Chinalytics Longmarch Blog

Over the years I have been following Omniture’s (slow) engagement with China with ongoing interest. Especially since we have clients who use SiteCatalyst and have seen strong interest in SearchCenter in the market. While I understand that China is still a comparatively small market for the big analytics vendors, I would have hoped for more leadership from Omniture, sooner, in the largest Internet market by number of users.

Finally their  leadership looks like it is forthcoming with Omniture naming Arics Poon as their MD for China. Arics is a HK native and a very experienced China executive with roles  as Vice President & MD at Oracle and later as GM for Microsoft China.  During the last two month I had the chance to talk to Arics a few times and could clearly see his vision  for Omniture in China.

Congratulations to Omniture for recruiting such a senior leader. You can reach Arics by email and at Omniture’s China offices.

Beijing Office Address:
Office 511, 5/F., South Block, Tower C, Raycom InfoTech Park
No. 2 Kexueyuan South Road
Zhongguangcun, Beijing
100190 P.R. China
美国安力卓有限公司北京办事处
北京海淀区科学院南路2号融科资讯中心C座南楼5層511室
邮编100190

Hong Kong Office Address:
Level 15, Nexxus Building
41 Connaught Road
Central, Hong Kong
+852 3757 9666 ext 9663 tel
+852 3757 9401 fax

香港中環干諾道中四十一號
盈置大廈十五樓

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• Omniture Site Catalyst training in Beijing this September (longmarch.chinalytics.com)

Image via CrunchBase

Omniture is getting more serious in China, with a new GM in town and some upcoming trainings. Each training is a full two day workshop and will cost RMB 8,000.

If you want to bulk up on your Omniture skill and add a line to your resume, please leave a comment on this blog or email directly to Omniture at cloh[at]omniture[dot]com. If you email them, just let them know you heard about it here.

After all your feedback about the upcoming Omniture training in Beijing (March 17th, 18th) & Shanghai (March 19th, 20th) , Omniture realized it is not enough to provide a in debth 2 day Omnitiure training.  (Yes they are learning )

So, for those of you who want to get a glimps of SiteCatalyst and SearchCenter, or who have specific questions to ask about either tool, Omniture and me are hosting a

- “Free Omniture Online Business Optimization workshop” -

Time:  Wednesday April  March 11th,  3:30PM – 5PM (Thanks Shoji for the correction)
Place: Kerry Center, CBD, 11th floor, Regus offices

The workshop will focus in Omniture Site Catalyst and Search Center and will be lead by as Omniture Sales engineer.  It will cover the basics of both tools in the first hour and aims to answer attendees questions in following 30 min.

Of course this is by no means an in depth training (For that we still have to pay ), but it should be an insightful afternoon nevertheless, for those of us working with Omniture’s tools, and those who aim to do that in the future.

See you at tomorrows WAW!

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• March Web Analytics Wednesday Beijing with Google’s Stephanie Hsu (longmarch.chinalytics.com)
• Upcoming Omniture training in Beijing and Shanghai (longmarch.chinalytics.com)

MRM Worldwide logo

With client demands for Web Analytics growing, MRM Worldwide is expanding its team of Web Analytics analysts and consultants in Beijing.

Join us and

• Be part of a team that pioneers web analytics in China
• Work in an international bi-lingual environment for a global 4 A agency
• Work with exciting global clients like Microsoft, Intel and others that push the limits of digital marketing in China with innovative new projects
• Learn from the  most experienced Web Analytics practitioners in China, trough regular trainings, experience sharing and on the job guidance
• Work with a young, fun and motivated team of professionals that together makes a difference in how our clients do digital marketing to reach business objectives.
• Competitive compensation

If you are interested in joining us, please forward your resume and a short cover letter explaining why you are the right person for our team to mei-dot-zhao-at-ap-dot-mccann-dot-com, or send it directly to me florian-dot-pihs-at-ap-dot-mccann-dot-com. Feel free to mail in either in English or in Chinese.

Your chances are best if your experience fits the criteria I have compiled in the job description below for an Analytics Consultant / Lead Analytics Consultant (with a big hand from Aviansh’s sample job description). If your know someone who is qualified and interested, please kindly get us in touch. If you don’t fulfill all the requirements yet (but aspire to), reach me anyway, we need junior web analysts as well. Please leave any questions in the comment section of this post, and I will do my best to answer them.

Typical Deliverables:

• Weekly, monthly reports (excel, BI tools, web analytics tools).
• Website behavior and customer experience analysis.
• Data consolidation and validation.
• Coordinating tags, tracking parameter implementations.
• Business requirements synthesized from multiple sources including product managers, development teams, and functional group members.
• Documentation relating to existing processes and suggestion / presentations for improving those processes.
• Effective and persuasive presentations (verbal and written) for project teams and business leaders.

Knowledge / Background / Experience:

• Bachelor’s degree (MBA preferred).
• Web Analytics
  • Preferably one to two years of working with standard click stream analysis tools: Omniture, Click Tracks, WebTrends, HBX, Core Metrics etc.
  • Experience in advanced web analytics methodologies such as experimentation and testing, competitive analysis, surveys and market research preferred
• Experience in one or more roles in an online e-commerce or online support environments.
• Expertise with Business Intelligence tools, such as Brio, Business Objects, Micro Strategy, Cognos etc with experience writing and tuning SQL queries in a online or offline environment preferred.
• Three to five years of experience in using the Microsoft Office suite with very strong Excel skills.
• Excellent communication skills and ability to interact with all levels of end users and technical resources.
• Exposure to project management skills, business process redesign principles, tools and techniques a plus.

Team / Leadership Skills:

• Works effectively both independently and as a member of a cross functional team.
• Uses sound judgment to identify issues and escalates when appropriate.
• Contributes to improvements in processes (technical or business) used by analysts.
• Drives focused decisions within specific areas and is a key contributor to decisions beyond specific scope of role.
• Ability to identify key needs or gaps and provide leadership to close those gaps.
• Resolves disagreements and conflicts constructively, knows when to involve others.
• Learns from mistakes, takes action to apply the lessons and provides peer and team wide feedback for those in immediate area of focus.
• Identifies and communicates specific personal growth goals for self.

Technical / Functional Skills:

• Understands relevant technology applications in their area.
• Using strong analytical skills provides insights as well as recommendations for changes
• Identifies and drives requirements trade-offs by proposing solutions to BU/FU leadership.
• Handles multiple tasks, switches priorities and focuses as needed.
• Exhibits high degree of pro-activeness in analyzing customer behavior using available data to influence changes on the website.
• Understands the complex web ecosystems and best practices and applies this knowledge to their work.
• Collaborates on creation of project plan and tasks for the team.

Language Skill

• Strong written and spoken English and Chinese are required to communicate effectively to clients and co-workers.

I am looking forward to your feedback. Keep it coming!

One of the major limitations on Web Analytics in China is the lack of skilled and experienced analysts. Once a company or agency has decided on persuing the digital ROI path though Web Analytics, they soon notice that while tools are free (like Google Analytics, Yahoo! Analytics and Microsoft AdCenter Analytics) or can be bought from respected vendors (like Omniture, Webtrends and others), skilled and experienced analysts are in severe short supply. (as I’ve argued before). As a result, most analytics teams are made up of one senior person, spending most of his/her time on training and a bunch of smart young analyst coming staight from university or from a market research background. Most of the trainig is on the job and done informally. Most of it is done “on the job”. I have never met a certified Omniture or GA analyst in China (let me know if you are!).

This is about to change, with Omniture offering their first Site Catalyst Fundamentals training in Beijing and Shanghai in March. The training will last 2 days and will be conducted in Chinese  Here are the dates and prices:

BEIJING – MAR 17 – 18

SHANGHAI – MAR 19-20

Prices per person range from USD 1,500 to USD 1,800. Given current exchange rates, thats beween RMB 10K and 12.5K.

This is a princely price for China, given that it reflects a monthly salary for a senior analyst / senior analytics consultant in the market. While I am excited about this opportunity, I am not sure how many companies can afford that kind of money in the current economic situation. I can only urge my readers to review Avinash’s 90/10 rule.

• Our Goal: Highest value from Web Analytics implementation.
• Cost of analytics tool & vendor professional services: $ 10.
• Required investment in “intelligent resources/analysts”: $ 90.
• Bottom-line for Magnificent Success: Its the people.

Re-read it! Re-read it again! And now go looking for the money. If you are lucky and find a pot of gold, contact your local Omniture salesperson (Darry Su, CY Yueng) or, lacking their contact info, comment on this post to sign up for the training. I will then share the Omniture contact info with you via email.

I am looking forward to seeing you in March.

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I just got an email from Stephane Hamel announcing V 1.02 of WASP, his Web Analytics Solution Profiler utility. Congrats and kudos to Stephane. Good job. Rock on.

For those who have not heard about WASP here is the skinny:

WASP is a Firefox plugin for Web Analytics professionals that allows you to easily do

• Quality Assurance:  Check If your own pages are correctly tagged, that is
  • If there is a web analytics tag on your page (works for ad tracking tools, A/B testing tools and e-commerce tracking as well). This works page by page, but also automatically with a crawler if you are using the licensed version.
  • If that tag is executed correctly and is sending the right data to the Web Analytics server (e.g. the right profile ID in GA, or the right Omniture SAINT tag). This works especially well for Omniture and Google Analytics, since WASP provides an “enhanced tags view” that explains each data point sent to the server.
• Market Research:  If and page you are visiting has a web analytics solution installed (e.g. your customers, your competitors, or your own business in other countries)

I have been an enthusiastic WASP user for more than a year and encourage you to test it out. My only reservation is that it doens’t work well for Flash “experiences”. To Q&A those, we have been using HTTP Watch and looked at the data sets send to the server manually. I am looking forward to version 2.0,  so I can ditch HTTP Watch completely.

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Happy New Year to all friends or Web Analytics Wednesday in Beijing. 2008 has been a great year, and I enjoyed every event we celebrated with you!
2009 is shaping up to be even more interesting as Web Analytics is touted as a key growth area that can benefit from the challenging economic environment. (better results with lower ad spend? Yes, please.)

I am especially excited about the upcoming WAW, because it is the first time we have a corporate user of Web Analytics speaking here in Beijing (not a vendor, agency or consultant): Anya Zhao (赵冬云), Air China’s Online Marketing Director. (More on Anya is a short bio below).

Anya will share her experience in setting up and running corporate Web Analytics at eLong and Air China, with a focus on tools, people and processes. I can’t wait to hear from her what works and what doesn’t work in Web Analytics in China from someone who has experience running web analytics at companies that stand to capture most of its value.

Please join me for this groundbreaking event, and bring any friends who might be interested to join our community.

Time and date: Wednesday Jan. 7th. 8PM
Location: Luga’s Villa (right behind 3.3 in Sanlitun)

View Larger Map

It will be standing room only with a buffet dinner. Part of the cost will be covered by our sponsor. Be prepared however to spend about RMB 50 for the evening. As usual the knowledge you get in exchange is invaluable

Please RSVP by commenting to this post or by sending me an email florianpihs-at-gmail-dot-com. Any problems please call my mobile at 13401191916.

Best,
Florian

Bio of Dongyun Zhao, Online Marketing Director, Air China (copied form the the Ad-tech panel on Web Analytics)
Ms. Anya Zhao ( Dongyun Zhao) has a professional background in online marketing and analytic measurement area. As the Director of online marketing for Air China, she drive the online sales grow up dramatically in the last 10 months by leading the online marketing team driving online marketing activity according to the online tracking and data analysis result . Prior to joining Air China, she was the online analysis and marketing manager of elong Inc, the division of Expedia Inc.. There, she grew the Omniture tracking and data analysis to be such a good fundamental for online marketing business development and benefit in making the online marketing to be one of the most efficient and important sales channel of elong Inc. She holds the master degree of Econometrics, who graduated from the Hebei University of Industry and was the government sponsored international student in the University of Applied Sciences Munich in 2003.

With the next WAW right around the corner, its time to finally publish the writeup for the WAW on October 15th. Last time I had the luxury that Tango Chan did a write up for me, now I need wet the metaphorical pen myself. 

In my last post, I announced the October Web Analytics Wednesday for Oct. 8th with Paul Denlinger of ChinaVortex and IAB China fame. Since Paul is busy “attending a conference” in Bali, plans need to change. While I would love “attending a conference” in Bali myself once in a while, I cross my fingers for Paul and wish him all the best for the iMedia Agency Summit.
In order not to disappoint those seeking knowledge from the tree of Web Analytics, we have postponed the event to next week and invited Darryl Su of Omniture China, to introduce their Web Analytics offering. As one of the leading global web analytics vendors, it will be interesting to hear more about product features, localization for China and an update about their Beijing office and China servers, both of which have been planned for a long time.

It will be standing room only with a buffet dinner. As usual part of the cost will be covered by our sponsor Web Analytics Demystified. Be prepared however to spend about RMB 50 for the evening. As usual the knowledge you get in exchange is invaluable To register for the event, please sign up at the Web Analytics Wednesday platform, or leave a comment to this post.

Those of us using Omniture in China have been facing a big problem
optimizing search campaigns. Baidu’s search terms were encoded
correctly only 50% of the time (I am being generous), the other 50% we
got obscure characters that mean absolutely nothing. That results in
all keyword related reports (most popular keyword etc.) delivering
wrong results. Paid search might be exempted when you use campaign ID’s
to tag the keywords. Anyways… after escalating the issue to Omniture
forever ago (sorry guys, it had to be said), a solution is at hand.
The problem has apparently been on Baidu’s side. They are only randomly
handing over the correct encoding, sometimes they had over not encoding
info at all.

• WebTrends has the same problem (see my response to Leon’s question on this post),
• Google Analytics customer service commented that they had that problem as well, but solved it some months ago.

Now during yesterday’s dinner Omniture’s
commented that their engineering team has found a solution as well and
is implementing it these days. Your truly is waiting with bated breath
an will certainly keep you updated.