[Sigia-l] Intranet analytics

[Jonathan Baker-Bates]

> -----Original Message-----
> From: sigia-l-bounces at asis.org 
> [mailto:sigia-l-bounces at asis.org] On Behalf Of Julie Renee Hatlen
> Sent: 19 July 2005 00:36
> To: sigia-l at asis.org
> Subject: Re: [Sigia-l] Intranet analytics
> 
> Please forgive the late reply...
> I originally asked about intranet analytics and Ziya said:
> 
> "You may want to narrow your query to get a meaningful 
> answer. Are you expecting analytics to unearth a problem you 
> had no idea existed or are you looking for 
> confirmation/validation of user stats for problems you have 
> already identified? Is it the 'what' or the 'how'?
> 
> Ziya
> Nullius in Verba"
> 
> My answer:
> I think more the 'how'.  We've identified areas that could be 
> improved and we're interested in the ways analytics could 
> provide the data to facilitate finding solutions.  For 
> example, comparing search logs to keyword metatags to see if 
> the authors' language matches the users'.  I was wondering 
> what kinds of methods people were using to improve taxonomy 
> and navigation on intranets through analytics.  Also, if 
> anyone knew of any articles on this topic.

You need to be careful when using web analytics to improve IA. Without a
solid understanding of how exactly the data is collected (and what
things can confuse or distort the interpretation of that data) you can
easily make unsafe conclusions. Things aren't always what they seem to
be, and the web analytics software vendors don't usually like to make
that very clear. The only one who does is the writer of Analog, who has
a good run-down of the issues:

http://www.analog.cx/docs/webworks.html

See in particular the section "What you can't know." Once you've got
that down, you're OK to go out and do some effective analysis.

Jonathan





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