Google Analytics vs. Omniture (Adobe Analytics)

Google Analytics is the most used web analytics package. Leveraging Google Analytics may have possible disadvantages, because it may not meet the needs of your brand’s digital strategy. Omniture, now part of Adobe Marketing Cloud, offers advanced capabilities; however, they do come with a hefty price tag (Adobe Systems Incorporated, n.d.; Five Rivers Interactive Media, n.d.).

In order to determine which analytics program is better suited for your brand, you should first know the key business decision drivers and define what is required out of an analytics program. If a company needs customization and features, has a lot of resources to work with the analytics program, and doesn’t care about cost, Adobe Analytics would be the appropriate choice. Conversely, if you don’t require such things, Google Analytics may be the perfect size application to get the job done.

COST

Cost is one of the main things you should consider when choosing an analytics platform. The price of Google Analytics is its strongest benefit – it’s FREE! Whereas, pricing for Adobe Marketing Cloud’s Adobe Analytics isn’t even listed on its website. You have to contact Adobe to find out pricing – online or by phone – and they’ll provide you a custom quote (Five Rivers Interactive Media, n.d.).

IMPLEMENTATION

Google Analytics is easy to implement compared to Adobe Analytics. Implementing Adobe Analytics requires more in-depth development work as it can be customized to track your specific metrics (Ingle, 2013). Therefore, Adobe Analytics not only takes longer to implement, but has higher implementation costs. If you require such detailed reporting, the upfront work and monetary set-up costs associated with Adobe Analytics can be worth it.

NEEDS

Another area to look at when determining which analytic solution is right for you is how big your website is and what it’s going to be doing. If you have a small operation that needs high-level reporting, Google Analytics can meet your needs. However, if you’re selling hundreds of products and need to track hundreds of conversion goals, Adobe can keep track of them all (Five Rivers Interactive Media, n.d.).

SPEED

You also need to assess how fast your business moves. Are you running A/B split testing or optimizing your shopping cart and need real-time data?  If you do require real-time tracking, Adobe Analytics is the solution for you. Adobe Analytics provides data in real-time, enabling a user to check the effectiveness of a campaign or piece of content almost immediately after it launches. With Google Analytics there is a 24-hour lapse in data (Five Rivers Interactive Media, n.d.).

TRAFFIC

Another area to look at when considering the appropriate analytics software package is how many visitors your site gets in a month. Google caps the visits/visitors tracked at 10 million page views per month. Adobe Marketing Cloud, on the other hand, does not cap visits/visitors. Tracking all of those visits/visitors will cost you though (Demers, 2013).

CUSTOMER SUPPORT

If you need help, you’re pretty much on your own if you’re using Google Analytics; there is no dedicated support staff. However, there is an official Google Analytics Forum and Help Center you can tap into if you have questions. Additionally, there is a three-week Digital Analytics Fundamentals course that teaches the principles of digital analytics and how these principles can be used to enhance business performance. Furthermore, there is a Google Analytics Academy which offers in-depth training (Chianis, 2013). This may be okay if you’re in charge of a small website. If you’re managing a large and highly-complex website, on the other hand, you’ll likely find the 24/7 support offered by Adobe to be critical. Training on Adobe Analytics is an additional fee, but Adobe also offers a variety of support materials for free online as well (Chianis, 2013).

TESTING TOOLS

With Google Analytics you can do A/B and multivariate testing. You can also perform A/B and multivariate testing with Adobe Marketing Cloud. However, in order to have this functionality you need to not only purchase Adobe Marketing Cloud’s Adobe Analytics, but Adobe Target as well (Adobe Systems Incorporated, n.d.).

SECURITY

Do you care who owns the data? When it comes to security, if you use Google Analytics, Google owns the data. On the other hand, if you use Adobe the data belongs to you (Five Rivers Interactive Media, n.d.).

METRICS

Google Analytics offers many metrics such as transactions with a minimum purchase amount (Google, n.d.). Compared to Adobe Analytics, Google Analytics metrics reporting capability is limited. However, Adobe Analytics offers over 100 metrics (Five Rivers Interactive Media, n.d.).

GOAL TRACKING

With Google Analytics you are limited to 20 goals per reporting view. To track more than 20 goals, you’ll need to create an additional view for that account (Google, n.d.). Adobe Marketing Cloud, on the other hand, lets you track hundreds of goals (Five Rivers Interactive Media, n.d.).

CUSTOM VARIABLES

Both analytics programs allow you to set custom variables. However, Google only allows five custom variables per page. Adobe allows for significantly more variables to be set. Even though both allow you to expire a variable at a specific time, Adobe allows you to stack variables on top of each other, giving you the ability to identify a sequence of events (Chianis, 2013).

SEGMENTATION

The ability to segment visitors is available in Google Analytics, but again, Google Analytics is limited when compared to the competition. Adobe has a lot of options to segment your audience (Five Rivers Interactive Media, n.d.).

ADWORDS INTEGRATION

If you are running an AdWords campaign(s), you are not alone. In fact, more than a million businesses run such PPC ads. If you are one of these businesses, Google Analytics can import your AdWords data seamlessly very quickly and easily. Once you link Google Analytics and AdWords, you will be able to:

• “Import Google Analytics goals and transactions into AdWords as conversions;
• View Google Analytics site engagement data in AdWords;
• Create remarketing lists in Analytics to use in AdWords for targeting specific audiences; and,
• Automatically view your AdWords click and cost data alongside your Analytics site engagement data” (Google, n.d.).

HISTORICAL DATA

How long do you need/want to keep your data? Google Analytics keeps data up to 25 months. Whereas, Adobe Analytics will keep all of your data – as long as you’re a customer (Chianis, 2013). According to Kaushik, keeping a lot of historical data around is overrated for the fact that your visitors, computations, website, etc. change too much (2008). However, Kaushik does say aggregate data on a critical few metrics should be kept as well as “some revenue stats just to prove you’re worth it” (2008).

As you can see, these two analytic programs have pros and cons. The first step in choosing which one is right for you is to define your digital strategy. Determining the key business decision drivers and defining what is required out of an analytics program will help you select the right-sized analytics tool.

References

Adobe Systems Incorporated. (n.d.). Adobe Marketing Cloud. Retrieved from http://wwwimages.adobe.com/www.adobe.com/content/dam/Adobe/en/solutions/digital-marketing/pdfs/marketing-cloud-solution-overview-ue.pdf

Adobe Systems Incorporated. (n.d.). Omniture. Retrieved from http://www.adobe.com/solutions/digital-marketing/omniture.html

Chianis, A. (2013, October 11). Google Analytics vs. Adobe SiteCatalyst – which data analysis platform is better for business? Retrieved from

Demers, T. (2013, May 10). Guide to analytics software platforms: 25 analytics tools compared. Retrieved from http://searchengineland.com/web-analytics-software-comparison-identifying-the-right-web-analytics-tools-for-your-business-149373

Five Rivers Interactive Media. (n.d.). Google Analytics vs. Omniture. Retrieved from http://www.fiveriversinteractive.com/pdfs/GAvsOMNITURE.pdf

Google. (n.d.). About goals. Retrieved from https://support.google.com/analytics/answer/1012040?hl=en

Google. (n.d.). Link Google Analytics and AdWords. Retrieved from https://support.google.com/adwords/answer/1704341?hl=en

Google. (n.d.). Set up, edit, and share goals. Retrieved from https://support.google.com/analytics/answer/1032415?hl=en

Ingle, S. (2013, May 15). What’s the difference? Comparing Google Analytics and Adobe SiteCatalyst. Retrieved from http://www.paceco.com/google-analytics-adobe-sitecatalyst-comparison

Kaushik, A. (2008, January 22). History is overrated. Retrieved from http://www.kaushik.net/avinash/history-is-overrated