Grabs, Views & Clicks

Starting with this issue, Analytics will be published six times a year instead of quarterly, which means subscribers will receive the only online magazine dedicated to the field of analytics 50 percent more often. It also means we will need about 50 percent more editorial material, so if you have a success story or a failure story, a how-to story, a how-not-to story, an essay, op-ed, “think piece” or some other story that seems right for Analytics and its worldwide audience of analysts and executives of various interests facing who knows how many analytical problems, please bring it to our attention.

As we’ve said many times in this space, Analytics is an interactive exercise. We don’t have all the questions, let alone all the answers, but we’re determined to keep asking questions, seeking expert insight and input, and publishing the results.

At the end of 2009, Analytics boasted nearly 4,000 subscribers, and we look forward to boosting that number significantly in the year ahead. Digital word of mouth is perhaps our most effective marketing tool; if your colleagues haven’t yet signed up for their own free subscription to Analytics, feel free to send an e-mail directing them to www.analyticsmagazine.com.

Speaking of “digital word of mouth,” you know you’ve hit the big time in the online social space when you’re known by an acronym, in this case DWOM. While DWOM might not be up there on the recognition scale with LOL or BTW, it carries a certain cache in the digital marketing world, which brings us to this month’s cover story, “Marketing Analytics in Online Social Spaces” (page 8).

In his article, author Kevin Geraghty, the head of analytics at an independent digital marketing agency, runs the reader through DWOM, virality, measuring digital assets and other exotic concepts in the emerging field of online social marketing, where it’s all about “grabs,” “views,” “hubs” and “clicks.” Geraghty says up front he doesn’t know what the future holds for analytics in this arena, but the present sure looks and sounds cool.

As they say in the texting world, BFN (bye for now).