Web Analytics Management

Has Digital Analytics Made it into the Digital Production Lifecycle?

Continuing on with Part 5 of this year's Profiles in Analytics - Does Web Governance Drive Analytics...or get the whole analysis, survey data and digital analytics profiles at Semphonic.

Has Digital Analytics Made it into the Digital Production Lifecycle?

For all of the aspirations on how to create digital cultures and data driven organizations, when it gets down to basics, simply making sure that data collection occurs is a back burner issue. While Web governance oriented organizations may have processes in place and top down commitment to ensure that analytics is part of the development cycle, that it is only at around 60 percent says that there is room for improvement.

While non-governance organizations have roughly the same compliance, that there is such a high level of dissatisfaction with the process of implementing code changes, tells you something about an underlying issue that can sabotage whether accurate data is available when senior leadership wants to use it for appraising the role of the digital channel.

The Details

It stands to reason that organizations with established Web governance have more formalized processes around production of new content and applications for the digital channel, than organizations that don’t have strong governance.

Web development process. Nearly twice the number of organizations with governance includes digital analytics in the process “all the time” versus those that don’t, as seen in the chart below. Still, at 25 percent, there is clearly more work that needs to be done in this area. Interestingly, once you combine “all” and “most” of the time responses, you get roughly 60 percent in all organizations.

The research shows that there is still a great deal of work that needs to be done in the area of integrating analytics to the digital development process. While there is an increasing amount of project management best practices aligned with enabling analytics, analytics itself is often implemented after a project has launched. With the advent of mobile applications and social media initiatives, there are new opportunities for using analytics, and at the same time a repeat of the poor practices that have left analytics out of the fixed Web development process.

Implementing data collection code changes. The research showed the biggest difference between governance and non-governance when dealing with the process for implementing changes to data collection code, as seen in the chart below.

Anecdotal research tell us that the application of data collection code, considered to be the least glamorous element of analytics, to be a universal and significant hold up in the analytics process.  Because there are often other projects in the queue ahead of analytics, or analytics is considered expendable if content or applications need to meet a deadline for launch, data collection coding may be held up for weeks and even months in certain organizations.  

The “not acceptable” level of satisfaction among organizations without governance is a situation that if addressed, could show immediate improvements to the availability of analytics and potential value of metrics created with the data.

Next week: So, will Web governance make your digital analytics program run faster, jump higher and make you smarter?

Get the entire research at Semphonic.

Are Web Governance Oriented Organizations “Better” at Using Digital Analytics?

Continuing on with Part 4 of this year's Profiles in Analytics - Does Web Governance Drive Analytics...or get the whole analysis, survey data and digital analytics profiles at Semphonic.

Are Web Governance Oriented Organizations "Better" at Using Digital Analytics?

Enterprise Web governance may contribute to high quality digital analytics for the enterprise, but it does not guarantee success. At the same time, lack of enterprise Web governance doesn’t necessarily doom an analytics initiative to failure. However, programs seem to stop short on delivering all that they can deliver. 

In both cases, analytics programs appear to be primarily centralized entities that focus on dashboard development, reporting, providing analysis and recommendations.  While there is service to multiple stakeholders, the lack of time dedicated to training, encouraging self service and creating analytics standards that may be used throughout the organization fosters a somewhat isolated digital analytics culture. So, while multiple stakeholders are potentially served through distribution of reports, the value of what’s being conveyed in the reports may or may not be understood.

The Details

If you serve more stakeholders more efficiently does this mean that you are providing a high quality analytics product? Perhaps, but not necessarily. This is like saying that a Super Size meal is better than a 4 oz filet mignon. Quantity doesn’t mean quality.

To determine the level of quality, the research focused on three elements:

• Digital analytics program priorities of digital analytics managers
• Whether the program priorities were in line with senior management
• Priority tasks of the digital analytics teams

Top priorities.  In looking at alignment in priorities between digital analytics managers and their management, it appears there is actually more alignment among those in organizations without Web governance councils.

 

 

It is altogether positive that there is fairly strong agreement between digital analytics managers and senior management that the primary mission is delivering recommendations and analysis, even if it is not completely equivalent.

There is a fairly strong sentiment among senior leadership around the importance of developing dashboards and reports in organizations that have Web governance. This suggests that there are a number of senior leaders who believe that success in analytics is based on getting reports into as many peoples’ hands as possible. 

But there is more to this story…

Top tasks. When asked about the tasks the analytics team spends the most time on, there is an interesting disconnect from the goals and perceptions described previously…the prominence of implementation and maintenance of the analytics tools, as seen below.

 

Neither Web analytics managers nor senior leadership wants to consider that this is a top priority. However, lack of recognition of the importance of this task is akin to driving a car and not wanting to get it serviced regularly. Negligence can catch up in a number of ways. In the scenario of mutual denial, analytics teams may not have sufficient resources to provide more valuable insight from analytics.  However, the question is whether they make the business case to request these resources. Conversely, senior leadership may not be aware of the amount of time and effort required to maintain and improve the Web analytics implementation.

Finishing among the top three tasks analytics teams spend their time on, and what also doesn’t show up as a priority is “conducting ad hoc analysis.”

Like implementation and maintenance tasks, there would be agreement that this would not be a priority; however, because so much time is spent on this task, it takes away from potentially other more valuable tasks. It is worth noting that organizations without Web governance indicated that their team spends more time on this than any other task. However, this activity actually occurs more often as a second and third task than non-Web governance organizations.  Reasons for this can range from positive to negative: a focus on conducting deep dive analyses, “drive by” requests, weak or non-existent request management and evaluation process, or a need to improve quality and distribution of dashboards.

Regardless of whether the organization is driven by Web governance or no not, the tasks that could potentially drive high value throughout the enterprise are given the lowest priority among both Web analytics teams and senior leadership. These tasks also get the least amount of analytics team attention:

• Train and educate on the use of analytics
• Provide strategic direction on the use of analytics
• Create organizational analytics standards
• Developing culture of self-service analytics

Next week: Has Digital Analytics Made It into the Mainstream of the Digital Production Lifecycle?

Get the entire research at Semphonic.

Does Web Governance Encourage More Efficient Operation of Digital Analytics?

Continuing on with Part 3 of this year's Profiles in Analytics - Does Web Governance Drive Analytics...or get the whole analysis, survey data and digital analytics profiles at Semphonic.

Does Web Governance Encourage More Efficient Operation of Digital Analytics?

Digital analytics teams in organizations with Web governance appear to be more efficient in serving a larger stakeholder base than those that are in organizations without Web governance. While staff size appears to be somewhat smaller in Web governance oriented organizations, there appears to be slightly more management expertise.  The experience of digital analytics team management coupled with overall organization Web governance could contribute to a more process oriented approach to serving stakeholders. This would enable more stakeholders to benefit from the use of digital analytics services.

In addition, stronger management of digital analytics teams could also lead to a tighter definition of roles and responsibilities within the team. This could foster greater specialization among team members that could be manifest in more efficient completion of tasks.

The Details

Digital analytics teams in Web governance-oriented enterprises appear to serve more stakeholders than those organizations without Web governance.  As indicated in the chart below, digital analytics teams in organizations with governance appear to serve more stakeholders in all categories except one.

Of course, some of the difference in stakeholders served can be attributed to organization size…larger organizations have more stakeholders. However, the research suggests that the influence of Web governance on staff size and management experience also plays a role in how many stakeholders are served.

Analytics staff size. Organizations with Web governance had twice the percentage of large staffs with 10 or more people. However, these enterprises actually had smaller staffs than did organizations without Web governance in the mid-range (2-10 staff size).

Digital analytics management experience. From a title perspective, managing a digital analytics team is largely a middle management function, with Director and Manager the most frequently indicated titles.

However, it is in the area of both analytics and management experience where there are potentially significant differences between teams in organizations with and without Web governance.

Organizations with Web governance tend to have managers with more management experience than analytics experience. Organizations without Web governance tend to have managers with more analytics experience than management experience.  A significant plurality of organizations, 30 percent, has managers with both ten and more years of analytics and management experience.

This overweighting of technical and management experience appears logical in context with the characteristics of the types of digital analytics teams one finds in large and Web governance-oriented organizations vs. those that are smaller and not inclined to Web governance. Managers in large organizations appear to be more involved with  strategic and operational functions; in smaller organizations with less staff, managers are in a more practitioner/manager role.

Is there an approach that works better? If there is an organizational strategy to scale analytics across the enterprise, than having more experienced managers who know how to manage programs and staff and are comfortable interfacing with senior leadership makes sense.

 

Next week: Are Web Governance Oriented Organizations "Better" at Using Digital Analytics?

Get the entire research at Semphonic.

Does Web Governance Drive Digital Analytics?

Continuing on with Part 2 of this year's Profiles in Analytics - Does Web Governance Drive Analytics...or get the whole analysis, survey data and digital analytics profiles at Semphonic.

Larger Organizations Invest in Web Governance

By their nature, large organizations recognize the need to invest in operations governance as a means to manage processes and people efficiently.  Web governance is a natural extension of a governance culture that already exists.  Smaller organizations tend to have less process and a flatter management structure. The concept of Web governance may run counter to how the organization approaches overall operational processes. In addition, as smaller organizations tend to run leaner from a staff perspective, they may not have the resources to dedicate specifically to Web governance.

The Details

There is a relationship between investment in Web governance and an organization’s size and annual revenues. Larger organizations tend to be more inclined to have Web governance councils than smaller organizations, as seen in the charts below.

51 percent of the organizations with over $501 million in annual revenue have Web governance councils compared to 17 percent that do not. On the other end of the spectrum, 77 percent of the organizations with less than $500 million in revenue do not have Web governance councils compared to 24 percent that do.

The trend towards Web governance is also borne out based on number of employees. 66 percent of the organizations with over 1,000 employees have Web governance councils compared to 25 percent that do not and 44 percent of the organizations with 100 or fewer employees do not have Web governance compared to 11 percent that do.

 

Next week: Does Web Governance Encourage More Efficient Operation of Digital Analytics?

Get the entire research at Semphonic.