Today the 17th of July 2023 I’ve decided to relaunch our old blog about web/digital analytics that I launched in 2006.
Not that I want to write a lot about the subject 7 years later, but I thought it would be useful and I hope insightful for the new generations of digital analysts. I will write some posts from time to time and I hope that the historical posts and the news will be valuable to you.
I want to thank the former writers of this blog: my ex-wife Aurélie Pols, my former employees that have crushed after their OX2 experience Julien Coquet and Siegert Dierickx. Thank you to the three of you. Without you this blog wouldn’t had been possible. Also thanks to all commentators of our posts. We had over 200 insightful comments in less than two years. Thank you to all of you! And of course I couldn’t finish this short post thanking all the former OX2’s team, without you nothing could have been possible; I just was the sales guy 😉
Cheer Regards from hot Madrid!
René Dechamps Otamendi
Posted in Web Analytics | Comments Off on I’ve revived our old Web Analytics blog
I wanted to encourage our readers to subscribe to the WAA Blog that has just been launched this month.
As you know the Web Analytics Association is working hard since its creation to help the Web Analytics Industry.
The Social Media Committee of the Association has thus launched a blog which is open to all WAA members. So if you’re a WAA member and would like to contribute to the Association Blog, please read the Terms of Service and if you agree make your first contribution.
NEW YORK, NY November 19, 2007 – OX2, the Brussels-based interactive web agency reinforced its established position as an industry leader by building closer ties to online marketing analytics platform provider IndexTools. OX2 officially became IndexTools’ Strategic Alliance Partner in Belgium and the first company certified under IndexTools Certification Program. Two OX2 consultants passed detailed exams to qualify as a Certified Analyst and a Certified Deployment Specialist.
“OX2 has earned its place among the premiere Web Analytics experts in Europe,” said Dennis R. Mortensen, COO of IndexTools. “We’re extremely proud to strengthen our relationship.”
The partnership culminates years of close dialogue between the two firms. As a Strategic Partner, OX2 will work hand in hand with IndexTools in order to help their common clients benefit fully from the vast data rendered by the online channel and to provide tailor-made Web Analytics solutions to enterprise clients.
OX2 reported that joining the new partnership was no sudden move, but rather the latest development in a longer term, well-considered process. “We believe our independence adds tremendous value to our business,” said Ren� Dechamps Otamendi, CEO of OX2. “Before we agree on a partnership with a vendor, we want to be sure they will meet with the approval of our clients. In the case of IndexTools we liked that they have a European office with a strong familiarity of European business norms and culture, including European Web culture.” (more…)
I just spotted this video on YouTube. A conversation between Jeremiah and Jim regarding the state of the Web Analytics Industry recorded earlier this year.
If you haven’t been able to attend an eMetrics Summit yet, this will allow you to see Jim at work explaining very clearly his vision about Web Analytics.
If you’re not familiar about Web Analytics, after viewing this you will understand what Web Analytics is about. You will learn how Web Analytics can change your online business and thus affect the bottom line of your company.
You’ll see that you have a bonus discussion as you get a second discussion between Jeremiah and Jim about how to measure campaigns starting at the 16th minute.
You might have heard that Eric has launched a new survey about Web Analytics. If you’re using Web Analytics within your company now is the time to make a contribution to the industry by providing anonymously your opinion and experience regarding Web Analytics tools. The survey takes no more than 10-15 minutes.
Why should you give 10 minutes of your time? Because you will help us all to better understand the industry and particularly how practitionners relate to Web Analytics products. Also because the results will be freely available to the whole planet as the previous survey conducted by Web Analytics Demystified Inc.
Please take 10 minutes of your time, the industry needs your help and we all value your opinion in order to make this discipline evolve, based on your needs. Let your voice be heard, here’s your chance.
After my presentation at the eMetrics in Washington, I was approached by an off shore company specialised in data analysis based in India. Or at least, that’s what I thought it was, during our first encounter.
I had already noted the little black note books lying on the tables of the big hall where the keynotes were held and thought to myself that it was good timing as my third Google note book – which fits into my handbag – was already full. But the name of the company did not ring a bell even though the tag lines “data analysis – technology services” spiked my curiosity.
So, when the guy from Theorem actually came up to me, it rang a bell and I wasn’t really surprised by the idea of outsourcing data analysis to an off shore country. India seems the logical step as we had already discussed such possibilities of future evolution within the Web Analytics industry, when he was first approached by a couple of Indian guys some months ago. (more…)
This non Web analytics post to present you an interview of Aurélie and Thomas Dusart, Marketing Manager of Panos one of our customers. The interview is in dutch and was made the week after eMetrics Washington. Aurélie was sick that week (you’ll see it in the video) but still she decided to go for this interview. I hope that the dutch speakers will enjoy 😉
When René barged into our bedroom some 72 hours ago with my laptop in his hand, announcing Greg Drew’s departure from WebTrends, we finally understood why his name had been popping-up on searches to our blog for the last 24 hours in such an abnormal way.
I had thought Greg already looked tired when we briefly met in Washington and attributed that logically to the Road shows that WebTrends was holding, following its August release of the long awaited Marketing Lab² (ML²).
On the other hand, this news also reminded me of some discussions we had back in the spring in San Francisco with some WebTrends folks about the need for a refreshing touch within WebTrends in order to get past the very bad feeling we all shared about the first release of Marketing Lab. All partners we talked to were anxiously waiting – for far too long, I really want to stress that – for a more advanced release that would bring true added value to our existing clients. With ML1, this was clearly not the case.
So, let’s get back to WebTrends news as some more information has been published online regarding it’s top management changes.
The first thing that seems clear now is that Greg Drew and the other three VPs were asked to leave by the Board of WebTrends.
Bruce T. Coleman, who has become the interim CEO, knows WebTrends very well as he was member of the Board since 1998. So even if he has no experience in Web Analytics operations, my feeling is that he understands very well the sector and he has got some ideas for the future.
Coleman has also extensive experience in running technology companies and thus we can expect some changes in the coming months. From public declarations of their CMO Tim Kopp:
“The company has been doing great. We’re driving double-digit growth. But we believe we can continue to do better and the board wanted to make a change to help accelerate growth“.
So the objective is to increase growth and this seems to be the main reason of the management changes. This was corroborated by Bruce Coleman who stated:
“We need to get more new deals, this is a company that’s growing, but not growing as much as the marketplace. Given the investments, [the owners] want to see more of a return.” (more…)
After the acquisition of Visual Sciences, we all wonder how Web Analytics vendors will react. So let’s get back to the different vendors out there and try to take a look at the future.
If we take the latest Forrester Research regarding Web Analytics that Megan Burns wrote a few months ago, which you can download here at Unica’s website, we find the main Web Analytics vendors well represented. Here’s a graph that sums up Megan’s findings:
Yesterday I had a journalist calling me to ask my opinion regarding Visual Sciences’ takeover by Omniture. Since becoming a public company, Omniture has been acquiring different companies, but one can wonder: where’s Omniture going
Omniture strategy: Pacman?
We see different types of acquisitions done by Omniture in the past:
Complementary products to enhance the portfolio of solutions proposed to their clients. This is the case for TouchClarity and Offermatica. One could argue that buying TouchClarity also allowed Omniture to have a better UK presence, but my feeling is that the technology was the first motivation for this acquisition. Other Web analytics players have also done acquisitions of this type as WebTrends with Position Gold and Dynamic Search or WebSideStory with Publish.
A different type of acquisition made by Omniture is the one represented by that of Instadia. Instadia was a great Danish WA product that got acquired last year and if it wasn’t clear enough at the beginning, it is clear crystal now what the intentions where. Even if the product was interesting, Instadia’s product has been abandoned and clients are being migrated towards Omniture’s SiteCatalyst. The objectives behind this acquisition were to gain presence in the European market through customers and skillful employees that could integrate the rapidly growing European Omniture’s team (Omniture is now one of the vendors with most resources in the European market).
Based on this, where the does Visual Sciences acquisition fall? Well, a bit in between both scenarios. Buying Visual Sciences provides Omniture with clients, great minds and probably the best analytical and data visualization tool out there. See below for more details about Visual Sciences in the Omniture ecosystem. (more…)
Brussels, October 16th 2007 — Eric Peterson becomes shareholder of OX2, the Belgian/pan-European interactive agency leader in the field of measurement and analysis of online behavior, also known as Web Analytics or WA. Eric Peterson becomes a shareholder as well as a member of the agency’s board. As such, Eric’s mission will be to influence the WebAnalytics.be business unit by confronting his vision of web analytics against that of Aurélie Pols (Web Analytics Team Leader chez OX2). Eric Peterson will also travel to Europe to assist OX2’s European clients, should they require his unique presentation and strategic workshop management skills. (more…)
David Rhee (former Director of Web Analytics at Gateway Computer) joins OX2 to lead the agency’s new German branch
Brussels, October 10th, 2007 — OX2, the Belgian interactive agency and a leader in the field of website measurement and online behavior analysis (a.k.a. Web Analytics) increases its international clout. After expanding into France last January, OX2 develops its activities in Germany by opening a web analytics branch in Frankfurt. This endeavor was made possible with the addition of a renowned web analytics expert to the already celebrated Web Analytics European Dream Team. OX2 went all the way to California to retain the services of David Rhee, former Acting Director of Web Analytics at Gateway Computer (NYSE:GTW) and Primary Moderator of the Web Analytics Forum, run by the Web Analytics Association.
Here’s the video that we sent for the BarCamp event last week-end in Buenos Aires. I was requested to speak about the state of Web analytics in Europe and give some examples of things that we were doing with Web Analytics for our clients. As you can hear it’s in Spanish.
This month, Juan Damia, asked me to participate to the first BarCamp in Argentina that will take place in a few hours in Buenos Aires. I was given 10 minutes to discuss about the state of Web Analytics in Europe and provide some examples of works that we have done at OX2.
You may know what a BarCamp is, if not, here’s a quick definition from Wikipedia:
BarCamp is an international network of user generated conferences — open, participatory workshop-events, whose content is provided by participants — often focusing on early-stage web applications, and related open source technologies, social protocols, and open data formats.
As it was a bit complicated to travel to Argentina for this week-end (next week I’m traveling to the Canary Islands, in 2 weeks to Washington and in 4 to Stockholm), we decided to prepare a little video with my intervention and connect online for the Q&A. (more…)
It’s becoming a little tradition to fly over to the US to attend the eMetrics Summits. In a few weeks in Washington Aurélie and I will be attending the eMetrics Marketing Optimization Summit and we’re really looking forward. Aurélie will be presenting and I’ll be networking and attending the lobby bar as usual. And yes, don’t worry, I’ll bring the chocolates 😉
I’m really looking forward catching up with all our Web Analytics friends from the other side of the Atlantic (Eric, Jim, Avinash, Bryan, Clint, Stéphane, Ian, Joseph, Judah, Dylan, Andrea, Brian, June, Braden, …) but also some European friends that will also be making the trip as Vicky, Neil and Oliver.
If you’re serious about Web Analytics, this is the conference you need to attend. If you attended our Web Analytics Day and you enjoyed it, attend eMetrics you will be bluffed.
Here’s a little video that I hope will make you think about it:
For those of you who couldn’t attend our Web Analytics Day and enjoy Eric presenting, you can view hereunder a video taken at eDay in Rotterdam that features Eric’s Peterson presentation “Web Analytics is Easy” which was the first of the 3 presentations Eric did at our last week’s event.
– All OX2 team that has been working hard on top of their day2day jobs to get this event ready.
– And last but not least, all the participants that showed up. This event was for you and the best gauge that I can think of to measure the successof the event are the feedback forms. Besides one person that complained because it was too much oriented for big compagnies, here are some interesting statistics from the 50 forms that we received back:
100% of respondents found the conference instructive
100% said that the agenda and topics matched their expectations
100% would recommend the event to their friends
Regarding the speakers, the ranking of satisfaction was pretty much as expected: Eric leads with almost everybody stating that he was very good followed by Aurélie, Dave and Stephan. On the vendors side, the ranking of satisfaction placed Omniture followed by WebTrends and then Indextools, Nedstat and Extenseo.
I have to admit that we were really amazed by the feedback forms and the positive emails that we have received since last friday. Here are some of the comments we have received:
“René, Aurélie, just a short note to say congratulations and thank you for today, I thought the audience, content and venue were all first class!”
“Thanks for hosting the event last week. I thought it was very informative and I certainly picked up a few useful insights.”
“I just wanted to congratulate you guys again in setting up this great event. All the people I have spoke to during the day where all enthusiastic about the event and Web Analytics.”
“Thank you for your event, I was really impressed”
“As I just told Rene over the phone. I think it was an amazing event on the level of Emetrics (and I do about 25 shows a year).“
this last comment really made my day, as eMetrics is for me the nirvana of the Web Analytics event.
Thanks again to everybody that came and allowed this event to be a great success.
And yes, see you next year at our third OX2 Web Analytics Day Brussels (It’s going to be difficult to do better I think…).
Last friday, Aurélie and I had the pleasure to host our second Web Analytics Day. It was a great event with over 100 participants attending. One of the key moments was when Ian Thomas presented to the audience the forth coming Web Analytics tool: Microsoft Gatineau. Eric and Robin have already published the slides of the presentation, you’ll find hereafter the video of Ian’s presentation:
We wanted to thank again Ian for this Worldwide Première presentation of Gatineau and for even personalizing the presentation to the Belgian market with his chocolate example 😉
If you want to sign up for Gatineau’s Beta, you just need to go here.
We will be publishing more material and comments from OX2’s Web Analytics Day 2007 in the coming days so keep checking if you’re interested or subscribe to our RSS feed.
Now that Eric has posted about this in the Web Analytics Yahoo Groups, I can share with you that the next 14th of September, during our Web Analytics Day, Ian Thomas, responsible of the Microsoft Gatineau project, will be doing the first public demo of the Bêta version of Gatineau.
If you’re in the Web Analytics Industry, you already know about Gatineau as many Blogs (including ours) have been talking about this product these past months. If you’re not familiar with it, Gatineau is the future FREE Web Analytics tool of Microsoft. So a competitor of Google Analytics.
This quick note to let you know that the Standards Committee of the Web Analytics Association (WAA) has released 26 new definitions of Web Analytics standards.
The new definitions:
Building Block Terms: Page, Page Views, Visits, Unique Visitors, New Visitor, Repeat Visitor, Repeat Visitor & Returning Visitor
For those of you who won’t be able to attend our Web Analytics Day the next September 14th, you can nevertheless attend Eric Peterson Presentation ‘Web Analytics is easy!’ through a Web analytics Association Webcast that will take place on August 29th. Please note that this exclusive event is open to WAA members only: another good reason to become a member 😉
This unique day is intended for practitioners in Web Analytics wanting to increase their knowledge in the subject. Eric and Aurélie along with Stephan Loerke, Managing Director of the World Federation of Advertisers and David Rhee, Web Analytics Director at Gateway Computers will share with you their knowledge around Web Analytics. This is your perfect chance to learn all you need to know to get started efficiently in your Web Analytics Journey. Register today!
You can register directly (seats are limited) on www.WebAnalyticsDay.eu. You can also find hereafter the agenda of that event.
Aurélie and I just got back from a little break in France were we enjoyed the pleasures of the nature and good food after months of hectic work. I was catching up my emails and I saw on a Google Alert that Aberdeen Group had issued a Research Study on Web Analytics, more precisely on Web Analytics knowledge and education.
Dennis from IndexTools has already blogged about the subject, but I wanted to add my little contribution to the spread of this research. This study is the result of a survey in which one of the findings was that the main frustration of the respondents is not having enough ressources to manage Web Analytics. After explaining the results of the survey, John Lovett presents what can be done to increase the knowledge about Web Analytics. He divides the possibilities in four main groups: (more…)
This is the blog of WebAnalytics.be, a Business Unit of OX2, a pan-European Interactive Agency based in Bussels capital of Europe.
This Blog has been created to allow our team members to share with you and the rest of the world their ideas thoughts and views on Web Analytics.
I wanted to encourage our readers to subscribe to the 
NEW YORK, NY November 19, 2007 – OX2, the Brussels-based interactive web agency reinforced its established position as an industry leader by building closer ties to online marketing analytics platform provider IndexTools. OX2 officially became IndexTools’ Strategic Alliance Partner in Belgium and the first company certified under IndexTools Certification Program. Two OX2 consultants passed detailed exams to qualify as a Certified Analyst and a Certified Deployment Specialist.
You might have heard that Eric has launched a 
After my presentation at the 
Bruce T. Coleman, who has become the interim CEO, knows WebTrends very well as he was member of the Board since 1998. So even if he has no experience in Web Analytics operations, my feeling is that he understands very well the sector and he has got some ideas for the future.
Yesterday I had a journalist calling me to ask my opinion regarding Visual Sciences’ takeover by Omniture. Since becoming a public company, Omniture has been acquiring different companies, but one can wonder: where’s Omniture going
Brussels, October 16th 2007 — Eric Peterson becomes shareholder of 
Brussels, October 10th, 2007 — OX2, the Belgian interactive agency and a leader in the field of website measurement and online behavior analysis (a.k.a. Web Analytics) increases its international clout. After expanding into France last January, OX2 develops its activities in Germany by opening a web analytics branch in Frankfurt. This endeavor was made possible with the addition of a renowned web analytics expert to the already celebrated Web Analytics European Dream Team. OX2 went all the way to California to retain the services of David Rhee, former Acting Director of Web Analytics at Gateway Computer (NYSE:GTW) and Primary Moderator of the 
This month, 
It’s becoming a little tradition to fly over to the US to attend the 
As you might have read here these previous days, OX2 is organising with Eric Peterson and Web Analytics Demystified a 
Aurélie and I just got back from a little break in France were we enjoyed the pleasures of the nature and good food after months of hectic work. I was catching up my emails and I saw on a Google Alert that 
OX2 Web Analytics Blog 