Yahoo Web Analytics in 30 minutes (VIDEO)
I recorded a 30+ minute DEMO (screencast) of YWA version 9.5 the other day - and am publishing the outcome below. The tone of the Video is less advert-like and much more educational; or this is at least something I tried to capture.
I believe the video is a great appetizer for how we approach web analytics from a feature point of view - and if you are not yet fully comfortable with YWA, I am most confident this video will shine some light on the product. Enjoy :-)
The above screencast is reduced in size, simply to fit this blog page, but you can click through to the original sized (990*938) screenscast, should you want the full experience. :-)
Yahoo Web Analytics in 30 minutes (VIDEO - HD)
If you made it through the video, and were pleased, you might be happy to hear that we plan to do a number of 3 min. videos focused on insight - not features.
Cheers :-)
/ Dennis Mortensen (@dennismortensen)
June 29th, 2009 at 14:09
[...] Dennis Mortensen tiene en su blog una presentación en formato video de YWA 9.5 en inglés, la he visto. Para los que no conozcan la herramienta es una presentación hummmmm pasable, [...]
June 29th, 2009 at 14:49
Great video! I am surprised that I am in such a minority here, actually - I always perceived analytics as being a pretty balanced discipline gender-wise and expected blog readership to be same. Although I realize that is not the thrust of the video, I just wanted to mention I found that interesting!
I look forward to the 3 minute videos - please get them out quickly so I can use them for my WAA Championship submission ;D
June 29th, 2009 at 15:00
Thanks Jen,
he he.. We’ll work on those snippets of video insights as fast as we can.
Thank you for the thumbs up!
cheers
d. :-)
July 2nd, 2009 at 8:32
Hello,
I have to admit that YWA is a great webanalytics tool and the movie explains the features in a good way. Nevertheless, I have a remark concerning the campaign tracking possibilities. Unfortunately the YWA intelligent campaign tracking feature attributes a sale to campaign visitor if that visitor visited the site via a search engine or other campaign source up to 1 year before the sale was actually made. In google and other webanalytics tools this is 1 month, so it is difficult to compare google results with YWA results. Is is not possible to have the same 1 month period or give the user the possibility to set this interval himself?
Keep up the good work.
July 2nd, 2009 at 8:58
Hey Eric,
As you’ve probably noticed by now, Yahoo! Web Analytics provides three distinct traffic attribution filters:
- Direct
- Intelligent
- Original
These are not unique filters by themselves but a way of attributing credit to a given completion. The following example is provided by my good friend Tami Dalley:
Imagine a game of football… The quarterback throws the ball to the receiver in a perfect pass. The receiver runs like the wind all the way to the 5-yard line before running into the defense. Before he is tackled he gives the ball to another player who dodges the defense and takes it into the end zone to score a touchdown. The crowd goes wild! The quarterback’s mother thinks, “My son is a star! Without his excellent pass there would be no touchdown at all!” The receiver’s mother is there also and says to her friends, “Without that brilliant 80-yard run from my son there would have been no touchdown.” Then the girlfriend of the scorer says, “Wait a minute, it was my boyfriend who scored the touchdown—the full credit belongs to him!” So who does deserve the credit?
And this is what traffic attribution is all about (which I am sure you are all aware about Eric), but for a lot of people it might not. So before I answer your question let me provide the fact about the three “models” in YWA:
Although the available attribution models are simple, Yahoo! should indeed receive some praise for providing more than one model. Many tools available on the Internet use only one attribution model, the last-click model (Direct).
The Direct attribution model attributes everything to the last click of the source in question. The Original attribution model attributes everything to the first original click of the source in question.
The Intelligent model that Yahoo! provides and that you question Eric, essentially translates to the Original (first) paid for (campaign) click on your own.
>>In google and other webanalytics tools this is 1 month, so it is difficult to compare google results with YWA results.
It is indeed one year in YWA, BUT if you were to compare with Google you should probably use the Direct Attribution Model and not the intelligent (still one year though).
>>Is is not possible to have the same 1 month period or give the user the possibility to set this interval himself?
Unfortunately it is not. BUT this problem (attribution) is something we are working very hard on - making it more flexible.
Thanks you for the thumbs up and have a great 4th of July holiday
Cheers
Dennis
July 10th, 2009 at 9:18
Hi Dennis,
Great demonstration, and I really like the possibilities that you can get from the flexibility and functionality in YWA. I am a heavy user of Webtrends, and I am curious about other tools. I am particularly interested in features for segmentation, like age, gender and interests. How exactly does YWA gather that kind of data? Will the quality of that data be affected by the fact that I work for a Norwegian website, where more than 85% of the traffic comes from users located in Norway?
Bente : )
July 10th, 2009 at 10:14
Hej Bente,
>>How exactly does YWA gather that kind of data? Will the quality of that data be affected by the fact that I work for a Norwegian website, where more than 85% of the traffic comes from users located in Norway?
It is based off of yahoo sampled visitor data (not just search, which some think is the only source), and it is applied to your data set at a (customizable) confidence level. AND should we not have enough information on your (and I do agree that we have better data in the US than in Norway) data, we simply say so in the reporting. When and if this happens you can always expand the reporting period to get more data.
Cheers
d.
July 14th, 2009 at 10:00
Hi Dennis,
thank you for the really good walkthrough. I have a few questions though:
1) You’ve got email addresses within the individual visitors report. Isn’t this considered as violation of privacy? What’s Yahoo’s take on sharing PII with analytics users?
2) Are there plans to allow for the import of member/customer data into YWA so that the demographic information is more accurate? This would be more useful for sites that are based outside the US.
3) Regarding the topic of attribution in the comments above, I realise that this is a hot topic within the WA community. However, don’t Omniture have something that solves this where they show all the campaigns that resulted in conversions (I believe they call them “Touchpoints”)?
Cheers
Kamal
July 14th, 2009 at 10:29
Hey Kamal.
1. DEMO Data :-)
2. Not as of today.
3. Yes. They do indeed have this and you are very likely to see something like this end up in tools like YWA
Thank you very much for the input Kamal
cheers
d.
July 14th, 2009 at 11:44
Hi Dennis,
thank you for the answers on 2 and 3.
Regarding 1, I wasn’t actually referring to those specific emails in the video :)
I am just comparing against Google who don’t allow us analysts to view the IP addresses of visitors to our sites. But it looks like Yahoo allow this. Is there a need to note this within a privacy policy if a website is using YWA? I’m just wondering about the legal issues.
There must’ve been a reason why Google aren’t doing it that way (unless it’s because they’re going to be scrutinised more due to their size in comparison to other search engines).
Just wanted to know your thoughts about that. Let me know if this is a conversation I should be having with a more “corporate” person within Yahoo :)
Cheers
Kamal
July 14th, 2009 at 13:12
Very interested in learning more about YWA — this site is very helpful. Quick question I can’t find an answer for: how does YWA handle cross-domain and sub-domain linkage? We’ve had a hellacious time trying to make GA work (requires awful javascripting for ALL cross-domain links), and I’m hoping that YWA would be an saner alternative. (If it is, it might be worth signing up for Yahoo account status just to get the Analytics….) All I find on the docs is that it requires some “easy javascript customizations”. But if it, like GA, requires that all links back and forth between all domains be handled via javascript coding, that may be “easy”, but it’s not practical. Any help much appreciated!
July 14th, 2009 at 14:18
Hey Dave,
>>how does YWA handle cross-domain and sub-domain linkage
No need to set this on every link. You set the following on every page that holds an exit link to a second domain which you are tracking as part of your project.
YWATracker.setDomains(”dennis.com”);
Essentially making sure that you track this as a single session and don’t see exit links and the likes. AND dennis.com is whatever domain you need it to be.
>>..that may be “easy”, but it’s not practical. Any help much appreciated!
Whether the above is easy; is for you decide of course :-)
Cheers
dennis
July 15th, 2009 at 1:26
[...] esittelystä kiinnostuneet voivat jatkaa pidemmällä 30 minuutin esittelyllä. Järjestelmän saa tällä hetkellä käyttöön kaikki Yahoo-mainostajat, mutta jatkossa [...]
July 15th, 2009 at 9:14
Hey Kamal.
Sent you a positive email to answer your questions.
Cheers
d. :-)
July 23rd, 2009 at 17:42
[...] check out Avinash Kaushik’s page for beginners, or perhaps just check out a new video on Yahoo Web Analytics to see an analytics tool [...]
July 24th, 2009 at 11:23
Great video Dennis,
This is just what I needed to get to the next level.
Thanks,
July 24th, 2009 at 12:44
Hey Darren
You are most welcome.
cheers
d. :-)
August 3rd, 2009 at 4:17
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August 26th, 2009 at 17:44
Hi Dennis,
Thanks for the link to your YWA video. It gave great insight, and took away teh fear of contact with the tech stuff. :)
Your old friend :)
Claes
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