Analysis: Marketing Measurement Heads for ConvergenceAnalysis: Marketing Measurement Heads for Convergence

"Most companies don't want to have to tap into five or six disparate silos of information to make heads or tails of their online marketing information," says Eric Peterson, a senior analyst at Jupiter Research. That's why we're headed for "a single interface for all marketing data, including Web traffic, search, e-mail, banners, RSS--everything."

In the last week alone, two more signs of this digital convergence emerged. On-demand Web analytics vendor Omniture integrated with DoubleClick's DARTmail tool, and rival WebSideStory introduced a keyword bid management system as part of its Web marketing platform.

The integration between Omniture's SiteCatalyst Suite and DARTmail supports the sharing of data between the two systems and, thus, complete measurement, management and optimization of outbound campaigns and cross-selling opportunities. E-mail campaign management systems such as DARTmail typically report on messages delivered and received as well as clicks on links within those e-mails, but Web analytics measurement begins where these tools leave off--at the Web site with the clickthrough. Between bad links, slow Internet connections and other factors, there can be a significant difference between clicks and clickthroughs. And once e-mail recipients reach the site, their navigation and purchase behavior can be tracked so publishers can learn more about readers and marketers can segment lists, refine tactics and analyze the entire online customer experience.

"Not all e-mail addresses are equal," Peterson says. "The goal is to identify the highest value recipients, and Web analytics is really the tool to do that." According to a recent study by Jupiter, 40 percent of e-mail marketers plan to add Web site clickstream data as an e-mail marketing tactic within the next 24 months.

The combination is nothing new, he says. Before Omniture and DoubleClick, Digital River brought together e-mail tool Blue Hornet and Web analytics tool Fireclick. WebSideStory has many e-mail partners, and it acquired Avivo, better known as Atomz, to integrate its hosted search, content and e-mail campaign management services. And just last month, Experian's CheetahMail unit bought Harvest Solutions, a Web analytics provider.

Web analytics vendors WebTrends and CoreMetrics also have e-mail partners, but Omniture says DARTmail is the most popular tool of its kind, with more than 400 customers (including CMP Media, which also uses Omniture's service). The API-level integration is also deeper than rivals' marketing-driven ties, the company asserts.

"If you want to review your DARTmail data inside SiteCatalyst, that can happen automatically," says Matt Belkin, vice president of Omniture's Best Practices Group. For many rivals, it's a "manual cut-and-paste integration in which you have to take a CSV file from the Web analytics tool and put it into the e-mail serving platform" to segment lists.

In another move toward the convergence of online marketing measurement, WebSideStory on August 1 launched the "Bid" component to its Active Marketing Suite. The move was expected, having been announced this past spring. The keyword bid management system lets marketers measure and manage large numbers of paid search engine keywords with built-in conversion tracking and ROI reporting capabilities.