Yahoo’s free web analytics tool: the best yet?
Yahoo’s acquisition of IndexTools – and its announcement this week that it intends to provide the web analytics solution free – is a fantastic development for the industry.
Dennis R. Mortensen, COO of IndexTools, claims that the solution has 80% of the functionality of Omniture. By bringing an enterprise-class solution to the masses for free, Yahoo takes another rail off the entry barrier to web analytics.
IndexTools is a rich solution that has all the bells and whistles you would normally associate with licensed solutions. Yet it’s now going to be free.
Yahoo’s free solution will initially provide serious competition for Google Analytics and Microsoft Gatineau, but will also be a concern for the more established players such as Omniture and WebTrends.
If a free tool has 80% of the functionality of a much more expensive tool, then this is something that medium sized businesses in particular may find a compelling offer.
Anil Batra provides some interesting speculation about the impact that Yahoo’s acquisition and “free giveaway” tactics will have on the marketplace.
Until people start using Yahoo’s web analytics tool, we can only speculate…it’s a matter of watch this space.