SwellPath Interactive

Web analytics education has an active been subject of my life in several ways in the last couple weeks, so I thought I’d throw together a post covering my thoughts on the subject, what I’ve been up to, and what others have been up. First up, I’m officially ramped up to be Webtrends go-to trainer for Webtrends for Marketing Professionals: Fundamentals I and Fundamentals II, as well as their new course in Advanced Analytics. I’m really excited about that last one because it covers essentials for aspiring expert analysts, gets into advanced use of Webtrends, spends a good bit of time covering how to sell-in analytics in your organization, and includes an actual certification. After getting reacquainted with the materials, I highly recommend these courses for Webtrends clients. A few days of training can have a major impact on the evolution of your analytics program, and the value any marketing professional can personally derive from having a strong understanding of web analytics.

I previously posted about how I had the pleasure of teaching a couple of lessons for Aaron Gray as part of a course he is teaching at Portland State University called Measuring & Optimizing Your Website. I already wrote a blog post on that, so I won’t say much more about it, other than the presentations are now up on the SwellPath SlideShare account. There is Getting Started with Google Analytics and Getting Started with Google Website Optimizer.

A couple weeks ago I also had the pleasure of talking to Greg Holiat who recently received the University of British Columbia Certificate of Achievement in Web Analytics. It was great to get a first hand account of the program, and how it had directly benefited him. I was impressed with how enthusiastic he was about the program, and his well-rounded knowledge of web analytics. Similarly, this week I was speaking with Dash Levine, who is taking the Data Warehousing and Business Intelligence course through the University of California – Irvine, and he had nothing but good things to say about the course.

Finally, the Web Analytics Association launched a new site this week, which (besides looking great) has a section now dedicated to the new WAA certification program. Greg Holiat is volunteering with WAA to help finalize the certification program, and he was giving me the details on it. I’m looking forward to seeing this become a standard for all practitioners in the industry.

There are some other programs and certifications out there (e.g. the Google Analytics Individual Qualification); so don’t consider this post all inclusive, and I encourage you to contact me if you need any more info on any this. I don’t entirely have a point here, other than how great it is to see all of this effort in the industry to educate and certify web analytics professionals. We have vendors, academic institutions, and industry organizations all stepping up. Obviously they all are going to focus on slightly different aspects of analytics and measurement, but the core intention is the same: to fill in the gap in knowledge that exists in the online marketing and business community about web analytics. I’d love our clients and partners at various interactive agencies take an interest in these offerings; a more educated “consumer” will really help analytics really move to “2.0″ and beyond.

SwellPath was mentioned in a recent Portland Business Journal article on web analytics. It was great to get our first mention in the PBJ, as we are avid readers, subscribers, and frequent many of PBJ’s great events. The article is a surface level look at the current state of the web analytics industry. The discussion we had with PBJ focused on how SwellPath helps clients make sense of the seemingly limitless reports available in enterprise analytics solutions. Phrases like “drowning in data” and “analysis paralysis” are more relevant than ever with ever-growing types of reports now available. With social measurement, mobile measurement, rich internet application measurement, and traditional analytics reporting, the need for the tpe of expertise SwellPath provides is more critical than ever for most organizations. It was great to see the Portland Business Journal recognize this and feature SwellPath in the discussion.