Website Analytics and Algorithms

WEB ANALYTICS DEFINED From Wikipedia  Web analytics is the measurement, collection, analysis and reporting of internet data for purposes of understanding and optimizing web usage.  Web analytics is not just a tool for measuring website traffic but can be used as a tool for business research and market research.  Web analytics applications can also help companies measure the results of traditional print advertising campaigns. It helps one to estimate how the traffic to the website changed after the launch of a new advertising campaign.  Web analytics provides data on the number of visitors, page views, etc to gauge the traffic and popularity trends which helps in market research.

Analytics Types  There are two categories of web analytics- off-site and on-site web analytics.  Off-site web analytics refers to web measurement and analysis regardless of whether you own or maintain a website. It includes the measurement of a website's potential audience (opportunity), share of voice (visibility), and buzz (comments) that is happening on the Internet as a whole.  On-site web analytics measure a visitor's journey once on your website. This includes its drivers and conversions; for example, which landing pages encourage people to make a purchase. On-site web analytics measures the performance of your website in a commercial context. This data is typically compared against key performance indicators for performance, and used to improve a web site or marketing campaign's audience response.

Analytics- How it Works Examples  Historically, web analytics has referred to on-site visitor measurement.  However in recent years this has blurred, mainly because vendors are producing tools that span both categories.  Google Analytics in a Nutshell (video) (video)  Placement Targeting (video) (video)  E-commerce Tracking (video) (video)

Content Algorithms  Internet content providers are developing software programs that better indicate what people are interested in reading and accessing on the web  If successful, such a formula translates to the kind of stories that entice users to click and companies to advertise  Learning what people are clicking on, searching for, and interested in now, today, and tomorrow can be a good thing– in the competition for online eyeballs

The AOL Example Source: Columbia Journalism Review, Nov./Dec  AOL is at the forefront with a program called Demand/ROI- currently in Beta mode, it will be rolled out soon for use by AOL News and rest of AOL’s 50-plus niche sites or brands  Demand/ROI does two main jobs  It scours databases and social networks to discern user interests- through search and other behavioral data  And it monitors how readers are responding to a story or aspect of a website in real-time  The program not only reports on a story’s success, but predicts the degree of success and even how much revenue it might thus generate  This information is potentially useful to those assigning and producing content and to those advertising alongside it

Content “Opportunities”  AOL executives say Demand/ROI is so adept at assessing content “opportunities” that eventually the algorithm may be used to post some basic assignments- automatically- in areas such as Seed.com, AOL’S new professional-amateur site, which offers low-pay assignments for freelance writers, photographers, and soon, videographers Seed.com  Editors pull up “heat maps” on a screen, a program that tells them what’s hot and what’s not on websites by tracking where people are clicking  Headlines, copy and visuals/art can be quickly changed to try increase appeal

AOL Redefined  Divorced from a rocky 10-year marriage to Time Warner at the end of 2009, AOL is in a race to reinvent itself  Its core dial-up service continues to retreat before the march of broadband  AOL is seeking to become more of a content and advertising company  In June 2010 AOL pledged to hire as many as 500 journalists over the next year  The company has been posting hundreds of openings, primarily but not entirely in its fast-expanding Patch.com community news network Patch.com  AOL is investing $50 million this year in Patch, a spreading network of hyper-local community news sites  Patch operates in communities of 15,000-50,000- in mostly middle- class to affluent bedroom communities where demographics are attractive to local and national advertisers  Patch news operations emphasize original reporting, from local high school graduations to town/city council fights over taxes and zoning

Patch Pay and Perks  Local Patch editors range from fresh journalism/communication school graduates to 20-year veterans  Salaries (with benefits) are in the range of $35,000- $50,000  Every editor gets a Blackberry, laptop, digital still/video camera, and a police scanner to monitor breaking news  No office space is provided- they work out of their homes and are encouraged to work out of local coffee houses or other public venues where they are supposed to be in touch with their neighbors- and the local news  They are 24/7-foot soldiers and they work hard at cultivating their Patches  More AOL job and internship opportunities HERE HERE