Yahoo recently launched its very own analytics tool – Yahoo Analytics. This can be deemed as a remodelled version of the IndexTools software for online marketing that Yahoo had acquired in April 2008. Yahoo has made this service available currently to customers of Yahoo! Small Business with e-commerce sites hosted with Yahoo, as well as Yahoo Custom Solutions and Yahoo Buzz Marketing advertisers. A wider rollout for a broader base of users has been planned for later in 2009.

With Google Analytics being already popular with online advertisers and webmasters all over the web, it would be an interesting proposition to compare Yahoo’s latest entrant with Google Analytics. This article explores a few basic important features on Yahoo Analytics vis a vis its Google counterpart.

At the first glance, Yahoo Analytics seems to be just like Google Analytics – colorful, easily understandable charts and graphics for data reporting, ability to integrate with other Yahoo products, like Yahoo search marketing, and a single user log-in service that works with other company properties. But what sets it apart from Google Analytics is Real Time Data – Yahoo boasts of reporting visitor information and site activity on the Analytics interface within minutes of an action on the website. Google Analytics takes upto 24 hours to update data on the Analytics

Tracking:

The tracking system used by Yahoo Analytics to track data is similar to GA – JavaScript page tagging. A cookie is set by the JavaScript file on the web server, when a visitor requests the Yahoo Analytics enabled webpage on his browser. So, the level of accuracy of Yahoo Analytics data can be said to be at par with its Google counterpart.

Features:

Yahoo Analytics offers a completely customizable dashboard, just like Google does. On the Reports side, Yahoo Analytics offers over 100 reports, in six basic categories – Traffic Reports, Navigation Reports, Marketing Reports, Demographics Reports, Content Reports and System Reports. These reports give detailed information about the visitors, bounce rates, entry and exit URLs, internal site searches, to name a few. One can easily draw parallels with similar reports available on Google Analytics. The ‘Scenario Analysis’ feature is similar to Funnels Visualization in GA. An additional feature here is the ‘Ad-Hoc’ scenarios, which allow you to analyse historical visitor behaviour or test possible steps in a scenario before configuring a pre-defined scenario. The ‘Action tracking’ feature is similar to Goal Conversion tracking, wherein you can track sales, revenue, sales, submissions and custom actions on the website. In addition to these, Yahoo analytics also offers custom reports and custom filters, just like the recently launched custom reporting on Google Analytics.

Google Analytics Traffic Graph

Yahoo Analytics Traffic Graph

To sum it up, Yahoo Analytics is very similar to Google Analytics, providing similar reports and tools as Google Analytics. However, as mentioned at the beginning of this article, the ability to present data in real time can work as a tremendous advantage in Yahoo’s favour. Getting real time data means that Webmasters and Advertisers would not have to wait even a day to get the crucial website information they need for decision making – they can take action in immediate timeframe to tweak the websites and ad campaigns, and make the most of their online campaigns. Whether this becomes the one factor responsible to threaten the popularity of Google Analytics, especially when Yahoo Analytics is made open for all, time will tell.

At Convonix, we understand the importance of web analytics in determining the effectiveness of an online property to achieve its goals. Our custom Search Engine Optimization Services with advanced Google Analytics setup helps maximize the ROI from the online property

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