Web Analytics Management

cmf2007 - Web analytics meets web content management

Last week I was in Aarhus, Denmark for cmf2007, a great web conference put on by Janus Boye and his firm.

Janus was kind enough to invite me to give a tutorial about maximizing ROI from web analytics and present about Web 2.0 and web analytics.

This is the third year Janus and his team have put this conference on, and I'd have to say it's one of the best conferences I've ever attended...maybe second to our X Change conference. The reasons are easy to cite: smaller sessions, presentations that focused on creating an interaction with the audience, and great parties after each day that gave plenty of chance to talk, network, and relax.

Most of the 250 attendees were web content managers and web managers, with a number of Intranet managers thrown in. Analytics comprises only a part of their roles, which primarily center around content management activities.

Although there were many folks from Denmark, Finland and Sweden, there was also good representation from the UK and Germany.

While it makes a nice topic to discuss whether Europeans are ahead of North Americans in web analytics sophistication or vice versa, I found that people whom I spoke to have the same challenges as do web content managers and web site managers in the US: having the time and resources to figure out how to best use web analytics tools, trying to come up with metrics that help the business, and finding ways to show senior management that web analytics has a tactical and strategic business value.

The one difference I noted: a greater understanding and use of qualitative research, such as usability testing, surveys and focus groups by the Europeans.

California Dreamin' about Web Analytics

Ok, so I am a little wistful about Semphonic's first X Change conference in Napa last week. It seemed special...the conversation, the people, the location, the wine... To me it felt more like a gathering of the best and the brightest in web analytics and site measurement; more like a retreat than a conference. And as Gary explains so well in his blog, that was the vision of the event. The atmosphere was relaxed, the ideas were high charged and during the huddles there were lots of great takeaways...not just new knowledge, but inspirations around the process and practice of web analytics. It was the only conference I've attended where after a full day, I actually felt recharged instead of tired. 

I led an X Change huddle on the topic Focusing Senior Management on the Business Value of Web Analytics.

My group included analytics managers from American Express, O'Reilly Publishing, JP Morgan Chase, Intuit, Xilinx, HIMSS and WebMD. While many challenges were expressed, I'd say that the they could be grouped in 2 primary categories:

1. Obtaining funding and resources support
2. Creating compelling metrics for senior management

We discussed a number of ways to address the issues. Not surprisingly, web analytics practice takes a back seat to project management, communication and organizational political savvy as the way to best tackle the situation.

Developing your strategy for dealing with senior management is based on researching your organization...talking to people, asking questions, and understanding the culture.

Let's break this down into 7 key success actions:

1. Know your audience – understand what’s important to senior management. In most cases, you'll find that its all about the bottom line. That boils down to the following:
   • Making money
   • Saving money
   • Not losing money (i.e., avoid law suits and fines, fraud and theft detection, security)
   This is a pretty simple formula. Use this as a benchmark against all you do, and you'll be successful in making your case most of the time. I learned this in the early days of the Internet (1993), when convincing the company president that a dial up account to AOL was a good investment!
2. Know your environment- understand how information travels; is it presentations, documents, conversations, or the grapevine? The fact is even though you want to reach senior management, you need to conduct an information campaign directed to them directly, as well as at the grassroots level. Get a poster child success story that can generate grassroots buzz, as well as percolate to the top. While it's important to build processes, the success of any process is in getting cooperation and buy in from participants. With this in mind, do what you can to build your internal networks and relationships. It pays to make friends throughout the organization who you can rely on for favors and information. As one of my former managers told me, "To get things done, make sure you have friends in low places."
3. Get their requirements and buy in - find out what senior managers want to know; or do your research and make a proposal on what to analyze; get on the schedule to present in person. If you can't, then refer to Point #1.
4. Know your competition – what other information sources compete with analytics for senior management attention – it's best to cooperate and combine with other business intelligence sources within your organization. You can also discredit other data if it doesn't address business goals. For example, if senior management is fixated on page views, you'll need to educate them on the real value of analytics to the bottom line metrics.
5. Know how to tell a story – know company objectives and how they translate into operational decisions at your level. One of the key stumbling blocks in making analytics relevant is the disconnect that occurs between the lofty objectives for the organization and how these objectives get interpreted outside the executive suite. You need to demonstrate outcomes that relate to the company objectives; tell the story in language the managers understand, i.e., dollars and cents – money made and saved.
6. Present the data formally – create opportunities to give formal presentations; work through established channels such as advisory boards, steering committees, and web councils.
7. Present the data through grassroots methods – develop web analytics newsletters, memos, and user groups; conduct training for senior level managers to introduce them to the business value of analytics and why it is important – tell them how much they’re spending on the web; make sure that there are channels going from the bottom up, and that web analytics is credited as the source for data moving to senior managment.

If you manage analytics, you know that it's not simply an issue of getting key metrics understood by senior staff. Your success in communicating the importance of what you do will also yield bigger budgets, and more resources in good times...and help protect you against downsizing in bad times.