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Neil Mason wrote a recent article in Clickz that neatly summarizes the three stages of building an organization that can effectively analyze and use data from its online marketing and sales endeavors. He uses the metaphor of a journey, and describes three steps:

1. Building a performance tracking capability This is the process of getting the right numbers right, counting the things that count, developing KPIs, distributing key reports that tell you how you’re doing, and whether you’re meeting goals or not.
2. Process analysis and optimization At this stage, organizations use their measurement systems to understand and optimise key business processes, such as acquisition and conversion. They are using additional tools such as A/B and multivariate testing. They’re thinking more strategically about site design, developing key customer journeys and segmenting their visitor base.
3. User-Centricity In the final stage, the organization’s focus is the shifts from the site to the user or customer. Retention as a process becomes more important and, as a result, site behavioural data must be integrated with other data sources and other marketing technologies. Metrics for customer loyalty and lifetime value become KPIs. The online channel is an integrated part of the multi-channel customer strategy.

Many, probably most, organizations involved with web analytics are squarely in step one. The process of creating insight into your goals leads to the development of clearly understanding the most relevant key metrics. This realization brings about the necessity to share, communicate and educate — to broaden the base, to expand the organization’s capability to understand and integrate this information into itself.

Over time, with persistence, the result can lead to a clearer understanding of where we stand, here and now, and of how we’ve gotten to this precise point. The elements necessary to achieve this goal are widely held to include:

• Clearly established goals and metrics
• Accurate, trust-worthy numbers and data
• Consistent reporting
• Procedures to document tests, actions and results

At some point, the line between building the organizational capability and process optimization begins to blur. Key metrics become more clearly defined, insight into segment behavior becomes more critically valuable. Gaining insight into these areas requires the same practical approach of identifying, integrating and proving the data, followed by defining the actions and sharing the results. The cyclical nature of reaching a deeper understanding means you have the opportunity to travel the same ground again and again. This is the continuous improvement process, or kaizen. And though you’re repeating the same procedures, each cycle brings you further along the path.