Pattern Finder

Analyst Numbers Down 66%

Industry analysts that cover the Web analytics space are dropping like flies.  First, Bob Chatham of Forrester announced in December that he was leaving Forrester Research.  (I've been sworn to secrecy about where he's gone until it's announced, but it can't be that much of a secret.  I use Plaxo to synchronize/update my Outlook Contacts and Bob updated his business card to reflect his new position several days ago.  So if you're dying to find out, sign up for the Plaxo service.  Assuming you have Bob's Forrester e-mail address in your Outlook Contacts database, you'll get his updated contact info automatically.)

Then, on January 13th, Eric Peterson of Jupiter Research said on his blog that he was leaving Jupiter Research.

At this point, it's the analyst who has been covering the space the longest (since 1999) that's left -- me.  Forrester posted an opening for Bob's position even before he left, and I'm assuming Jupiter Research will do the same, but it usually takes awhile for a new analyst to get the lay of the land.  Or, as an unnamed CMO of a Web analytics company told me several years ago, "It usually takes me six to nine months to whip a new analyst into shape."

Given the general public's uncertainty about cookies and what Web analytics does, let's hope the new analysts are quick learners, as what we need is good, informed commentary on the subject.  And as much as I think I do a swell job, three viewpoints is better than one.

After 6 Weeks, Google Analytics Finally Open for Business Again

Today, Google finally announced on their Web site, "We're pleased to announce that we've begun re-opening signups for Google Analytics on an invitation basis."  It's certainly taken them long enough -- around six weeks by my calculation.

To review this whole story, in 2005 Google purchased Urchin, a Web analytics provider.  On November 14th, to great fanfare, it announced Google Analytics, a free Web analytics service.  The press release's headline was, "Web Analytics Free of Charge, Courtesy of Google."  Ooh, Web analytics from the "Do no evil" company -- makes you feel warm and fuzzy all over, doesn't it?

Well, customers pretty quickly got hot and bothered.  The rush to Google's offering was so great that pretty soon the system got overwhelmed -- users were having trouble logging in to their reports and the data was hours behind.  Ten days after the announcement, Google shut out new users, saying:

Over the last week, we've experienced extraordinarily high demand for Google Analytics, so much that we've had to disable new signups to ensure the best possible user experience for our customers. We are aware that some of our users have experienced a slow-down in seeing their reporting data due to the huge demand, and we're working hard to make report data as fresh and current as possible.

After six weeks, Google is starting to let new users trickle in.  While this doesn't seem to have ruffled any feathers in the press, in the IT world, if you shut out new users for that long -- say on your CRM or ERP system -- you'd be called on the carpet and perhaps fired by the CEO.  At the very least, your credibility would drop like a rock at your inability to plan for potential problems.

At the very least, Google has given a lot of ammunition to the other software as a service Web analytics vendors who charge for their solutions.  They can now rightfully point out, "Do you really want to use a free service that can't give you any kind of Service Level Agreement (SLA)?"

Windows Vista: Easier to Read

I've been futzing around with a mock-up of the Microsoft Windows Vista interface and I'm not sure I'm a big fan.  It's smoother and perhaps a bit more Apple-ish, which is a plus, but the see-through glass can get a bit much.  It's nice when you have one window open, but if you have six stacked on top of one another it just gets confusing.  Of course, since my eyes are going, maybe it's just me.

However, a really nifty piece of Microsoft Vista is the new TrueType font that the OS uses -- something called Segoe UI.  It's definitely an improvement compared to Verdana and Tahoma.  So on Windows XP I've gone in and changed the font style for things like menus and icons to use Segoe UI rather than Tahoma.  The Segoe UI typeface, in concert with Microsoft's ClearType technology (http://www.microsoft.com/typography/ClearTypeInfo.mspx), makes my screen a lot easier to read.  So why wait for Vista?  Install the Segoe UI font and enjoy one of the benefits of Windows Vista before it ships.

We Just Sell Content Management, We Don't Practice It

The new year has arrived yet a whole bunch of Web sites still think it's 2005.  Let me explain.  As an analyst, I often pay attention to details, such as copyright notices on Web sites.  If a a company updates the year promptly, it signifies to me that they're careful about the small things.

So, more than a week into 2006, how are we doing?  Well, a lot of companies are still sticking with 2005 -- including a lot of Web content management companies.  You'd think at least they'd get this one right.  After all, a common feature is the ability to set triggers for Web page changes -- for example, ensuring that the press release doesn't go up before the company has briefed the analysts.

So even though they sell the feature of automated content updating, ten out of twenty Web content management companies that I track aren't using the feature -- that is, they still have 2005 copyright notices on their own Web sites.  The laggards are ATG, BEA, CrownPeak, Day Software, Ektron, Interwoven, iUpload, Mediasurface, Open Text, and Stellent.   

Dell Strikes Again

Last night I got a call from a Dell rep.

Figuring it was a follow up to my motherboard replacement adventure, I was surprised when the woman on the other end was perky, named Julie, spoke with an American accent, and said, "Hello.  I understand you purchased a Dell computer back in July, and I was calling to find out how you liked it."

I said, "Well, the motherboard has already failed."  A certain amount of stunned silence on the other end.  I think she was about to launch into an upsell script after I followed the script and said, "Just peachy keen."  Still, to give her credit, she recovered admirably.  "Oh.  Have you called Dell Support about it?"  "Yes, and it was replaced several weeks ago."  "Oh, good."

I said, "But while I have you on the phone and you're asking how satisfied I am, I still haven't received the rebate check I was supposed to receive for the Dell laptop I purchased last January."  "Oh.  Have you e-mailed the Rebate department?"  "Oh, yes."  "Hmm, well I'll have to follow up on that.  Well, have a nice day."  Click.

I guess she figured -- with my failed motherboard and absent rebate check -- that I wasn't a super upsell candidate.  Go figure.

Structured Blogging: Compound Documents Revisited

The announcement of the Structured Blogging initiative in mid-December is an interesting one.  To take a historical perspective, it's bringing compound documents to blogging.

A "compound document" is a term that sprung up in the 90s.  Initially, word processing systems (e.g. Wang WP) and early PC word processing programs handled only words.  However, as PCs became more powerful and users could insert pictures and Excel tables into their Microsoft Word documents, the industry coined the term "compound document" to describe a document with different objects embedded in it.

History is repeating itself here.  Blogs were initially text only, but as bloggers started inserting pictures, movie reviews, etc., they got frustrated that these things they viewed as embedded objects were getting mushed all together.  Structured blogging is an attempt to define what is called "microcontent" -- different content objects, such as reviews, events, lists, and media -- so that RSS and other syndication mechanisms can better recognize them for what they are and ultimately do a better job of both syndicating and displaying them.

You can find further information on this at http://structuredblogging.org and the affiliated blog.   

Testing Dell's Support - Part 3

The saga continues.  I received a call from "John," on Tuesday, December 20th, telling me he'd be coming to my house to replace my motherboard on Wednesday, sometime between 9 and 12.  He arrived at my house at 10:25 on Wednesday in a non-descript station wagon.  No Geek Squad orange and black, no blue Dell logo plastered on the side of a van.  So I was a bit suspicious -- but then figured, who in their right mind would walk around with a Dell motherboard to talk their way into someone's house?

John, quite a personable fellow, came upstairs, quickly got to work, and left at 11:10 -- taking all of 40 minutes.  Turns out he works for BancTec and fixes PCs for Dell and HP.  In addition, I discovered why he was turning up on business day 3, rather than business day 1 as Dell specifies in their contract.  BancTec suddenly decided that their techs needed to use up all their vacation by the end of the year.  So rather than 10 techs, this week only four were available.

Before he put the case back on, John did the prudent thing and said, "I'm just going to make sure everything is where it should be," and carefully looked at the board and other innards, and discovered a connector not connected.  After a certain amount of contortions, and noting, "Next time I'm make sure to connect this first," he attached it and closed it up.  We rebooted, and the PC came up fine (other than a lot of BIOS messages early in the boot process because everything had gone back to the factory defaults).

After he left, I suddenly noticed that the PC was louder.  It's still very quiet, but every once and awhile a variable speed fan kicks in, runs for 10 seconds or so, and stops, often after the disk drive has been kachunking for awhile.  All of a sudden it was clear to me as to why the motherboard had failed.  Some bozo at the factory hadn't connected up that variable speed fan, so it never kicked in, and five months down the road the board failed.

So all in all, not too bad an experience, at least from the people side.  My PC does work, and we didn't get into the, "Well, let's try this, oops, that didn't work, hmm, let's try that, oops, that didn't work...."

Of course, they were outside their Service Level Agreement (SLA) of one business day by 200% and I still haven't received my $200+ rebate check for a Dell Inspiron 700m laptop that I bought a year ago....