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What is
WebTrends?
WebTrends, Inc. is a
private company headquartered in Portland, Oregon.
It provides web analytics and other software
solutions related to marketing intelligence. The
company was founded in 1993 and now serves more
than 10,000 firms ranging in size from small
companies to large enterprises. [1]
WebTrends Analytics
WebTrends Analytics is a Web analytics tool
which collects and presents information about user
behaviour on web sites. It collects data from Web
server log files augmented with information from
client-side scripts, presents results through a
graphic user interface, and can present a large
variety of data and analyses on many different
kinds of web sites. The report presentation
interface is highly configurable, allowing the
administrator to select specific information to
present. It has a large number of configuration
parameters, and requires the administrator to
understand HTTP and other Web technologies in
detail. WebTrends Analytics can require
considerable resources and governance for web sites
with high traffic.
Presentation of collected data
The WebTrends Analytics interface presents
reports such as top pages, referrers, search words,
visitor information, etc. in detailed tables, with
some drill-down options. The data is also normally
presented in graphs, although these require Java
runtime environment, and are not always as detailed
as the tabular data. Although in the latest version
(8.5) the use of Java has been removed for
displaying graphical information. It has been
replaced with flat files (gifs)
Practical uses
Web analytics reporting is useful to analyze
and understand
• User behavior on each particular page of
the site
• User navigational behavior between pages
on the site
• Task execution by users
• Referrals from search engines
• User behavioral and demographic data
• Advertising results
Web analytics reporting is often used to improve
web site design, such as
• Improving conversion of visitors to sales
and subscriptions
• Streamlining website navigation
Collection of data
There are two ways to collect data:
Built-in Tracking / SDC
WebTrends can collect data using its own
collecting mechanism (SmartSource Data Collector /
SDC), where data is collected by implementing a 4Kb
script on each page of the website, which then
collects a myriad of variables about the user
including:
• the page being visited
• the page which was just left (assuming
that the user entered the site via a link, or came
from a page within the tracking realm)
• revisit information (assuming the user
has visited the site before)
• IP address
• country code
• screen resolution
• browser and browser version
• window size
• JavaScript support
• regional settings.
Accurate reporting depends on cookies and
JavaScript being enabled on the user's client.
Web Server Logs
WebTrends can analyze Web server logs, both
current and historical. Client-side tracking is
unnecessary.
Web server logs may not contain full sufficient
information for some kinds of analysis.
Current version & Brief version
history
WebTrends Analytics prior to Version 6.0 was
primarily a log analyzer.
Version 6.0 became more a hosted application -
with a central server - analyzing logs on a
scheduled basis and presenting the reports on a
need basis thru a login interface.
WebTrends has undergone big changes in the
application and the interface from Version 6.x to
Version 7.x. The most visible changes are a cleaner
interface, more features, and support for new
technologies. An important internal change was the
new focus on client-side tracking for increased
accuracy.
From Version 7.5 (last 7 version) to Version 8.0
there were only minor visible changes. Multiple
features were modified, altered and in other ways
improved. Some features were added.
Version 8.1 of WebTrends is a completely
redesigned tool and was released on July 31,
2007.
Version 8.5 of Webtrends now features calculated
measures and Enhanced Media/RSS and Web 2.0
Tracking out of the box
Version 8.6 was released in October 2008. The
release featured "WebTrends Connect" which provides
7 access points to data.
WebTrends Ad Director
WebTrends Ad Director is an automated
optimization solution for management of paid search
advertising. The technology evaluates combinations
of networks, keywords, positions, creative, and
landing pages, then allocates advertising dollars
to the top-performing combinations across major
search networks, including Google, MSN and Yahoo!.
[2]
WebTrends Open Exchange
WebTrends Open Exchange is a partnership network
of related marketing technologies that integrate
with WebTrends products. The Open Exchange
partnerships fall into nine technology categories -
ad serving, content management, customer
relationship management, email marketing,
enterprise campaign management, site search,
targeting and optimization, users experience, and
web site monitoring. Integrations exist with both
mid-market and enterprise solutions such as
Percussion and Interwoven (content management),
ExactTarget and Responsys (email marketing), and
Microsoft Dynamics CRM (customer relationship
management). [3]
WebTrends Visitor Intelligence
WebTrends Visitor Intelligence at the core of
this tool is comprehensive "Interest Profile" that
combines a person's online behavior with offline
customer data, such as CRM or demographics to build
insight into a person over time. This insight,
combined with analysis and multi-dimensional
reporting, gives enterprise organizations the
ability to answer questions that are critical to
improving marketing ROI
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