The Blog of Brandon Milford - Marketing, Entrepreneurship, and Design

Google has re-branded Urchin ‘Google Analytics‘, and is now offering it for free. Google acquired Urchin in March of this year and quickly lowered the price from $499/month to $199/month.

I guess it makes sense that Google would make this move. As we all know Google is a data collecting machine and offering Urchin at no cost will greatly increase the number of users and the amount of data Google can collect.

What I am curious to see is how this is going to affect the landscape of the web analytics market. How will Urchin’s competitors continue to compete? Will we see their competitors making even greater strides to further differentiate their offerings from Urchin? I’m sure we will. Certainly many clients will be switching to Urchin, but I’m sure there are many who will continue using the web analytics software they have grown accustomed to using each day and remain loyal to that brand.

In constantly performing competitor analysis’ you have to look closely at your competition and ensure you have a competitive advantage, but what do you do when a competitor offers a comparable product at no charge? There should be more differentiating your product than just the price. For instance, with IntelliContact we not only offer low prices, but also features that our competition lacks. You should also differentiate on customer experience; how your customers interact with your software (easy to use, visually appealing, and reliable) and their experience when contacting support - Does someone answer the phones when customers call and sufficiently answer their questions? Are their emails answered in a timely manner?  If you can work hard to ensure your customers are happy each time they interact with your brand - you’ll win.