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#3 Deconstructing the TC40: GotStatus

#3 in my “deconstructing the TC40″ series (see #1, #2).

GotStatus. Analytics for back-end, server-side stuff.

Summary: Gets a “hold” rating from me. Tech sounds good, value is there, but target market is too small.

The Proposition: GotStatus claims to be the “Google Analytics” of the server-side. The goal is to make gather statistics (about your database performance, for example) as simple and as powerful as Google has made gather stats about your user’s experiences.

Value Add: Monitoring site health is an often complex process. GotStatus wants to make it simple.

Warning Bells: Sites that are big enough to need serious-server side metrics are already getting them through professional IT shops, packages like WebTrends, and built-in transaction logging systems. Sites small enough to not have access to these resources I’d say are generally small enough to not need server side metrics in any serious way at all. In other words, GotStatus is targeting a very small middle ground: companies that are big enough to need server metrics but small enough to not have “professional” means of accessing them. How big is this market?

analytics, gotstatus, tc20, tc40 techcrunch

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Another Suggestion for Google Analytics - “Link Event” Alerts

Yes, sharing Analytics would be great, but that’s not my only suggestion.

As a new blogger, I’m particularly attuned to “Link Events” - those anomalies where traffic spikes like crazy due to a mention on another site, getting Dugg, or whatever. Often I don’t find out about these till the next day when Google Analytics has updated; that’s a big missed opportunity as I try to capitalize on link events by putting out a custom message targeted to visitors from a specific page.

So - here’s what Google could do for me: based on Analytic’s knowledge of my average daily traffic, send me an SMS and an Email when there’s a link event and traffic is surging. Tell me:

1. The time it started.
2. The referrering domain and page.
3. How much traffic I’m getting per minute.

Do this in real time. I don’t care if the main analytics readout doesn’t update for a few hours, but use your datastores to make time-sensitive info available when its needed.

Theoretically other services could provide this as well - whos.amung.us, for instance, or MyBlogLog, or the WordPress Stats plugin. Maybe this service is being offered already somewhere? If so, please let me know.

analytics, google, linkevent, mybloglog, suggestion., techfold wordpress

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Google Buying Feedburner; Feeds are another media like Radio, Print, or WWW

TC breaks it: GOOG is buying Feedburner for 100M. WatchMojo covers the origins of FB’s 10 million in VC funding, DeepJive says it only makes sense, and SEW sums up some good advantages for Google.

Holistic Analytics and Advertising

From where I’m sitting, it make sense. Feeds have been out in left field for a long time in terms of a consistent means of measuring their audience and impact on site traffic; with this acquisition and their existing analytics portfolio, Google has a means to connect all of the dots and create a truly holistic means of looking at sites.

Of course this also means that Google can expand their ad inventory as well, offering feeds as another media channel to advertisers. Feeds have evolved into another “media,” so to speak, and as Google has tried to expand into print and radio, so they are taking a stab at RSS.

Creepy

One final thought: as is mentioned more and more, Google’s reach is sort of creeping me out. The Internet is increasingly at the mercy of Google’s “Don’t be Evil” motto - here’s hoping they stick to it.

analytics, feedburner, google, news, rss, stats techcrunch

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Hey Scobleizer: Here’s a Solution for Web Stats

Scoble blogs tonite on how stats services generally seem to suck: they don’t agree with each other, they don’t agree with server logs, they don’t match up with experience.

The same frustration drove me to posting weeks ago when I proposed a unique solution: Google should let web masters make a subset of their Analytics data public. Of course, this doesn’t address Scoble’s questions about the conceptual thinking about stats - i.e.: are pageviews still relevant?

The original post is here. The gist of it, quoting myself:

Adding a “Sharing” option to Google Analytics and surfacing stats in “site:” searches (for those site owners who have elected the sharing option in their Analytics account) would do the job nicely. Let site owners control the degree of information shared, keep everything opt-in, and rock and roll. I know I’d share my high-level views & visits stats in a second. In addition to providing all of the value Alexa does, it would also add a layer of transparency to making ad-buys - something else I would appreciate.

I still think this would be a great idea, and would be more than happy to share my stats this way. What about you?

alexa, analytics, compete, google, scoble, scobleizer stats

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E-Skating.com - I can see your stats in Google Analytics

My partner-in-crime at HDDb.net and UpcomingDiscs.com logged into Google Analytics this morning and was surprised to have access to the stats of e-Skating.com - a French cross-country skiing site with which we are definitely not affiliated, and have most definitely not added in Analytics.

Is this a demo site or something for the beta? Or is this a legitimate error?

analytics, error, google, privacy, skiing, stats xcskiing

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