Web Analytics Wednesday Toronto Review
June 4th 2009 10:33 PM
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The Web Analytics Wednesday held in Toronto yesterday was a big success. Thanks and much respect to Patrick Glinksi for organizing the event, and AT Internet for sponsoring it.
Who knew Web Analytics Wednesday could be so much Fun and a Great Party (not me)?
A diverse and interesting mix of people from all walks of life including web analytics, online marketing, SEO, ‘internet entrepreneurs’ and people interested in digital marketing were all present. As I expected, the majority of people that attended either use or are interested in learning about web analytics as a part of their web strategy, but it is not necessarily their core area of expertise. Its great to see more people realizing and incorporating web analytics into their overall web strategy in Toronto. There were at least 50 people at yesterday’s event, and each Web Analytics Wednesday in Toronto keeps getting better and better, thanks Patrick once again for organizing them.
Free drinks were available from the start of the evening in Fionn MacCool’s Pub on University Avenue in Toronto, which got many marketing-related conversations flowing. An enticing selection of food was then placed in the middle of the room, its attractive scent filling the air, especially the calamari as I am in tune with all things aquatic. The next time I looked back, it was all gone!
AT Internet demonstrated their web analytics product called XiTi. AT Internet is a well established and successful web analytics vendor in Europe, starting out in France, and is trying to expand into the North American market. They have started out in Montreal. and have the ambitious goal of expandng into the English speaking areas of the continent. Respect to Fehmi who delivered a pretty good presentation… in his FOURTH language… are you kidding me?!
The interface of XiTi was quite attractive (heat-map / hotspots feature in the above image), with a host of features and capabilities that compete with their main rival in North America, Omniture. If you are looking into a paid web analytics solution, I would add them to your short-list.
Just editing this very post, I realized that XiTi are actually one of Forrester’s 8 enterprise web analytics players for 2009, and I wish them all the best. They’ve obviously put a solid marketing effort behind their North American strategy, and I’m sure they’d appreciate any feedback on their tool. They offered me a full demonstration of their product which I appreciate and hope to do a future post on.
I asked a question at the end of the presentation: “Who do you see as your main competitor in North America, and what is your differentiating factor against them?”
The answer was that the main competitor in the North American Web Analytics market is Omniture, with the main competitive advantage being a lower total cost of ownership (TCO). I don’t like price cutting as a sustainable competitive advantage in general.
However, in this present market situation, cutting costs really does sell. It’s the buzz word/phrase in every organization and on everyone’s mind: How do I reduce spending while increasing efficiency? In our current situation, a cost cutting value proposition really does work, and is selling like hot-cakes did when they came out.
In the Q&A period, someone raised an interesting question, and let me paraphrase it:”Why should I pay for web analytics when I can get it for free?” This question gets asked at pretty much every presentation they do, and was on my mind as well.
If you are just starting out with web analytics, a solution that costs money is not for you. Free web analytics tools such as Google are a good way to introduce and begin to implement a web analytics data driven culture into yourself or your organization.
If you are running a more mature web business where certain functionality such as real-time reporting and advanced segmentation is more critical, a paid solution definitely makes sense, and I would recommend at least adding AT Internet into your short list, and evaluate whether they make sense for your present requirements.
My expectations for this event were quite high, and I was pleasantly impressed. I’m looking forward to the next Web Analytics Wednesday in Toronto which should draw an even bigger crowd, be more even more fun, and make me even more late for work the next day 
Have you been or heard of Web Analytics Wednesday? What do you think about Web Analytics in general? We’d like to hear what you think about it…
