Today, Google announced some measures to ensure that online visitor privacy is maintained.

Opt-out browser add-on made available

The first announcement is the launch of a Google Analytics opt-out browser add-on for Internet Explorer, Firefox and Chrome (all in beta).

The opt-out provides users with a choice of whether information about website visits is collected by Google Analytics. The add-on stops data from being sent from your computer when you visit websites that use Google Analytics Javascript (ga.js) to track usage.

The opt-out browser add-on can be downloaded at http://tools.google.com/dlpage/gaoptout

Google trying to repair recent privacy blunder?

The question begs, is Google attempting to “look good” re privacy especially in light of the recent privacy blunder when it came to collecting WiFi data in their Street View cars;  (Google claimed they unknowingly collected snippets of payload data such as MAC addresses as they drove through your neighborhoods).

Or is Google genuinely attempting to empower end-users who deserve to protect their privacy. Either way, if it catches on, this could seriously affect the accuracy of reported visitor data.

Ability for website owners to anonymise visitor IP address information

The second announcement allows website owners to anonymise visitor IP address information sent to Google so that only a portion of the IP address is used for geographic reporting.

It is however worth noting that the accuracy of Geographic reporting will be impacted:

Keep in mind, that using this functionality will somewhat reduce the accuracy of geographic data in your Analytics reports.

For further information on implementing this feature within Google Analytics visit: http://code.google.com/apis/analytics/docs/gaJS/gaJSApi_gat.html

Jim Sterne reports on the The Feedback Loop Gap where organisations have web analytics data but they rarely act on it.

In Jim Sterne’s words:

We have the data, we have the pretty reports, but we do not have an educated team made up of technical and business people who can take the resulting statistics and turn them into meaningful plans.

In my travels I have found that organisations rarely look at their web analytics data let alone act on it in a structured way to improve the user experience, conversion rates and possible ROI or revenue.

Organisations that do look at their analytics, tend to focus on channel measurement (i.e. what channels are driving traffic – or conversions – assuming goals have been set up) or most popular keyphrases or content.

But clearly the power of web analytics data is the interpretation of data and then the execution of that data by way of website enhancements and modifications.

As Jim Sterne’s reports, this requires

a team made up of information system, designers and business people [to] map out the changes necessary to improve usability, increase customer satisfaction, and boost revenue.

Yesterday Google announced the roll-out of more enterprise-level features within Google Analytics. For a free web analytics service which has already surpassed itself and the competition, these new features make Google Analytics all the more compelling.
Their new features include:

• More advanced goal tracking including brand and engagement goals
• Up to 20 goals per profile
• Mobile website tracking (including mobile apps)
• Custom alerts
• Analytics intelligence highlighting trends in visitor behaviour
• Multiple custom variables

The list goes on. You can view the full story at the http://analytics.blogspot.com/2009/10/google-analytics-now-more-powerful.html.
We particularly like the enhancements made to goal tracking which now includes basic engagement and brand goals as explained below:

There is no doubt that web analytics in general has become a key tool in commercial decision-making as online marketers and web analysts become more adept at extracting important and actionable website and user data.

In the web analytics market, Google Analytics, launched in 2005, clearly has a strong market share (24% in the Netherlands, The Mirabeau Monitor 2008).

Within Google Analytics (and many other web analytics tools), one of the most important areas for measurement is goals and related metrics such as goal conversions, goal conversion rates, reverse goal path and form abandonment. Most web analytics tools will also produce a funnel visualisation based on goal conversion.

No goal tracking
The reason we write this article is because we are astonished by how many businesses that are using Google Analytics have either not set up goal tracking at all, or have set it up incorrectly; sadly the former seems to be more common.

Not only will this prevent measurement of the above metrics, but conversions will not be measurable against referrer types, non-paid (organic search) keywords, paid (PPC) keywords and other important metrics that can have a significant effect on SEM success.

Google Analytics can also use an assigned goal value to calculate ROI or an average score, something which site owners will miss out on unless goals have been set up.

Lack of skills or complacency?
In their web analytics buyer’s guide 2007, E-consultancy highlights the importance of employee skills when using web analytics, and the failings of businesses to set up Google Analytics goals is a good example of this.
Our opinion is that many site owners are still of the mindset that real-time web analytics is a rebadged log file analysis tool similar to original products such as AWStats or Webalizer where basic measures such as most popular pages or “hits” were reported on.

Alternatively, one could argue that because Google Analytics is free and fairly simple to install, site owners do not go to much effort to configure it once it is up and running. If a cost was attached to it, it might encourage site owners to seek out the real benefits and make configuration tweaks accordingly.

Of course there’s always the argument that site owners simply aren’t aware of goals and their importance!
As a final point, we would like to announce that in the near future Emarketeers will be offering a web analytics training course, so watch this space.

Please tell us of your experience in relation to Google Analytics and goal setup.