Is Web Analytics 2.0 Right to Discourage Predictive Analysis on Web Data? I don't think so.

The great Eric Siegel is going to speak in a webinar on March 31^st on the topic of predictive analytics for online applications using web analytics and other data as input.

In web analytics we always think that predictive analysis is the natural next step and will do great things for us. But most of us, when asked, have a very hard time explaining what exactly predictive can do. Avinash Kaushik in his (otherwise groundbreaking and highly recommendable) book Web Analytics 2.0 (and earlier on his blog) almost downright discourages predictive analysis on web data.

But, this is one area where I think Avinash’s opinion is not as balanced as it should be.

Predictive analysis folks such as Neil Mason and Eric Siegel and myself have made various recommendations in articles and posts in the past to showcase opportunities from predictive analysis. Of course, Eric Peterson too has aimed to describe the possibililties in his paper “The coming revolution…” 

But come and see the webinar with Eric Siegel so you can make up your own mind.

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P.S.: I highly enjoyed Avinash’s web analytics 2.0 book though and will hope to post a critique  in coming weeks.