Google has revamped its analytics tools, with free real-time data and a new system for enterprise customers called GA Premium, charging $150,000 a year.
Until now, Google’s free analytics tool had a lag of at least an hour or so before most data would show, and a 24-hour lag on full data reporting.
The new Google Analytics Real-Time tool offers an instant look at a site’s active-visit count. It began rolling out Thursday to some users and will be available to all users in the next few weeks, Google said in a blog post.
Google has also rolled out the first part of a complete user-interface overhaul and introduced Google Analytics Premium, its first paid offering for larger websites.
While Google’s free offering tops out its data collection at 10 million website visitors per month, its new paid plan offers more data collection, additional modeling tools and service support.
For a fixed cost of $150,000 (£96,000) a year in the US, it will offer 24/7 customer support, robust data processing and service guarantees.
According to Google, the paid for tool will enable advertisers and businesses to measure the impact of a campaign within four hours of it going live.
Hundreds of thousands of companies use the free version of Google Analytics to monitor campaign activity. But many large corporates use premium paid-for services by the likes of IBM and Adobe. Google will hope to encourage such clients to now switch to its own premium service.
Enrique Munoz Torres, senior product manager at Google, said, “Even though we’re very proud of our standard Google Analytics product, there are some important gaps, especially when it comes to enterprises. If something is broken, they want to be able to call someone. And even if something is not broken, and they want help with implementation and have any questions, they want to talk to a human and get answers right away.”
The service will initially be rolled out in the UK, US and Canada, with a full global roll out expected later.
Companies will be able to purchase the product either directly from Google or via one of its three authorised Google Analytics Premium resellers. In the UK these are ConversionWorks , I Spy and ivantage.
Google has been running a pilot programme in the UK to bring in resellers and ivantage has just been approved to sell and support it in the UK.
Matt Trimmer, managing director of ivantage (one of the GA Premium resellers), said: “We are delighted to be chosen as an approved reseller for Google Analytics Premium. It’s testament to the level of service and expertise we have developed with the Google Analytics Standard Edition product over the years. GA premium is an enterprise version of the hugely popular and free-to-use Google Analytics Standard Edition and we are excited to be one of the first wave of premium sellers.”
Google Analytics launched in late 2005 on the heels of Google’s acquisition of analytics software maker Urchin. Google doesn’t release its user statistics, but analysts estimate that the immensely popular free tool has millions of users.
Although Google remains tight lipped on precise numbers, the new product has been in pilot for the past year with a host of household name clients including Travelocity, Gucci, and Papa Johns.
Read the offical launch blog here.
http://analytics.blogspot.com/2011/09/whats-happening-on-your-site-right-now.html
