My wife Aurélie and I have an interactive agency in Belgium — OX2. Her dream has always been to work with numbers and KPIs. Before OX2, she worked in the insurance and banking sector on Internet-related projects, but she was perpetually frustrated: every time she requested something from the technical team, the most common answer was “it’s too difficult” or “it’s not possible.” Sick of those technical roadblocks, when she discovered our team she was thrilled by the fact that “Impossible” wasn’t in our vocabulary. She decided to work on the agency side.

OX2 was born from the ashes of Oniros Illusions Studio, a company devoted to gaming and Internet development that I joined in 2001. I was head of the Internet division, and in 2003, after a bankruptcy — we had trouble selling a game that was 80% developed, which ran us out of cash — I decided to buy what was left of the company to continue the Internet activities, which were profitable and in line with my aspirations. That’s how OX2 was born. The Internet team was rehired by the new company, and all of our clients stayed with us. The main asset of the team back then was their technical capability. Since 1999, they’d been building Content Management Systems used by RTL Group, Bridgestone Europe, and many others. Their technical skills are extraordinary, and that’s what pushed me to create OX2. What I’ve seen very often among competitors is that they’re great at marketing and design, but when it comes to building what they envisioned, problems arise. With my team, I’ve never encountered a project they couldn’t complete.

One year after creating OX2, we launched our Web Analytics services by partnering with WebTrends, which was for us the best tool in the Belgian market. (I know you’re going to say there are other tools as good as WebTrends, but their support in Europe — and especially Belgium — wasn’t convincing us.) When we saw version 7, my reaction was: “Wow! Finally a web analytics solution for business users.” Then we started our pilgrimage to push Web Analytics in Belgium. A few months after debuting our partnership with WebTrends, we won a tender to implement WebTrends at Belgacom, the former state telecom monopoly. From there, clients started knocking at our door. Since then, we’ve helped a couple of dozen clients — mostly multinationals like Bridgestone Europe, Toyota Europe, or Stanley Europe, and top Belgian companies like Atlas Copco, Barco, or Isabel.

Last year we created a full Business Unit devoted to Web Analytics — we’re the only interactive agency in the Belgian market to have done so — and launched www.webanalytics.be. We were also named WebTrends Top Partner 2004 South. Don’t ask me why, but Belgium was considered by NetIQ/WebTrends as part of southern Europe ;-)

In June, Aurélie and I got married. Given the amount of work we had, our honeymoon was shared with our mobiles and laptops. But we enjoyed a very pleasant stay at Colletta, 100km north of Genova in Italy.

After the summer, OX2 was appointed as the first European member of the WebTrends Insight Network (WIN).

In November, we organized a Web Analytics Day at the Federation of Belgian Enterprises, which attracted over 120 registrants. For a country like Belgium, we consider this a great success — web analytics is not yet as mature here as in other countries, and usually WA seminars attracted fewer than 20 people. During that day we presented WebTrends but also a more general view of how to launch a web analytics project in large organizations. The afternoon was devoted to workshops around Web Analytics and SEO, Emailing Campaigns, and Conversion.

Then Google — sooner than expected — launched Google Analytics just a few days after our Web Analytics Day. This pushed awareness of web analytics through the roof worldwide. We couldn’t sit still, so the first thing we did was test GA extensively. After two of our WA specialists analyzed it for two weeks, we decided to create a package to assist clients in their GA implementation. Even though GA doesn’t go as far as WebTrends in many areas, it’s a perfect solution for companies that want to start the web analytics learning curve but don’t have the budget for a WebTrends license. We called that package “GA Start” — it allows beginners to start the journey the right way.

This year we’ve concentrated our efforts on integrating WebTrends with our CMS to ease the configuration directly from the CMS interface. You can define translation files to avoid meaningless IDs in the reports, Content Groups, and even conversion funnels.

Well, I’m getting a bit long in my explanations (must be my Spanish side ;-)), so let’s get back to the question of why this blog now that you know a bit more about us.

This blog has been created to allow our team members to share with you — and the rest of the world — their ideas, thoughts, and views on Web Analytics. It will also allow me not to get woken up at 2 in the morning by my wife when she’s had a new idea about web analytics. From now on she’ll be able to write it here, and I’ll enjoy the reading in the morning with my cup of coffee ;-)

Our aim is to move the market forward and push the adoption of Web Analytics. The era of websites seen as purely cost centers is over. Now we need to define business objectives and measure — to report ROI on the one hand and optimize online initiatives on the other, maximizing returns.

We’re also conscious that the Web Analytics learning curve is long, and this is why we try to feed our clients with our knowledge to help them reach self-sufficiency.