Web Analytics Association Grows Membership Base to Over 500; Achieves Key Milestones  

Active Volunteer Base Collaborates to Achieve Major Milestones To-Date such as Published KPI Standards and a 3-Year Education Plan

 
     WASHINGTON, D.C. − June 6, 2005 − The Web Analytics Association (WAA), the not-for-profit professional organization dedicated to promoting the understanding of web analytics, today announced it has welcomed over 500 web analytics professionals as members of the association to-date, of which 90 attended the first member meeting at the Emetrics Summit in Santa Barbara, California, on June 3^rd 2005.  During the meeting, members discussed milestones accomplished in the areas of standards, education, technology and advocacy. Achievements discussed include the development of a web analytics education program, initiated by its first education partner, the University of British Columbia , as well as a published whitepaper outlining standards for web analytics key performance indicators (KPIs). In addition, members of Advocacy and Technology committees are actively participating in various government legislation initiatives to ensure web analytics is appropriately represented and defined.

 
     WAA members are located around the world, from countries such as Austria , Australia , Belgium , Brazil , Canada , Germany , India , Italy , Japan , The Netherlands, Romania , Scotland , and the United Kingdom .  Founding corporate members that have joined the WAA since its launch in February 2005 include Urchin from Google and Yahoo!. Corporate members recently joining the WAA include Digital Forest Inc., Elytics, Intellitracker, OneStat.com, Predicta, Stratigent, TraceWorks, Speed-Trap, SPSS, and WebAbacus. 

     “We've created a strong membership base of volunteers and are making real progress on our key initiatives like education and standards,” said Jim Sterne, President of the Web Analytics Association and of Target Marketing. “It’s great to see such a high level of interest and dedication to web analytics. We're creating a collaborative environment with multiple programs to help this industry achieve the success and recognition it deserves. 
 
Standards Committee Publishes Web Analytics Metrics and KPIs Whitepaper

       Web analytics solutions provide rich information detailing visitor interaction within a web site such as page views, page views per visit, unique visitors, loyalty, conversion, visit source, abandonment, and detailed shopping cart activity. In order to give companies a framework to understand their most critical metrics for measuring, benchmarking and ultimately steering their business performance over time, a baseline of definitions and standard metrics must be created.  
      
     Standards committee members collaborated and published a draft whitepaper titled, “Web Analytics Metrics and KPIs,” available for download and peer review at www.webanalyticsassociation.org/en/cmt/?5.   The paper was authored by the co-chairs of the Standards committee; Guy Creese , Industry Analyst for Ballardvale Research, and Jason Burby , Director of Web Analytics for ZAAZ. With the help of over 20 volunteers comprised of business analysts and web analytics practitioners, the whitepaper provides a framework of detailed definitions for web traffic and web business measurement terms, including a vocabulary for describing web metrics, a list of fundamental counts and ratios, a list of KPIs by both ‘site type’ and ‘process type,’ and descriptions for key metrics.

 Education Plan and Roadmap Developed

       Currently, there are countless open web analytics positions listed on job boards, underscoring the major demand in the marketplace today for web analytics professionals.  The Education committee will inform the marketplace about the field of web analytics, champion the effort to educate marketing professionals, and partner with educational institutions to ensure web analytics is part of their curriculum.

      The University of British Columbia (UBC), the largest and most highly rated university in Canada ranked with top American universities like Stanford, is the first educational institution to partner with the WAA Education committee to jointly create industry leading career development education programs. WAA Education committee members will provide the direction and content for the courses, while UBC will provide the infrastructure.  A series of online courses are already in development, the first of which is slated to be available in the Fall of 2005.  

      “As one of the top 25 Internet retailers, we, at TigerDirect.com, understand that web analytics is critical to driving decisions about online spending and optimizing  conversions,” said Lonny R. Paul, Director of eCommerce at TigerDirect, a division of Systemax Inc (NYSE: SYX) and Member of the WAA Advisory Board. “But not all companies are empowered to make decisions or take action based on their web analytics results. It's great to see that the WAA is already making headway in major areas that require industry wide attention, such as standards and education programs.”

 Active Advocacy and Technology Committees:

      Advocacy committee members are actively participating in public interest debates and government legislation meetings, discussing the HR29 and Allen Bills, to ensure that web analytics is appropriately represented in discussions on anti-spyware.  The WAA Advocacy committee has also partnered with the National Advertising Initiative (NAI) to address and differentiate harmful spyware versus cookies.  

     Supporting those efforts, members of the Technology committee have recently kicked off a Cookie Clarification initiative.  The WAA’s goal is to provide independent analysis of the available information and provide central online resources for WAA members to help them in dealing with issues like cookie deletion and rejection. 

About The Web Analytics Association 
 
      The Web Analytics Association is a not-for-profit professional organization dedicated to promoting the understanding of web analytics through education, advocacy, standards, research and technology.  Founded by web analytics industry leaders, the mission of the association is to unite and foster the interests of practitioners, vendors, consultants and educators who use, sell, install, implement, consult, teach or train in the field of web analytics.  For more information, or to become a member, please visit http://www.webanalyticsassociation.org.