consumers begin the checkout
process by putting something into their cart online and then don't finish it, don't actually
buy that product. The behavior you're looking at there is how many consumers am I
taking from in P&G's promise that first moment of truth and then converting into a
customer.
 Digital Analytics for Marketing Professionals:
Marketing Analytics in Theory
Prof. Kevin Hartman

Large organizations probably take these measures even a step further beyond just
acquisition, beyond just basic consumer behaviors, and now into outcomes in a couple
metrics that can be used there very effectively. One is the macro conversion rate; it's
basically looking at how many consumers came in, and how many did I convert into
customers. It's my conversion rate at a very macro sense. Micro conversion rate takes a
finer view of that data. What it's looking at is not only how many I turned into customers
from visitors, but if I had said here are different events that I want them to do that lead
along the path to sales, how many of those events did they actually conduct? How
many of those predefined goals that I've set did I achieve with that consumer? Per visit
goal value then is somewhat related.

That not only takes a look at this micro conversion rate, but then assigns a value to the
different steps. If one of the steps is I want them just to come to my website; if a second
step is I want them to download a piece of literature that I have out there; if a third step
is I want them to sign up for some email marketing program that I run I can assign a
value to each of those different activities, and then this metric will give me a sense for
how much I am maximizing or optimizing that value when consumers are coming to my
site.

Days to conversion is sort of a loyalty metric, but looks at the time, the amount of time
in-between visits or purchases made by consumers with me online. And then a very
sophisticated metric, percent assisted conversions, which looks at all the marketing
activity that I am doing that I have out there today. How are they influencing customers
that come to my site and then make a purchase? Was it my banner ad that drove them
 Digital Analytics for Marketing Professionals:
Marketing Analytics in Theory
Prof. Kevin Hartman

there? Was it the video that I put out online? All the things that I am doing to proactively
reach consumers; how-- what kind of impact are they having on the customers that I'm
interacting with?

So those are the steps. Those are the metrics that are really important, and a good idea
for you to get a good sense of those basic metrics there as you're beginning your
journey into analytics. And again, based on what size organization you are with, or you
are analyzing those metrics are going to change because your resources are different
and the challenges, frankly, that you're going to face are a little bit different. Now all that
information is very vital for us, right, and very important to the analysis that we're doing.
 Digital Analytics for Marketing Professionals:
Marketing Analytics in Theory
Prof. Kevin Hartman

But you have to take an attitude as you're beginning your analytics journey that will
allow you to come out with solid insights that do actively reflect the analysis that you are
conducting. This quote by Edward Tufte I think does a great job of kind of touching on
some of the dangers that are available to analysts today reads like this. "Some studies,
in the words of one critic, "use statistics as a drunk uses a street lamp for support rather
than illumination." You do not want to be that drunk leaning against your data output just
as a means of justifying or supporting some argument that you've made. You must enter
your analysis with an open mind, flexibility in the ability to go any which way that they
data points you, and that is really what Edward Tufte is talking about here.
 Digital Analytics for Marketing Professionals:
Marketing Analytics in Theory
Prof. Kevin Hartman

So that's lesson two. Let's recap quickly and look at what we discussed and what we
learned today. We learned that there are many sources of digital data accessible and
available to you as an analyst today. We learned that cookies and tags are two ways
that companies and brands are using to actually collect that information and grab that
information online. We've learned that the data availability, and the value of that data is
inversely correlated or negatively correlated; the more available data is probably the
less valuable it really is to you. Organizational size is one way to determine what
metrics and what data is important. And then finally, data must be used responsibly.

Again, to the Edward Tufte quote, it's something that you must enter in analyses with an
open mind and fairly doing or being willing to do whatever the data is saying to you and
pointing to you rather than arriving with an agenda that you're looking to support. A little
bit of supplemental reading to this lesson just to further your understandings, chapter
two of Peterson's work we'll talk about a lot of the things that we've discussed here
today in more detail. Chapters three and four we'll get into some of that terminology and
actually introduce you to whole another set of metrics that are important. Great article
that just came out recently that talks about super cookies and the use of them as a
collection method; getting back to our discussion on cookies and tags, and then finally a
really good discussion of metrics that can be used in digital analytics to reach decisions
and to reach insights.
 Digital Analytics for Marketing Professionals:
Marketing Analytics in Theory
Prof. Kevin Hartman

Lesson 3: An Introduction To Web Analytics Tools, Part 1

Okay, Lesson 3, An Introduction to Web Analytics Tools. Five things you will learn in
this lesson. One is that there are three main categories of marketing analytics out there
today. Second is that the right tool that you choose for your analytics needs is going to
depend on your resources and those needs that you have. Third thing is that there are
enough free tools out there to make any analyst formidable. Even with the most meager
resources. Next is that new tools are always just a search away. This industry, this is
growing very quickly and rapidly and changing. A quick web search will reveal all the
great new tools that have popped up around you. And then finally, very importantly no
tool is ever as important as the analyst behind that tool. So like I've said and like we've
seen, there are countless tools out there to help you conduct web analytics.
 Digital Analytics for Marketing Professionals:
Marketing Analytics in Theory
Prof. Kevin Hartman

And so we need a way to think about and segment this market. The way I like to do it is
to think about how much data is going to pour through that tool or what I'm going to use
it for. And when you think of it that way, the market really breaks into three different
types of tools. Enterprise packages, which are big powerful solutions that handle lots
and lots of data, real dense capabilities there. Point solutions, a little less information
density it can handle but still very very strong in its own right. And finally, on the low-
data density side of the scale, analysis gadgets. Let me spend a little bit of time talking
about each of those are.
 Digital Analytics for Marketing Professionals:
Marketing Analytics in Theory
Prof. Kevin Hartman

The enterprise packages you've certainly heard from. They come from some of the most
recognized names in marketing analytics. You've got comScore, Adobe, IBM, Google
Analytics with the paid version of its product there. These are very strong, as I've said,
very powerful enterprise packages that do a great amount of web analytics capabilities.
Really, anything that you would want a system to do, these products can do. Here's the
downside to those things is that they all carry about a six-figure price tag with each of
them with the implementation and then the subscription to the analytics they do. Now, if
you're part of an organization that has this enterprise or a enterprise package installed
that's great. You've got access to a great amount of information, but that's not clearly
going to fit everyone. So let's look at a more affordable solution to our analytics
problems. And if you've just got a single objective or challenge that you're trying to go
out and a chase, a point-solution is a very valuable and viable solution.
 Digital Analytics for Marketing Professionals:
Marketing Analytics in Theory
Prof. Kevin Hartman

So say you want to do multivariate A/B testing, which is checking how two or more
creative executions are operating, and which one is performing better. Or if you're doing
attribution modeling, which is really taking a very sophisticated look at your marketing
and collecting all the different interactions and all the channels that you are operating in
and determining the relative impact of each. Or site optimization, just tracking how
consumers are interacting with your website. That kind of flow that they're engaging in
and how you improve that experience for them. Or media optimization, again,
determining what media works and what does not work in your marketing mix.
 Digital Analytics for Marketing Professionals:
Marketing Analytics in Theory
Prof. Kevin Hartman

For each of those types of challenges, there are a whole host of companies out there
that provide very successful solutions to those problems, not as expensive, certainly, as
an enterprise solution, but still some investment typically required to get those point
solutions installed and get them running. Once you have them, they are great founts of
data and great -- very valuable to the analytics that you're going to be running. But
again, that's probably not everyone able to even afford a point solution.
 Digital Analytics for Marketing Professionals:
Marketing Analytics in Theory
Prof. Kevin Hartman

So let's look at some, what I will call now it says gadgets that are out there. And they do
have a variety of different things from clickstream analysis, very similar to the capability
that we just talked about, which is watching consumers on your website, how they're
interacting with you and how you might optimize that flow. To outcomes analysis,
looking at factors that contribute to some kind of outcome if that's sales or some other
thing that you're wanting to look at. Voice of the customer, a very important analytics
technique collecting information, primary information from consumers and their thoughts
on your brand or the products that you have or whatever it is you want to ask them
about. Experimentation/testing, similar to A/B testing. Again, looking at different things
that you're putting out into the market and how they are performing. Competitive
intelligence is another area of analytics that is very important, collecting information on
your competitors.
 Digital Analytics for Marketing Professionals:
Marketing Analytics in Theory
Prof. Kevin Hartman

For each of those basic capabilities, and then throw in some more emerging analytic
capabilities, there are free to very low-cost solutions out there for you. These gadgets,
you can find them online. Some of them require you to sign up to -- with an email
subscription. Others don't require anything at all. Some of the do have some costs on
the usage, on a use-base model. Others are completely free entirely. As an analyst, you
need to understand these tools. You need to go out there and find which ones are right
for you, which ones provide the information that you need, which ones are you
comfortable investing in to round out your capabilities.
 Digital Analytics for Marketing Professionals:
Marketing Analytics in Theory
Prof. Kevin Hartman

Lesson 3: An Introduction To Web Analytics Tools, Part 2

As we saw earlier, one way that you can think about differentiating those different
capabilities, determining what is important to you could very well be your size of
organization. Small organizations are going to have different needs from medium
organizations and again, different needs from large organizations. And based on what
organization you are a part of, whether it's clickstream [phonetic] analysis all the way to
competitive intelligence, probably take on some relative value for you. For a small
organization, clickstream analysis, outcomes analysis, and voice of the customer are
three, very important in that order probably, different analytic techniques that you'll want
to master. Medium organizations probably a little more focused on behaviors and
outcomes.

So let's start with outcomes. Go to clickstream analysis, voice of the customer, and then
experimentation and their relative value. Large organizations, a much more
sophisticated view and many more resources that they can apply to data collection and
investment. So voice of the customer is probably what is most important to them.
Outcomes next. Clickstream, experimentation then finally competitive intelligence. Now
that's not to say that the other analytic capabilities are not important to you. It's just to
say based on your size of organization, you probably have a pretty distinct set of needs
and the different analytics capabilities that we've talked about fill those needs.
 Digital Analytics for Marketing Professionals:
Marketing Analytics in Theory
Prof. Kevin Hartman

But regardless of who you are, there are some that you really should get a good sense
of using because they're not only tremendously valuable, they are tremendously
affordable and any analyst can have access to them. I'm going to profile the Google
ones that I'm familiar with right now. And as I said, these are vital tools in your analysis
chest. Things that you should get a good working understanding of.
 Digital Analytics for Marketing Professionals:
Marketing Analytics in Theory
Prof. Kevin Hartman

Google Trends is a tool that will look at search topic and volume over time. So you get a
sense for what are -- what consumers are interested in and how those interests in
different terms, search terms, have either fallen or risen over time. Correlate takes that
a step further. It takes a single search term and then will report what other terms
consumers are interested in or curious about in conjunction with that term. So it gives
you a sense for some context around that search term. And a very important piece of
information for you as a marketer to know how consumers are thinking about a search
term or some topic.

Not just how frequently or how much they're thinking about it. Think Insights is a great
resource with all sorts of information on marketing trends, industry data, different
insights that have come out of research from Google. And that's all free. Came out of a
simple url. And then finally, Consumer Surveys is a very intuitive, very powerful voice of
customer collection tool. That is very affordable. There may be some expense to it but it
is something that every analyst, if they're looking for a solution to collect information
from their customers or people who look like their customers, consumer surveys is a
great tool to do that.

Now as I've said, there are tools coming in. New tools popping up and being introduced
all the time. Simple web search is an easy way to find them. And enter in these words
that I've just -- that I popped in earlier. Free social media analytics tools. And you will
see dozens, if not hundreds of tools come up that you can use for free or for very limited
investment and start collecting social media and other value, valuable digital data right
away.
 Digital Analytics for Marketing Professionals:
Marketing Analytics in Theory
Prof. Kevin Hartman

So those are tools but what is important for us to understand is while the tools are very
valuable and vital to the work we're doing, no tool is ever as important as analyst. And
that's summed up in this quote here by Avinash. No tool would be useful unless you had
a Michelle or an Amir or Enrique or Sasha who understands your business and has the
drive to use the tool intelligently to deliver actionable insights. And that's so true. The
tool's going to do a great job of identifying information and collecting that data for you.
Even probably conducting some analysis for you and maybe even dusting off some
insights but without the context of understanding the business, without the assurance
that the information that you collected and put into the tool is solid, that insight is not
going to be valuable. Never underestimate the importance and the value of the role that
you, the analyst, play behind that tool.
 Digital Analytics for Marketing Professionals:
Marketing Analytics in Theory
Prof. Kevin Hartman

So that sums up Lesson 3. Let's talk about things that we saw here. So we saw that
there are three main categories of marketing analytics tools that exist today. We saw
that the right tool, the one that is appropriate for you will depend on not only your
organizational side and the resources that you have but also the needs that you have
going into the analysis. We saw that there are bountiful amounts of free tools out there
to make any analyst formidable. And that new tools, even though this market is moving
very quickly, are always just a search away. Very easy to find. And finally, summed up
by that great quote by Avinash. No tool is ever as valuable as the analyst. A little bit of
supplemental information in reading that you can do to get deeper on some of these
topics include the chapters 5 through 9 in Peterson's book to give you even more
information about the tools that we talked about. Avinash's blog posts where he does a
great evaluation of significant web analytics tools that are out thee. And then 10
fundamental truths about web analytics. Again, another blog post by Avinash to really
get your mind right and let you understand or convey for you the role of the tool relative
to the analyst.