Web Analytics Vet Starts Advisory Firm

Longtime Web analytics industry veteran and former JupiterResearch analyst Eric Peterson has left his position as VP of strategic services at Visual Sciences to form a strategic consulting firm to help companies gain ROI from their Web analytics. The company, Web Analytics Demystified, takes its name from one of three books published by Peterson.

Web Analytics Demystified will focus on five core truths about Web analytics. The truths aim to address company needs to understand Web analytics, recruitment of talented professionals, seeing Web analytics as a business process, and realizing ROI from its use.

“My goal is to help companies that are serious about competing in Web analytics understand not just how the tools work, but understand the process of Web analytics,” said Peterson. “It is very common that companies have technology and are collecting data; it’s far more rare that companies re using the technology effectively.”

Peterson announced the launch of his new company at the Emetrics Summit in San Francisco on Monday. As it ramps up operations, Peterson plans to start with a small staff and handle most of the consulting work personally. Immediately prior to the company launch Peterson said he had commitments from roughly half a dozen clients, and about the same number of companies are close to signing up for service.

Recruitment is an area of focus for the start-up advisory firm. It will identify opportunities within an organization, set goals and expectations, and conduct ancillary services such as drafting job descriptions and conducting interviews.

“There’s absolutely a shortage of available people” said Peterson, who said he sees a dramatic gap between stated the number of open positions and the available talent.

Under his new company, Peterson plans to publish free research and white papers with findings from regular surveys of the Web analytics community.