In this week’s reading, Stoke’s discusses the two main technology approaches for collecting Web analytics data; log-file analysis and page tagging. Log-file analysis software is used to interpret data on a server.  In contrast, page tagging, sends data to a third-party server for data interpretation.  Sometimes, both are used together to analyze a website. The information that is captured can be broken down into three metrics: Count, Ratio, and key performance indicators.

Chapter 15 continues on to explain how and what to test: behavior data, outcomes, and the user experience. Behavior data can be used to indicate intent, outcomes to meet or measure expectations, and experience looking at why users acted the way they did. 

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  There are four ways to further explore the user experience: A/B splitting, Multivariate testing, Listening labs, and single page heat maps. These are used to understand why users behave in a certain way on the website.


The most important skill i learned over the past two weeks was familiarizing myself with the AdWords  tools, particularly with the keyword tools.  There are vast amounts of words and phrases that never occurred to me when formulating the list on my own. However with the help of these tools provided by Goggle i was able to come up with a list of almost 800 keywords and phrases.

I am still finding it difficult to blog. I am somewhat afraid that my blog is public and can be viewed by anyone in the world. It does help to talk about it and ironically i am doing so ON A BLOG! I hope to continue improving my blogging skills. It may help that i am presenting on the topic in 28 minutes.