Coremetrics Web Analytics Review

Coremetrics has grown to be a leading web analytics solution for many businesses, including media sites. With several tracking features you can't find elsewhere, it's a tempting package you'll want to open. But it will cost you.

Coremetrics has monitored the sites of publications Men's Health, Harvard Business School Publishing, Bicycling, Backpacker, Mountain Bike and Playboy. Other clients include Costco, QVC, Macy's, Holiday Inn, PETCO, Victoria's Secret, Eddie Bauer, Office Depot, Panasonic and 1-800-FLOWERS.

It doesn't matter if your media entity is in first place or dead last. You're always keeping an eye on the competition. Coremetrics has a unique feature that compares data from your site with your competitors'.

Numbers tell you how long visitors are spending on your site vs. theirs and what they're viewing. Quickly see what's boosting their numbers and what's hurting yours to fix the problems in content.

Live profiling is another standout feature. Coremetrics follows visitors as they move around the Internet, not just on your site. You're given what looks like a profile page for each user that monitors their online activities. You know what the masses of your audience are looking for so you can create relevant content.

Sales departments will be interested in reports that reveal how many times a visitor saw an ad before clicking on it. But this is also useful information for media sites that advertise their microsites.

Stats are real-time with the ability to add notes directly into the interface too. If you plug a certain news story, add a note about your coverage and then follow the breadcrumbs of your visitors' paths while on your site. Find what they're searching for and where they're leaving so you can fill the content gaps to keep them on your site.

Video reporting tools are crucial for any media site wanting to know if posting video online is working for them. Coremetrics hones in on how many times videos are started, paused, watched in full and even how much of a video people watched before stopping.

Are your shorter news clips outperforming your two-minute reports? Are consumer-generated videos hogging your site's disk space and bandwidth without other visitors actually viewing them? Detailed video reports uncover those viewing habits so you can post the videos your audience really wants.

Tracking social networking activity is fairly new for web analytics companies and some still can't do it. Coremetrics can but the most interesting aspect of its social network tracking is the ability to type in a long list of key terms you specify. Watch the hot topics people are discussing to generate story ideas and to optimize your current content.

A big plus to Coremetrics is its support. You're assigned a technical support contact when you sign up. There's also a knowledge base and 24/7 support online, by email and by phone.

The advantages of such detailed reports and personal customer service come with a price disadvantage. Coremetrics is affordable if you're backed by a big budget. Pricing varies based on the tools you need and how large your site is, but you'll pay for the dazzling goodies this web analytics tool has to offer.