“I implemented Google Analytics because is free” is one of the most trite phrases this days in the Internet Industry and let me introduce you the FIN Concept…Free is Nothing.
Do you thing that Google Analytics or Yahoo! Web Analytics or any other tool is free just because your don’t have to pay for them? That is not correct and I’ll show you why…
Opening a Google Analytics Account is just the beginning of the history after that you have to setup the account and lost a couple of days thinking about what’s your system (website) Objective, how’s your system is composed, what is its structure, what can a user do and what cannot do, how is the user experience, what can you and can not measure, what do you want to measure and what you will not measure, etc, etc, etc.
After that you should plan how you will tell Google Analytics or Yahoo! Web Analytics or any other tool, how it must understand the structure of your system, otherwise you will probably receiving incorrect information. Remember that there is not only one way to implement a tool and the quality (and relevance) of the received information will depend exclusively on the particular way you do it. So this is not a minor step on your Web Analytics Project, it is probably one of the most important ones. There is a very nice quote that explains it perfect “Tell me how you measure me and I’ll tell you how I’ll Behave. Measure me in an Illogical way…but don’t complain if I behave I Illogical”.
Once you did all the above mentioned work you have to Implement the code in the correct place, with the correct lines and check is everything is working properly and adjust what it is not ok…etc, etc, etc.
After implementing you will probably have to setup Goals, Funnels, Segments, Filters, Actions among other things which will takes you pretty much of your valuable time.
Finally, you will have to spend some time analyzing your information and improving your Analytics Ninja skills if you wanted to get some nice actionable insights.
All the above mentioned doesn’t look like it worth nothing…right? It is a lot of work, lot of time from different resources involved for what? If you thing that just dropping an stupid tag on the footer will change your life forget about it. Even when you implement it right you know what? Tools don’t think so you will need to do it youself .
You can also say “dropping a tag is better than nothing” and I answer you…better for what? If it is for making money…then the answer is…no, it is not better.
FIN means “The end” in spanish…it’s up to you…
I finish this post with a very interesting Quote from Robert Townsend,…“If you don’t do it with excellence, don’t do it at all! Because if it’s not excellent, it won’t be profitable or fun, and if you’re not in business for fun or profit, what the hell are you doing there?”