To say Webtrends Analytics has been around the block a few times is like saying Google is just another search engine.
In the world of commercial website analytics and logfile analysis, Webtrends is one of the first. I remember using Webtrends for logfile analysis quite a few years ago and the depth of information you could get was incredible. If your webserver was logging it, then Webtrends could pull it into a nice report with graphs.
Today, however, Webtrends has become a much more sophisticated analytics package. Even so, they’ve still maintained their logfile roots (but I’ll get to that later).
Webtrends has 4 versions of their analytics package available: Standard, Marketing, Advanced Marketing and Ecommerce. Each version offers a variety of options.
Standard is, quite obviously, the most compact version while the otheres build on features found in the one before it. With standard you get Key Metrics, Performance Dashboard, 5-Point Scenario Analysis, Visual Path and Content Analysis, Scenario Conversion Analysis, Geographic Reporting, On-site Advertising, and Basic Search Engine Reporting. The other versions include these plus additional features. If all you need is basic analysis and reporting, standard will probably do for you.
If, however, you feel you need more then I’d recommend opting for one of the larger packages. Particularly if you sell product online (ecommerce) or need more robust reporting.
Standard Features
Looking at the standard features, you can see that Webtrends offers similar features to other popular analytics packages. Thinks like path and content analysis, search engine reporting, geographic reporting and basic conversion analysis are all items you find in even the most basic analytics package today. “5-Point Scenario Analysis” however isn’t something that you find in a lot of analytics packages.
Many analytics packages offer conversion analysis. And some even offer it in a funnel-like way. Webtrends uses this type of conversion analysis not just for ecommerce transactions, however. With it you can analyze any converison, from form submittals, to email requests to shopping cart transactions.
Marketing Package Features
In addition to the standard features listed above, the marketing package includes Campaign Performance Dashboard, Campaign Reporting, and Advanced Search Engine Reporting (Paid and Organic).
As the name suggests, this package is geared towards marketers. One nice feature found in this package is the campaign reporting:
As you can see from this screenshot, Webtrends has the ability to track your campaigns, whether they are PPC, email, print, banners, advertising partners or any other campaign you’d like to track. In addition, you can track the performance of individual terms in your PPC campaign. It even allows for A/B testing so that you can compare how different versions of the same campaign performed, as well as compare performance between campaigns.
Advanced Marketing Package
The advanced marketing package builds on the features of the other 2 packages but also includes Custom Reports, and Custom Segmentation. That means you can build custom reports suited to your organization or individuals within the organization.
Further, as your requirements change, so can your custom reports and segments.
Commerce Package
The commerce package is designed to not only track search engine and campaign performance but also product performance on the website. In addition to all the features listed above it includes Products Performance Dashboard, and Merchandising Reporting .
Using Webtrends Product drilldown you can get a complete view of how your ecommerce business is doing, from an individual product up to the top level category performance. Further, the drilldown can be organized to match existing product schemas. For example, if you have a product listing prefence which you use to replenish your inventory, then you can recreate that structure with Webtrends so that it mimics your order sheet.
But the best part is….
One of the things I’ve always thought that Webtrends did better than any one else was log file analysis. More specifically reporting on that analysis. With a little customization you could produce an abundance of reports that traditional tag type anaytics can’t. For example, with Webtrends log analysis I can quickly tell you what search engine spiders came to a site, what paths they followed and what roadblocks, if any, they encountered.
Since spiders don’t execute Javascript (which a lot of other analytics packages use to track visitors) their activity can’t be recorded.
With Webtrends you have the best of both worlds. Pages can be tagged but in addition you can use it to perform log analysis in addition to the tagging. Thus you get the advantage of live stats with the reliability of log analysis.
