What a great show this week!
OpinionLab came to eMetrics San Francisco with guns blazing this year. But, beyond all the cool stuff we have going on, the event was a clear indication of the many waves rocking the analytics world today.
It was no surprise that everyone was discussing the increased demand for real-time, location-based, multi-channel measurement tools. The importance of the move to omni-channel metrics was further confirmed with the Web Analytics Association’s name-change announcement: from here on out, the organization will be known as the Digital Analytics Association (DAA).
In general, eMetrics seemed to highlight a defining trend for organizations in every vertical: the role of data is shifting. Where measurement once acted as a mechanism for channel optimization, it’s now becoming an essential component of global, corporate business intelligence.
It followed that many folks were using the event as a forum to examine the c-suite’s increasing focus on measurement. We’ve been hearing this from our own clients for years, but it was fascinating to learn more about the many data-driven business people making a big splash in organizations of every stripe. In fact, an interesting panel with Joe Megibow of Expedia, Bob Page of eBay, and John Elder of Elder Research, Inc. focused completely on how to make a career in big data.
Another example of data-driven success: Tuesday’s keynote from Walmart’s Balaji Ram, the relatively new senior leader in site analytics and optimization who recently took over all analytics for Walmart.com. In a very short time, Ram has helped his company begin successfully addressing the big data issue, in part by building a powerful work bench (a proprietary tool they call RUM) that integrates the retailer’s many disparate data sources, including analytics, traffic, conversion, and my personal favorite, Voice of Customer. Ram’s strategy: build compelling business cases that show value in the way his team is addressing issues and opportunities through RUM.
And it’s apparently working: during the session, entitled Multi-Tiered Complex Ecommerce Optimization, Ram shared real stories and compelling results, such as his team improving page-load speed by 1 second, which meant a 2% increase in conversion—millions of dollars in Walmart speak. It’s successes like this that have helped Ram expand his team from 7 to 30 people in just 6 months.
I’m betting that Ram will receive plenty of positive feedback on his presentation: in fact, we’ve seen a great flow of comments about all the eMetrics presenters through the speaker feedback program we’re powering at the show. OpinionLab is looking forward to providing the same technology at future eMetrics events as well, so look for more to come.
The post Another example of data-driven success appeared first on OpinionLab.
