In the Summer of 1995, I was having dinner with some early Internet ... in San ... at Lulu's Bistro just off of the Moscone Center. These ... were snotty little twenty- and thirty-
In the Summer of 1995, I was having dinner with some early Internet "pioneers" in San Francisco at Lulu's Bistro just off of the Moscone Center. These "pioneers" were snotty little twenty- and thirty-somethings, like me at the time (at least the snotty part), hell bent on changing the world through Web connections, Mountain Dew, iguanas running the office corridors, "just say no to senior management," and countless fanny packs full of stock options.
"The Market be damned!" they'd say. "This is the Internet economy!"
"The old paradigm is OVER," they'd drool between sips of Sierra Nevada. "Wells Fargo. Wall-Mart. Berkshire Hathaway. O-V-E-R. Like Pearl Jam." (Remember, this is '95.)
Drunk on power and visions of world domination I raced home to Minneapolis to start Ciceron.
We all know how the California version of the Internet bubble ended. You probably know an ex-CEO who now mixes martinis for hire south of Market Street.
Recently, I revisited one of the Old New Paradigms: "Internet Time." You remember that one? The one where everything happens faster on the Internet. Is it still true? Does this dusty ol' ditty still play well on the e-jukebox of time?
I'm going to make the argument that, of all the paradigm-shifting, new age, margon-jargon (that's modern for "mumbo-jumbo"), geek-speak of the '90s, "Internet time" is the one that still stands for something.
That "something" is the speed in which we can gain empirical knowledge about how consumers behave in the marketplace, as represented on the Internet. Customer research is the next Big Boom on the Internet. Right now, as you're reading this, perhaps tens if not hundreds or thousands of people (depending upon the size of your online marketplace) are online, at your site, creating data. They're "behaving" in some form or fashion, either in a way that you want or in a way that you should know about. Either they're "getting it" or they're not. They've either bought something from you, signed up for that newsletter, filled out that form, downloaded that document, or forwarded that page to their boss, or they haven't.
So. Have they? Do you know? It's happening right now. THERE! Oops. It's gone. Did you see it?
What if you knew everything that was happening on your Web site right now and could act on it? Or at least make some simple changes that made their next visit more relevant to them. C'mon. What I'm talking about isn't evil or intrusive. You love it! It's Amazon!
The Internet and web in particular can give us a real-time glimpse into reality -- now. Tracking that information and translating it into actionable steps in both our online and offline experiences can -- and will -- have a huge impact on commerce in general. How much money can you save by simply using the Web to test new products, for example. Or a new message. Or a tag line. Or a seminar topic.
Web analytics is just a fancy term for customer research. Use it for that. Use all of that data to educate yourselves. It's just sitting there, waiting. Waiting for you to take it, learn from it, and make your visitors happier, you wiser, and your fanny pack bursting with greenbacks.
