Gary Angel's post on visitor segmentation based on the percentage of content a visitor viewed on a website is very helpful.  None of the tools I work with do this but I'll try to work though an example, as one one of my last posts of 2006 using Google Analytics.  

The problem is immediately apparent - While Google Analytics can segment from a geographic location to content - it can't tell you how many of those visitors viewed an area of my blog that also view site other areas of the blog.

Segment: People who visited a particular post about Noka Chocolates

You can see that Google Analytics can't tell me if the same people who came from Dallas to view this post (7 visits) also visted other content.

Using a different filter - Geolocation - Dallas viewing Content

It's possible that one person (visit) viewing my Noda Chocolates post also viewed other content like my post on the Optimus DV 5040 Digital Camera here either (did the one visitor who saw the Noka post also look at the Search box, or did they look a post on Seth Godin - can't tell.   

I tried one more thing - take a post and track the navigation to and from it - again - it's not going to solve the issue Gary Angel brought up:

It looks to me as if a higher end, more powerful package than Google Analytics is needed to do what Gary suggests we really need:

"……ability to classify visitors based on their percentage usage of an area is extremely rich. Not only does it provide the best way to classify visitors by interest, it also lets you identify special kinds of customers. In a transaction site, for example, it’s much more interesting to know the ratio of customer support pages to transactions than it is the raw number of customer support pages. The same is true when you are tying to build "interest-baskets" on a publishing site. If you just look at how many visitors who looked a X also looked at Y, you’re likely to get lots of navigational "noise." You’ll no doubt discover, for example, that your content is highly related to the home page. But if you can analyze related content by percentage of mind-share, you are getting a much richer view of how visitors actually behave."

In other words, my readout (above) would need to look something like this

<><>

 2 of the 3 visits also went to   

 and 1 went to /2006/09/the_clickfraud_elephant.html

And that's just scratching the surface.   But that's what Gary Angel is talking about - what is the visitor segment consuming the most (what are they interested in the most?)

I don't think Google Analytics, as it's presently set up, can answer those questions - that's fine - there's higher end packages that should be able to do it.

Look forward to meeting Gary when he visits NY soon.  Great Stuff - real nuts and bolts of why high end packages are needed.  Thanks for the post Gary.

Eric Peterson was tagged by Avinash Kaushik to predict the future of web analytics in 2007 (I already did that earlier today but no one tagged me to do it).

What interested me most was point 4,

"….Emetrics San Francisco will be widely proclaimed the "best ever" thanks to the combination of an interstellar line-up of speakers and a location that (finally!) says "Go out at night and PARTY!" [ Important: I have no knowledge about the speakers at Emetrics San Francisco, I just really trust Jim Sterne! ]"

Sounds like I have to go - I predict I will try to attend this conference (will have the time and money to do so).

Jason Calacanis says he's Lex Luther  - took the same Supervillain test and found out I'm Magneto.  OK, I can go for that. 

But I guess you know about me already.   Darn, now I know why metallic things seem to cling to me.

What Supervillain are you?

Second Life will become even more important in 2007 as it has become in 2006 - I just predicted it in my last post. Here's one example -  I have some pretty innovative ideas for my one Architectural House Plan client but I have to admit - many of my best ideas have already happened. 

My Cost to Build Search Engine must have been on Better Homes and Garden's drawing board when I thought of the idea - and my idea for Architectural Island - where an Architect (ie: my client) has recreations of their most popular (and eventually - all their stock house plans) in Second Life has been done already by Crescendo Design . 

I visited Crescendo Design's office in Second Life tonight to see how it was implemented - and while I did not run into anyone - my idea is totally correct - what I see for my architect is not only viable - it's here now and totally the right direction.  Gee..and I thought I was original …think again.  OK, I'll settle for being right and forward thinking.

A house in Second Life, recreated, is much superior to CAD Virtual Reality Movie; some architects have this on their sites, including Mascord.com - but you can't really "Live" in a virtual reality CAD movie - even if the recreations look more "finished'  than a house Second Life.

Here's a YouTube Movie of what Jon and Kandy Brouchoud have done in Second Life.

I did not get tagged for 2007 Predictions (I think there's another tag game going on for 2007 Predictions) but I'm going to go ahead and give my 2007 Web Predictions now. 

Web Predictions for 2007

1 - Google buys FeedBurner and Quantcast - merges both platforms into it's own - providing the first Web Analytics Platform/Product that provides RSS Feed/Podcast data and Audience Measurement/Geo-Demographics data in one place. 

Google Analytics becomes the De Facto analytics package/platform for small and midsized businesses.  The remaining big 4 Web Analytics vendors (Visual Sciences/HBX, WebTrends, Omniture and Coremetrics) will fight over the high end customers while giving up entirely on the low end customers.  ClickTracks will be stuck in the middle to fight it out and will have a harder time. 

2 - Google Fatigue starts setting in for many as Google's growth continues to lead it to act similar to Microsoft, HP and IBM.  Google's motto of "Do No Evil" is slowly continuing to erode, and this has already been noted this year; Google becomes too big to be as revolutionary as it has been (yet this is what people expect Google to be).  Nothing much changes but people start looking for the next big thing - which may not be Google. 

Google's shares stay in the 400 dollar range.  Google considers splitting itself into 4 divisions to maintain nimbleness - but waits till 2008 to restructure (and lays off about 10% of it's workforce in the restructuring - again, in 2008).

3 -Certain Web 2.0 Widgets become very popular in 2007 (ie: 3D Avatars from Gizmoz - everyone wants their own) - Widget Analytics comes into it's own and the Page view is no longer considered a metric worth looking at (it's already dead and buried but people still collect the data - we'll no longer bother to collect pageviews by end of 2007).

4-Online Video continues gain importance and YouTube becomes crucial as communications medium for Politicians running for office, as we're already seeing with John Edwards - and this is just the start - Much more to come.  RSS Feeds will become crucial (which is another reason why Google must buy FeedBurner - see prediction 1) to politics and FeedBurners' metrics for Feeds and Blogs are the most widely used.

5 - Second Life becomes crucial for many businesses (which it's more of curiosity for most now); right now most Large Corporations are in the process of creating presences in Second Life and in 2007 many more small and medium businesses will do so.  By the end of 2007, there will be close to 7 million residents of Second Life - almost triple the current population of 2 million+.

6- Ultra Mobile PC's begin to replace mobile phones in 2007 as the dominant device people use to collect information.  Certain Ultra Mobile PC's have mobile phone capability added to them - and the price of Ultra Mobile PC's continues to drop with a major Ultra Mobile PC being available for 399 by next Christmas.

That's it.  I think many of my predictions have a good chance of happening.  I hope to get 4 out of 6 (or better) a year from now.  I don't have any predictions for Social Media right now, or Net Neutrality, or Governmental Controls of Media - or anything in particular for Blogs - I think it will all continue to grow - won't set any marks as to where all this will be at the end of 2007.

I'm reading "Second Life" The Official Guide - which is pretty helpful to me as I don't have much experience with Second Life and there's a lot I want to find out about.

The other book I just ordered was a tip from Steve Rubel (BTW, I tried to add my blog to his list on del.icio.us  (but I don't know how to add webmetricsguru.com - or for that fact, artnewyorkcity.com).

The other book I just ordered today is called Start Your Own Blogging Business (Startup)

Let me be clear - the last thing I want to do is start a blog network - or anything like that - but I'm curious to see what Entrepreneur magazine says you need to do to make money on blogging.   I already make money on my blogs - but I don't control the advertising directly (except by the topics of what I write about, I suppose). 

I'll review both books once I finish reading them.  The Second Life book is pretty good so far - but it's just about the only book on Second Life now, and it was just published a couple of weeks ago.

There's a Super Hero Test/Quiz - you answer the questions and find out which SuperHero your most like.  The test said I'm most like Spider Man.  Hmm…don't know if I'd agree with that - I'd see myself more like Iron Man, Dr. Strange or Thor - not Spider Man.   I found out about the test from B.L. Ochman, who's the most like Wonder Woman.

Your results:
You are Spider-Man

Spider-Man 80% Hulk 80% Superman 70% Batman 70% Green Lantern 70% Robin 55% Catwoman 50% Supergirl 40% The Flash 35% Iron Man 30% Wonder Woman 20% You are intelligent, witty, a bit geeky and have great power and responsibility. Click here to take the "Which Superhero are you?" quiz…

According to B.L. Ochman:

"…I'm Wonder Woman. But I could have told you that. :>)

Jason Calacanis is Green Lantern. What Super Hero are you? And how come there are so many superhero references everywhere all of a sudden?"

I guess it's true - the big pink elephant standing the the middle of the room - the one everyone tries to ignore - but can't. 

What David wrote to me yesterday about Nielsen Netratings suing other web analytics vendors for patent infringement, on the face of it, is true.  

According to David, who wrote me earlier:

"…If you go to NetRatings.com, click on press releases and search for Patent you can find out more about their patent "enforcement" program. This has also been a prominent topic in their last several earnings calls which you can probably find online too.

Netratings has been on a patent acquisition spree for the last several
years, almost all of their patents have been purchased. These patents were originally filed by such companies as Red Sheriff (AU), Engage and Media Metrix.

"NetRatings? patent portfolio includes United States Patent Nos.
5,675,510; 5,796,952; 6,108,637; 6,115,680; 6,138,155; 6,643,696 and 6,763,386"…

And I did do exactly what David said and found 141 documents - many of them focused on patent enforcement.

Just got quoted by Robert Scoble on my post about John Edwards announcing his candidacy on YouTube. 

I had a couple more thoughts - many ideas "come to me" as I write, sorta like inspiration - and now that see his staffers logging onto my blog to take a look (saw 40-50 coming on in the last hour or so) it's a good time to mention thoughts I've had about political metrics.  

First, using Scoble's mention it was easy to identify  traffic pattern of Edwards' staffers as they all came to my homepage (they did not find it on search engines - the referral was Scoble's mention of me). 

Thanks Robert - we've met once or twice - very briefly at Webmasterworld Pubcon Boston last year and the another blogging conference in NYC in 2005. 

Here's what Scoble had to say:

"…..By the way, I sat next to reporters from Washington Post and Los Angeles Times. They told me they pay every part of the trip and won’t accept free travel or other things.

The problem is how do average citizens do trips like this and get access if they have to pay their own way? That’s going to be a problem. Maybe bloggers should start an association to pay for their own representatives to go on trips like this. That way we’ll make sure we keep our independence and credibility, while getting access to things like this.

Heheh, the staff is looking at Webmetrics right now to see what kind of increase in mentions they are seeing on the Web."

Sounds like a great opportunity - don't think I could afford to pay my own way (or have the time to do it right now - but I'm glad John Edwards is embracing bloggers - and it sound like a great place to be).   I can contribute with metrics, thoughts about it, at this point.  It also would be nice to be able to blog about this from time to time.  It's nice to see bloggers being embraced - because it's been shown that bloggers are influentials.

I think Howard Dean started this (using the Internet effectively to mobilize - but I think more is possible - and not everything needs to be created from scratch)

FeedBurner is improving it's RSS Feed Metrics - and it looks like you'll be able to geolocate RSS subscribers.   I believe the candidate that can best organize their subscribers will probably win (even against "voting irregularities" - which seem to be something you can almost "expect" - might as well plan around them).

There's a lot of problems with trying to Geo Locate Subscribers as not everyone can be geolocated easily (when I'm at work it looks like I'm in Durham, NC when I'm really in NYC) but there are also workarounds and new solutions (which I occasionally hear about).

Perhaps the best solution for a candidate, at this point, is to create custom RSS Feeds for each subscriber - and collect the address of that subscriber when they sign-up (and be able to match up the data you collect on each subscriber with the web data - even programs like Salesforce.com can do some of this - it's hooking up the data with web metrics that's the hardest thing to do); you can then track the activity of each subscriber, perhaps on several levels.  Here's when it gets interesting.  I think the technology can support this right now; but it does take planning.

In theory(I haven't done it - but I can "see it") - you can segment by location - see how your doing (forget about the pollsters - look at your metrics and make your own decisions based on good data - which, again, might not always be easy to get - have to PLAN for it NOW). 

…instead of those expensive "phone calls" just before election day - that no one listens to - because they're "unremarkable" and too obtrusive (aka Seth Godin) - he knows what makes something "remarkable" - you get RSS feed message- right down to the district level - to the block level from the candidate.

Think how powerful that can be - if its done well (and it's inexpensive, actually)

Using metrics you might  be able to set it up to determine how many have "read" the messages and have a good idea of who's going to actually SHOW UP and vote.

You can also mobilize before elections by sending out personalized messages via RSS.

At this time, you'd not want to let the number of subscribers (sign-ups, if you want to call it that) you have in every district of the country be public knowledge - but you want to know how many you have (and how many you need to have in every district to win) and you'll be able to communicate via RSS Feeds to your subscribers by district - (by block level - if you have to).  It's all in the planning.

You can supplement all of this with Podcasts (which you can track the number of downloads of), Videocasts, emails (which you'd want to tie into metrics as well).  All of this actually makes human contact possible (it does not take away the human element - it actually augments it).

If you have a large enough subscriber base - and it's coordinated (and backed up well) …..  That's what I saw today - it just "came" to me.

So, every district has a goal - what you need to have to win in that district (you'll know that that goal is).  OK, not everyone is computer literate - not everyone is going to want to get data in RSS Feeds, not everyone uses Meetup.com (which is pretty darn sophisticated - it's gotten possible to datamine it as well) - so you still have to do regular media buys - but not nearly as much.  Much more can be accomplished this way, I feel.

I would also think in terms of having a license to HitWise (more for trending - no service is good enough to bank on - but with HitWise you can do "cause and effect" tracking based on traffic which is not really possible to do with the free tools out there - they're not precise enough in my opinion.  If your going to spend money - spend it on RSS feed development, HitWise and possibly Brand Pulse (for feedback). 

Why Brand Pulse (or something like it)?   Because your going to need to be able to pickup and categorize positive and negative feedback from blogs and message boards and mainstream media very quickly - and the free tools can't do it - but the more advanced and (expensive) tools can.  Sure, you can get some talented programmers to write you something like this - but it's probably more effective to just use what's actually out there - because a lot of money and time has gone into developing these tools - in this case - you'll probably want the best tools for metrics.

Categorization is the key - it's the key to web analytics - it's probably also the key to this.   By the way, all of these tools are a drop in the bucket to what you'd pay for one or two MSM commercials.  Perhaps BrandPulse would be the most expensive part (depends on how customized you want to track feedback).

IN order to understand all this "data" that's flooding in - you need to be able to categorize it QUICKLY - so the campaign can make a decision on it.  At least, to understand what might be happening - so you can do something about it.

One thing that's become clear - as technology has evolved - the ability to react
quickly has become even more important - a debate is constantly going on and you need to be "plugged in" or it still goes on but without your participation.

Look what happened to Dell when they had "burning laptops" and did not immediately counter (they waited a month to start a blog); or the famous Kryptonite Lock issue, or even this new thing with the Microsoft / Edelman ACER Vista Laptops they were giving away free to bloggers (to review Vista) - in one day - Microsoft had to change their story about the laptops (and that may have been too long). 

Another thought - and it's all around us now - Second Life.   Sure, the population of Second Life is only 2 million or so, and only 20,000 are online at any time, so far, but it's possible - perhaps - to put some thought into having a presence there - in Second Life.

For one thing - it's a way to bypass space and time (to have virtual meetings where it's not possible to be together physically) and also, high end businesses have been embracing Second Life.   It's an idea I've floated to some of my clients (ie: if your an architect - and one of mine is - how about having an Island in Second Life with some of the best house plans the architect's firm creates - so you can be "inside of one" and then make a decision about it.   Or say…the Edwards campaign has an office in "Second Life" and anyone who wants to ….visit the Edwards "office" can just go there whenever they want.  Why not?  It makes sense to me.

For example, you could hold press conferences in Second Life - along with real life conferences - and this will be covered very well in BLOGS -which is a segment you want to reach and fan.

Finally- custom development of Widgets that can make it easier to communicate with the campaign and coordinate are probably a good way to spend money - again.  Except - you also want to go after the 3G mobile technology….. why?  Because many of the people who are going to vote - whose votes you need use mobile devices as their primary communication device - you can see that by reading Smartmobs.com, where I also post to.  And the Mobile phone - will also give the campaign the ability to mobilize people on the ground, in real time.

Eventually, this will lead to the next class of mobile devices - Ultra Portable Mobile PC's which are now coming on the market - for the same prices as the most expensive mobile phones.  Anyway - it's fair to say 2008 will be dominated by the Internet - by mobile communication, perhaps by Second Life, and certainly by RSS Feeds (along with Podcasts and Vidcasts, etc).  The metrics need to be built around that - all of it - and in a way where you can take the data and utilize it, in real time, on a district by district basis.   If you have the districts down, you have the city, if you have the city's and suburbs, you have the states, if you have states (enough of them) you have the country.   I've rambled enough on this tonight.

I hope this helps and I'm glad for link from Scoble - that's a first for me. Thanks Robert.

I've written about politics a couple of times over the last year, most recently in "Political Metrics" and I've noticed the buzz generated by John Edwards candidacy for President has generated in the blogosphere - just looking at the blogs I read.  I found it insightful as I wrote a post about Smartmobbing the next US Election  last April.

Look at the Buzz John Edwards is getting (it's higher than Hillary Clinton or Barrack Obama) - to me that's an indicator of support; though it's too early in this process to make much of it.

I think it's pretty smart to use YouTube to announce Edwards candidacy - people are using online video now as much as or more than TV; I know that for a fact - and it's all the talk at every conference I attend.    The fact of the matter - those people who end up voting in the next election will probably also be computer literate - a lot of them.  Why go and spend a ton of money to advertise on TV and Radio when you can do it….more or less…..for FREE on YouTube and other online media.   Sure, Edwards will have to spend some money - but he can also target a lot better using online media than TV and Radio broadcasts - or outdoor banner ads (although outdoor ads can be very effective if placed properly).

And measurement of all of this - is where we get the metrics (the one's we really don't have yet…do we?)  We don't do good tracking of online media for political campaigns (and there's probably no laws on this yet anyway).

One thing you could look at is the number of RSS Subscribers per candidate's web feeds - that should tell you something (if they even collect that yet).  You can reasonably expect that 99% of people subscribed to a candidates web feed are supporters and a good number of them will vote for the candidate where the next election comes along (in 2008 in this case).

Here's what's I have noticed so far about John Edward's Candidacy

Seth Godin calls John Edwards The YouTube President; the idea is the candidate that wins national elections is the one that best masters the newest communications technologies available - like what John Kennedy did against Richard Nixon in 1960.

"….John F. Kennedy was the TV president. The debates got him elected and his newsreel footage lives on. (When was the last time you saw Eisenhower in a video clip?)

That began an era of politics that lasted more than forty years. That's why it costs hundreds of millions of dollars to run for President."

Talk Left also likes the Edwards Candidacy

"…John Edwards is running a different campaign this time around. It's great to see him take such a strong progressive stand:

Edwards said it's not just Iraq that it is chaos and in need of moral leadership from the United States. He said the United States should be leading an end to genocide in Sudan and to atrocities in northern Uganda. He also said the United States should be part of the International Criminal Court, something that Bush has fought against to keep Americans from facing politically motivated prosecutions."

Someone else noted the video had only been viewed 10,000 times but I just looked and as of right now, it's had 58,000+ views.   Let's look at the metrics YouTube provides for a minute (BTW, here's something I'd like Google do do a lot more with ….Online Video Metrics).

Views: 54,688 / Comments: 98  / Favored: 58 times / more stats…

• Honors for This Video:

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