Understanding And Exploiting Web 2.0: Impact Analysis For Web Sites

A centre of expertise in digital information management

www.ukoln.ac.uk

Understanding And Exploiting Web 2.0: Impact Analysis For Web Sites

Brian KellyUKOLNUniversity of [email protected]

UKOLN is supported by:

http://www.ukoln.ac.uk/web-focus/events/workshops/stimulate-2006/talk-impact-analysis/http://www.ukoln.ac.uk/web-focus/events/workshops/stimulate-2006/talk-impact-analysis/

About This Talk

This talk gives an introduction to impact analysis for Web sites and describes how Web 2.0 services can be used to support this work.

About This Talk

This talk gives an introduction to impact analysis for Web sites and describes how Web 2.0 services can be used to support this work.

This work is licensed under a Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 2.0 licence (but note caveat)

Resources bookmarked using 'stimulate-2006-impact' tag


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Contents

Usage Statistics• Strengths and weaknesses

Impact Analysis• What is it?• Impact analysis tools and techniques

Web 2.0 and Impact Analysis• Using Web 2.0 tools for impact analysis• Web 2.0 is impact

Sector Statistics• What is it?• Would it be useful?


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Usage Statistics

Exploit Interactive example:• EU-funded e-journal

funded from 1999-2000• Steady growth in usage

measured by Sitemeter & usage logs

Usa

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Deeper analysis:• Popular article on

"Are You Linking To A Porn Site?", April 1999

Issues: Is popularity of Web site based on "wrong hits" and growth reflects growth in Internet usage? How can we aggregate usage data in a meaningful way?

Issues: Is popularity of Web site based on "wrong hits" and growth reflects growth in Internet usage? How can we aggregate usage data in a meaningful way?


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Usage Statistics

Usage statistics:• Can provide useful and valuable data …• … but can also be flawed

Implications:• Collect and use as they can be useful for

formative statistics e.g. has a new marketing campaign worked; what keywords do users use to find our Web site; …

But also:• Be honest about limitations and don't over-hype

statistics• Use as a part of a portfolio of metrics

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Impact Analysis

Usage statistics:• Data on who is using Web site and how they're

using it e.g. how many visitors are there?Impact analysis:

• Attempting to measure the impact of the Web site or the contents of the Web site e.g. how has the Web site visit affected the visitors

Challenges:• More difficult to measure than simpler 'visits'• Requires thought as to aims of Web site

Requires • Objective and subjective metrics e.g. 'possible'

indicators of impact• Automated and manual measurements

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Types Of Metrics

Automated:• Usage statistics • Link analysis• Search analysis

Manual:• Focus groups, surveys, etc.

Hybrid:• Blogs, RSS feeds, social bookmarks, etc.

Let's use a case study for the Institutional Web Management Workshop (IWMW) 2006 Web site – an annual 3 day event for University Web managers

Let's use a case study for the Institutional Web Management Workshop (IWMW) 2006 Web site – an annual 3 day event for University Web managers

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Link Popularity

Why link popularity?• A link to my Web site is an

indication that A We b author felt strongly about the resource

• Links help drive traffic (and so can boost usage statistics)

• Links enhance Google rating (and so can boost usage statistics)

http://www.linkpopularity.com/http://www.linkpopularity.com/

Note that you can receive a monthly email report, which can provide information on trends

Note that you can receive a monthly email report, which can provide information on trendsIt may be desirable to remove links from your own Web site, otherwise growth may just reflect growth in your site

It may be desirable to remove links from your own Web site, otherwise growth may just reflect growth in your siteMany site analysis tools now provide RSS feeds. This can help Web managers in their monitoring activities

Many site analysis tools now provide RSS feeds. This can help Web managers in their monitoring activities


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Search Analysis

Why search engine analysis?

• Search engines help drive traffic (and so boost usage statistics)

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Technorati:• There's more to search

engines than Google• Searches Blogs, RSS

news feeds, etc.• Use of tags can help

searching social networking services such as Blogs, Flickr, etc


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Talking To Users

Impact analysis can be carried out by talking to / listening to the user community:

• Focus groups• Visitor books• Evaluation forms• Anecdotes• Media watch• …

Such techniques are well-known – but how can technologies be used to support such activities?

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Impact Of Blogs

University of Warwick Blog service was first in UK

It has proved very popular:• 4,293 Blogs• 76,987 entries• 174,106 comments

Impact:• People willing to post &

even more willing to respond (average over 2 comments per posting)

http://blogs.warwick.ac.uk/http://blogs.warwick.ac.uk/

Impact can be measured by size of community, nos. of entries, nos. of responses, impact in real world, etc. (see talk at ILI 2006 )

Impact can be measured by size of community, nos. of entries, nos. of responses, impact in real world, etc. (see talk at ILI 2006 )


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Using Blogs

Blogs can make it easier to gather quotes & other impact measures:

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Blogs provides good indication of user satisfaction and of impact analysis of event "I've come back with ideas to …"

Blogs provides good indication of user satisfaction and of impact analysis of event "I've come back with ideas to …"

• Finding Blogs (e.g. tags, Technorati)

http://j4.livejournal.com/2006/06/19/http://j4.livejournal.com/2006/06/19/http://www.meanboyfriend.com/overdue_ideas/2006/06/10_years_of_the.html

http://www.meanboyfriend.com/overdue_ideas/2006/06/10_years_of_the.html

• Blogs associated with Web site

Official Bloggers has proved useful: set a standard for others; claimed a tag in tag space; shown benefits of trust; …

Official Bloggers has proved useful: set a standard for others; claimed a tag in tag space; shown benefits of trust; …


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Being Open

The impact of ideas can be maximising by allowing the ideas to be used freely:

• Open source software

• Open standards• Creative Commons

licence for contentCC licences for IWMW 2006 resources allows:

• Info about event to be used by others

• Blog articles, news, etc. to be syndicated

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http://www.ukoln.ac.uk/web-focus/events/workshops/webmaster-2006/publicity/

http://www.ukoln.ac.uk/web-focus/events/workshops/webmaster-2006/publicity/


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Imp

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isProviding Mashups

You can maximise the impact of your Web site by allowing others to make use of your content e.g.

• Syndication• News feeds• Third party

applications• …

Note CC licence for event details permits such reuse

http://upcoming.org/event/69469/http://upcoming.org/event/69469/


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Building A Community

Building a community for your Web site can:

• Maximise impact by allowing interested parties to discuss their shared interests

• Provide you with feedback & ideas

• Allow you to provide targetted information

http://www.frappr.com/iwmw2006http://www.frappr.com/iwmw2006

Web 2.0 services such as Frappr, Blogger, MySpace, etc. allow Web communities to be easily set up (and may be particularly valuable to the 'Net Generation')

Web 2.0 services such as Frappr, Blogger, MySpace, etc. allow Web communities to be easily set up (and may be particularly valuable to the 'Net Generation')


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Sharing Resources

Social bookmarking tools like del.icio.us:

• Provide an indication of impact (others have felt Web page worth bookmarking

• Support community building (finding others with similar interests)

http://del.icio.us/lisbk/iwmw2006-parallel-kelly-phippshttp://del.icio.us/lisbk/iwmw2006-parallel-kelly-phipps


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Maximising Impact & Web 2.0

We have seen how Web 2.0 technologies (Blogs, RSS feeds, syndication technologies, third party services, etc) can:

• Maximise impact by providing additional access mechanisms for users

• Minimise resource effort needed by making use of 3rd party services

• Be used to measure the impact of our Web services

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The Bigger Picture

Usage analysis and impact analysis aren't self-contained, but form part of a bigger picture

Usage analysis

• Who's accessing Web site?

• How are they finding site?

• What's popular?

User testing• How do users

navigate site?• What's difficult

to find?• Have they

achieved their aims?

Impact Analysis• How has Web site

influenced the users?• What do the users

find interesting?• What changes do

users make as a consequence?

These areas are complementary and should be addressed as part of a strategy for ensuring user needs are being satisfied. The strategy should be hybrid, covering software and processes, real world interaction, etc.

These areas are complementary and should be addressed as part of a strategy for ensuring user needs are being satisfied. The strategy should be hybrid, covering software and processes, real world interaction, etc.

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Sector Statistics

Another aspect of the 'bigger picture' is statistics for the sector:

• What are the characteristics of the sector?• What legitimate assumptions can we

make?• What are the benefits to be gained by

sector statistics?

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UKOLN has worked with Nedstats who have provided sector statistics based on 22 higher educational institutions who were willing to host their (invisible) counter.

Summary based on > 25 million page views and > 4 million visitorsSee <http://www.ukoln.ac.uk/web-focus/events/workshops/webmaster-2006/talks/sidhu/>

UKOLN has worked with Nedstats who have provided sector statistics based on 22 higher educational institutions who were willing to host their (invisible) counter.

Summary based on > 25 million page views and > 4 million visitorsSee <http://www.ukoln.ac.uk/web-focus/events/workshops/webmaster-2006/talks/sidhu/>


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Overall:Accept 95.93%Decline4.07%

2006 Average Accept 96.8%Decline 3.2%

External:Accept 94.64%Decline 5.36%

Internal:Accept 97.90%Decline 2.10%

Taken from <http://www.ukoln.ac.uk/web-focus/events/workshops/webmaster-2006/talks/sidhu/>


Visitors Accepting Cookies

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Cookies needed to monitor user trails

Cookies needed to monitor user trails


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How do people find my site?

Overall

56.29%

20.93

28.66

Three basic ways

Direct Entry

External Referrer

Search Engines

External

39.98

21.62

38.38%



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Number of visitors per day

Perc

en

tag

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f vis

itors

fro

m

searc

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Visitors from search engines – Number of visitors

University General

Cass

CCCU

Aberdeen

TVU

UCL

Sheffield


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Conclusions

To conclude:• Usage statistics should form a part of an impact

analysis strategy• A more comprehensive impact analysis strategy is

needed• This should be part of a user-satisfaction strategy• Web 2.0 technologies can help• Embedding Web 2.0 culture (openness, trust,

etc.) can help the impact of Web sites which aim to maximise engagement with its user community

• "Impact Analysis For Web Sites", QA Focus briefing document no. 99, provides further advice – see <http://www.ukoln.ac.uk/qa-focus/documents/briefings/briefing-99/>

• Would sector statistics be useful for your sector?

Documents

Understanding And Exploiting Web 2.0: Impact Analysis For Web Sites