Omniture acquires Instadia

The year began with the takeover of the Danish company Instadia by Omniture. Although it was well-known that Instadia wanted to be bought up, I still think it took many by surprise. Especially, it was surprising that Omniture decided to trash Instadia’s techology almost entirely. In fact the only promise they made was to integrate’s survey module into their own system.This integration has still not materialized, however, and as such I wonder whether it might have proven to be much more complicated than expected. So far it seems that the take-over has merely helped Omniture gain a foothold in the European market.
 

Google Analytics

Google bought Urchin in 2005 to launch their own Web Analytics tool, Google Analytics, in 2006. In 2007 we saw GA in a second revised version of the GA user interface. When GA was released in late 2006, the market seemed confused about whether this would be the death of other paid-for solutions or if it would increase interests in Web Analytics instead and thereby fuel growth for the entire market.Here, by the end of 2007, a realistic evaluation of the impact of GA seems closer, although the last word still remains to be said. The cheap solutions are just about to disappear completely. GA has made them superfluous due to the strengths of the features GA was able to present in 2007.More interesting, IndexTools, which is relatively low priced compared to e.g. Omniture, was not only able to survive, but actually made 2007 a great year.This came as a surprise because features in IndexTools looks like GA in many ways.I think this comes down to three explanations.Firstly, GA dows not allow for multiple user log-in, which in many organizations is a must-have. However, I can think of no reason why GA should not include this option in future releases of their software.Secondly, GA is still quite difficult to implement, if you want a reasonable data quality.Thirdly, GA comes without any support (other than from Google partners), which seems to be a very important option even for smaller companies. Although the number of companies specializing in GA support is increasing, support on a deeper technical level will probably never be possible with GA.Still, I think, IndexTools and similar companies need to think hard about how to differentiate themselves from GA in the years to come. They probably would be best off focusing on what GA cannot possibly offer due to the sheer volume of its subscribers. In my opinion those who thought that the mid-end and high-end part of the Web Analytics market would be unaffected by GA were definitely wrong.
 

Microsoft Gatineau

After much postponing, Microsoft Gatineau finally saw the light of day in late 2007 – at least to some lucky people (the beta is still only available to a limited and randomly selected websites).According to those reviews and slideshows I have seen, the first beta release features very easy implementation (actually it is claimed to be automatic) as well as additional information about demography such as gender and age. I am skeptical about both features and they will probably only “benefit” those who are completely new to web analytics.If what I have seen until now proves to be the most promising features of Gatineau, I predict that Gatineau will take a very limited part of the market, and that Google and GA is simply too far ahead of Microsoft. If Microsoft has to have a chance in this market, it would either be because people begin to dislike Google (and its integration with its own Ad-words) more than they dislike Microsoft, or it would be because Microsoft in the future will be able to bring about an integration between Gatineau other Microsoft products (as it is done with MSN and Gatineau now, but with more interesting data, like CMS or CRM integration).

The Rise and fall of Omniture and Visual Sciences

Apart from buying Instadia, at the end of the year Omniture acquired Visual Sciences (and thereby Web Side Story, which was renamed Visual Sciences). The takeover shocked the Web Analytics market and especially the high-end part, which many believed to be comprised by only those two companies (and perhaps some up-running competitors).Just after the takeover the stock market reacted positively by a clear rise and suggested thereby that many believed that the new Omniture would be firmly positioned as the dominant high-end provider of web analytics. But now, a couple of months later, Omniture’s stock price is going down with around 30 %. Perhaps the complications of the transitions of all the WebSideStory, Instadia and Visual Sciences customers begin to appear.With rumors (running for a long time) that Omniture is also thinking about taking over another little friend, Webtrends, there can be no doubt that Omniture is going for the big deals. But perhaps they are trying to move too fast, not considering that they are dealing with complicated software on different technological platforms. At the same time they should be able to satisfy all the new customers which perhaps, did not choose Omniture in the first place because they wanted something else. That something else would still have to be delivered by Omniture or they would risk losing many customers. And this would certainly be a problem, which a company with a high burn rate cannot risk. It will be interesting to see what the next move of the green elephant will be in 2008.With GA still approaching will Omniture change its business strategy and will it still be able to make big money on its mid-end solution, SiteCatalyst?
 

Europe – a beginning adventure (for those who do not know)

Most of the web analytics industry grew up in the States and 2007 saw quite a few blogspots about the maturing of the European market for Web Analytics. In some way they are right. For Omniture, Webtrends and other large American companies, 2007 was certainly a year where real focus was put on Europe. And for sure: In Europe we have been fighting our own battles for the customers, and the presence of the large American companies (perhaps besides Webtrends) has certainly increased. But many markets in Europe (France, Italy, Germany, Denmark) are not unexplored – they have just been dominated by local companies (like Netminers, Instadia, XiTi, ImetriX etc.) and 2007 was perhaps a year, where we saw, that web analytics is turning truly global.There will certainly be more competition on the European markets (Webtrends has been a very dominant player in many countries, where local players have been absent, up till now), but I think that local players will still be very strong due to local know-how and confidence. More interesting are the markets further east. As many parts of the former Soviet Union are still experiencing strong growth rates it will soon be open for exploration.And even more obvious markets are open for expansion: Asia and South America.But perhaps I am just unaware of local players in those markets – just as many still are of strong European vendors.
 

WAA grows stronger

As for the Web Analytics Association, 2007 was a year when whitepapers about web analytics metrics turned into standards. WAA got its own blog where members can exchange ideas and it even got a German division (not easy to find, and I don’t think there are other countries / languages who was got a local WAA site).Funny, but it actually seems like Europeans countries are split in two parts: Either the country has no serious web analytics vendors, but instead strong WA consultants who produce and engage in dedicated web analytics blogs. Or the country has strong local web analytics vendors, but no community in which to share ideas on the use of web analytics. In the first category we find e.g. Germany, Norway, Sweden and Belgium, while the second category includes France, Italy and Denmark.Anyway I think WAA is about to bring stability to a market highly in need of standards, even though the metrics definitions is yet very far from completion. The community of WAA is also developing, but a question still remains (mentioned at http://www.webanalyticsbook.com/archives/1106): Shall we try to give WAA monopoly on Web Analytics definitions, communities and blogging or should we try to maintain diversity?
 

What is happening inside Webtrends?

Webtrends has undergone severe organizational changes, and perhaps this reflects  the difficulties they have laying down a clear strategy. Not really operating exclusively in the high-end part of the market, this large and old company find it difficult to develop their business exclusively in the market of web analytics:“It might seem strange to hear those words coming from the mouth of a vendor that’s been selling the benefits of web analytics for more than ten years, but we genuinely believe that web analytics as a standalone discipline is no longer relevant to today’s marketers.”(Nick Cave, Webtrends, June 2007)So what to do now? For now Webtrends is discovering new land of e-mail marketing, CRM integration and Web 2.0 and technologies like Microsoft Silverlight. But is this enough? After all everybody else is doing the same, and the reality of integration of these features is still only maturing. The question remains the same: Is the technological platform used by Webtrends just not good enough to compete in the high-end part of the market?
 

Trends for 2008

I think the trend towards fewer but stronger players will continue. Just this month, Oracle acquired another local web analytics vendor, Moniforce. Even though Oracle might have bought Moniforce for other reasons than their web analytics solution, it could become a major player in the coming years (perhaps not 2008, but later). In the high-end part of the market, Oracle’s knowledge in database technologies will be of great benefit. Most certainly the Web Analytics market will continue its trends towards globalization and perhaps Asia will be next on the list.Also Web 2.0, Campaign marketing, e-mail marketing and CRM integration will continue to be words flourishing