This is in continuation to previous blog post “Actionable Web Analytics part-1”, in which we discussed about web analytics and its benefits. In this post we will discuss some more benefits.

1.   Trial to non-trial conversion

All the trial users can be effectively monitored by their application usage so that eventually they can be converted to subscribed/paid users. Using web analytics one can:

a.   Identify critical success factors for trial to non-trial user conversion such as frequency of usage and which features are being tested by the user etc

b.   Analyze the failed cases and make the program robust by focused marketing and training efforts to the trial users who are using the application sparingly. (more…)

Web analytics has evolved to become a serious business now. Gone are the days when web analytics was something you just added on to your application as an afterthought but today, it is considered a major feature that gets discussed up front in business circles when planning for a Web application and building a business case. What exactly is driving this tremendous change for Web analytics? To answer that we need to review the myriad business benefits you can get out of Web analytics provided you have planned and designed for it.

Web analytic tools can collect, analyze, measure and report on Internet data which will help in understanding user behavior and application usage. The data captured using other sources, like CRM tools, can only help inform reactive action and not proactive measures. For example, it is possible to identify how many users cancelled their subscriptions using tools like sales force, but not how many users will cancel. With Web analytics, customer usage patterns and associated pain points can be identified up front and that can help companies be proactive about those pain points and, hopefully, in the end game, retain those “at risk” subscriptions.  But, that is just one example out of many more “business benefits” you can expect to get out of using web analytics. (more…)

At some point in time, you will come across the need to select and implement a web content management (WCM) system. There is no single best WCM system that will meet all organizations’ needs. The WCM has to be selected based on your business goals and benefits you want to achieve from the system. With this context, how do you choose from the scores of available WCM systems in the market place?

Here are the steps and some best practices that we have used in selecting WCM system for our customers (more…)

In the last post we discussed issues faced by organizations while dealing with rapidly evolving media convergence. In this post we will try to highlight some exciting solutions to tackle the issues.

• Multi-Channel Publishing and Content Reuse: This is indeed the central theme of media convergence: organizations need to reuse the existing content and deliver the same across multiple media channels after content repurposing. Traditional content management systems (CMS) lack the ability to carry out multi-channel publishing since media like mobile or social media are relatively recent phenomenon. However using proper integration touch points organizations can get a start on this. Start small and gradually incorporate more channels to your content ecosystem. There are multiple mobile publishing systems in the market these days. After careful evaluation on features and interoperability with your traditional web CMS, integrate the two using standard APIs (application programming interface). Your web CMS will be the primary repository of content and its management whereas mobile CMS will allow you to repurpose the content with proper presentation layers based on device types. You can read more on publishing on mobile channel in this post. (more…)

Now that the US mid term elections are over, it is time to get back to work.  This week is Gartner’s ITxpo in Cannes, France.  Two weeks ago, they held the sister event in Orlando, Florida.  The Florida event was heavily attended, with some veterans comparing it to 1999 or 2000.  Any conference or event that can compare its attendance to any time pre 9/11 would be considered wildly successful.  Does that performance provide insight into IT pressures in the coming months?  Are these conferences accurate predictors of business climate?  And, if they are indicators of coming trends, what should IT personnel be looking for? (more…)

Part One of this post discussed key steps taken in the inception phase of gathering requirements for a COTS package. Part two will discuss key steps taken in the second phase of the process; the implementation phase.

Implementation Phase

Requirement Strategy: As the name suggests, this phase will involve implementing the WCM package that we have already selected based on our inception phase effort. This particular phase can be broadly categorized into following activities. (more…)

Gathering requirements for a Commercial off the Shelf (COTS) package, like any Web Content Management package, comes in two phases. This blog post will be split into two parts and will discuss these two phases. The first part will talk about the inception phase which involves capturing broad strategic level requirements to help organizations select the right package within a given time frame. The second part will discuss the implementation phase which involves elaborating further on those requirements and additional ones to help the design and development teams implement the package. The strategy, time, granularity and the types of requirements artifacts captured in both of these phases are quite different but equally essential in ensuring end success of the project. Let us discuss some of the key steps involved in these phases from a requirement gathering perspective. (more…)