News
Web Analytics Market Set to Explode
- By Scott Bekker
- 01/09/2001
Figuring out who your Web site visitors are is essentially
what Web analytics is all about. There are various levels of information-gathering
available, from the basic log checking of click-stream analysis through complex
data mining that reveals detailed profiles of users and their behavior.
It's a small but growing market, and IDC says it's poised for astonishing growth over
the next few years. IDC expects Web analytics to mushroom from a $48 million
industry in 1999 to $800 million in 2004. That works out to about 75 percent
per year.
IDC also contends that the pure-play Web site analysis
vendors that currently hold the lion's share of the market will be challenged
by vendors in other analytics markets, including business intelligence and
analytic applications.
"It is becoming clear that high-end pure-play product vendors will find
it increasingly necessary to expand their functionality to encompass analysis
of
non-Web site data," according to IDC analyst Dan Vesset.
Some major vendors of Web analytics software include WebTrends, Media
Metrix, Accrue Software, SAS Institute, NetGenesis, E.phiphany and Microsoft.
Picking the right Web site analysis tool is an important consideration for
an enterprise. They can be free or nearly free and take almost no time to set
up, or cost hundreds of thousands of dollars and take months to implement.
Howard Dresner, vice president and research director at GartnerGroup, says that you usually get what
you pay for. Web analytics, he comments, "is not a panacea. If you're only
doing click-stream you're suffering from business intelligence myopia.
[Click-stream data] is valuable, yes, but complete, no. It's very limited in
nature…with more information, the impact on the business is greater. For
instance, you can do one-to-one marketing." - Keith Ward
About the Author
Scott Bekker is editor in chief of Redmond Channel Partner magazine.