Background
Endsleigh is a leading independent insurance intermediary that provides a wide range of insurance products, including household, travel, motor, pet, business and insurance for not-for-profit organisations, as well as independent financial advice.

Founded in 1965 by the National Union of Students, Endsleigh now employs some 1,100 people across the UK. Its headquarters are located in Cheltenham, it operates a large call centre in Burnley and has 129 branches nationwide.

Endsleigh supports a fully functional Internet site that attracts a monthly audience of over 30,000 unique visitors, who generate over 350,000 page views. Individuals can search the site and obtain quotes for popular products like motor, household and travel insurance, as well as specialist insurance policies, all of which can be purchased securely on-line. The website also uses a wide range of calculators enabling clients to model their financial needs at any time and is backed up with direct access to qualified advisors via an on-line diary booking system.

The Case
Endsleigh identified a need to monitor their website activity when they brought hosting in house. Their existing solution used software that analysed web server log files.

Using log file analysis Endsleigh were able to collect basic site traffic data but little information about on-line applications and quotes.

Endsleigh also needed a product that could report in-depth about their on-line marketing activity, which they found difficult using their existing solution.

Endsleigh's project leader Paul Nicholas explained:

"These tools were fairly basic and were not really considered as a strategic solution. Although we managed a number of results the process was pretty painful and manually intensive. There were also concerns about the accuracy of the results and the ability of the tools to handle multiple domains".

Solution
The main impetus for introducing eVisitAnalyst was for analysis of web marketing campaigns.

Using eVisit Analyst, Endsleigh would be able to track banner ads placed on a number of different websites and measure the effectiveness of each campaign. This information could also be accessed in real-time allowing Endsleigh to see results as they happen.

"The decision (to install eVisit Analyst) was made more in terms of functionality and to save developing a system ourselves. There was also an element of going for something tried and tested" said Paul.

eVisit Analyst's ability to handle multiple domains and websites, such as Endsleigh's which are served by multiple web servers were key features. With eVisit Analyst's JavaScript tagging solution implementation was fast, straightforward and effective across all of Endsleigh's reporting domains.

Results
Up to ten users now regularly utilise eVisit Analyst at Endsleigh to monitor page views, numbers of quotes, types of quote, advertising campaign analysis and website stability. Paul explains:

"The product is generally very easy to use and the support is excellent. Any problems are resolved extremely quickly and support using the system is always available".

eVisit Analyst has also started to create a focus for information within Endsleigh's senior user base. Particularly popular features include 'at a glance' reports delivered by email, stability alerts and eVisit Analyst's unique Key Data. Paul continues:

"The initial expenditure was justified solely on a marketing campaign project but I believe the email warning alone has warranted its expense...all additional benefits are a real bonus".

Of these additional benefits, Paul indicated that Key Data functionality was particularly significant.

"We use Key Data a lot. It is one of the most important features of the system for us. It is used to record quote types, quote numbers for tracking conversion and policies issued. We are currently working on a mechanism for determining the number of submits of a form using Key Data. This will enable us to determine the number of requests for policies/quotes that are not handled correctly. We are delighted with eVisit Analyst and the support".

There have been a number of queries but all have been dealt with quickly and efficiently and on a number of occasions new features have been added to the system at Endsleigh's request.

Summary
John Harrison, eVisit Analyst's product manager, indicates why the product has been such a success at Endsleigh.

"One of the main strengths of eVisit Analyst is that a lot of its functionality has come from discussions about web analysis we have had with our customers."

We listen carefully to what Endsleigh and our customers have to say about eVisit Analyst. When they suggest an enhancement we will do our utmost to implement it as soon as possible for all our customers and at no extra charge.

eVisit Analyst is already an excellent product and its unique Key Data capability gives it unrivalled flexibility in monitoring application data. With our continuous focus on providing the best analytic solutions for our customers eVisit Analyst will only get better in the future".

Paul Nicholas feels that much of the success of the product is down to the relationship between Endsleigh and Maxsi.

"New company relationships are always difficult in the first twelve months but in the instance of Maxsi and Endsleigh I believe we have very quickly built a relationship, which has assisted us hugely in the implementation and extended use of the product... Problems are resolved extremely quickly and support using the system is always available. Requests for new functionality are generally implemented, and again, extremely quickly. We've found you all to be very approachable and honest".

Background
Established in 1992, the Northumbria University is one of the largest universities in the UK with around 25,000 students. It enjoys an international reputation in a wide range of disciplines and has over 3,000 students from overseas.

As a forward thinking institution the University has adopted a professional business approach to its communications. The website is an integral part of this strategy and it delivers information about the University and its courses to over 7,000 visitors each day, from over 90 different countries.

With 80% of all the University's course enquiries coming through the website a detailed analysis of its performance is essential.

The Case
Prior to using eVisit Analyst Northumbria University processed information stored in their web server's log files. Although this gave them basic information about visitors to their website it was far from ideal.

It did not give them much insight into visitor behaviour and did not identify whether visitors found what they were looking for on the website.

Neither did it help the University measure its return on investment from development and marketing initiatives for the website.

Dr Sean Figgis, Head of PR and Communications at Northumbria University, explains:

"With all organisations, understanding where money has been spent is an important requirement for running a business. With a university this is much more important as we are spending public money."

The Solution
The Northumbria University chose eVisit Analyst primarily as a tool to measure the return on marketing and development spending for their website.

eVisit Analyst would allow the University to monitor the effectiveness of paid for links.

It would also allow them to perform cost/benefit analysis of referrals by tracking how many visitors entered the site from a link, identifying the keywords used and recording how many would generate an enquiry.

Furthermore, eVisit Analyst would provide the University with a greater insight into how the website was used.

Nigel Bradley, the University's website manager welcomed the introduction of eVisit Analyst:

"Processing log files was laborious and time consuming. eVisit Analyst was a robust system that was easy to integrate with our content management system and could give us access to the information we needed instantly."

Results
Twelve users within Northumbria University use eVisit Analyst on a regular basis to analyse website performance. In addition daily email reports on website activity are distributed automatically by eVisit Analyst from departmental level up to deputy vice chancellor.

The University is using eVisit Analyst to identify underperforming investments in on line marketing. It has already cancelled marketing campaigns with referring websites that are not delivering the expected referrals as Dr Sean Figgis points out:

"Disappointing results are useful business information."

eVisit Analyst has also helped the University improve the performance of its clearing course search facility on its website. By using eVisit Analyst's unique Key Data analysis feature to record visitors' search requests, it discovered that a number of searches requesting specific courses did not produce any results. A visitor searching for 'Media Studies' would not get a result as the subject is called 'Communications' at the University. Dr Sean Figgis explains:

"Something as simple as adding new keywords to a course can make a huge difference."

Nigel Bradley believes eVisit Analyst has dramatically improved the distribution of information within the University:

"Before the University implemented eVisit Analyst we would get requests from departments asking for information about particular parts of the website which we had no way of separating out. We can now log into eVisit Analyst and obtain information specific to each department and quickly identify whether our visitors are from the University or indeed from anywhere in the world."

Implementation of eVisit Analyst by the University was straightforward as Nigel Bradley explains:

"We have had very few problems implementing eVisit Analyst and those we had were fixed there and then by Maxsi. We had a number of suggestions for new reports and these were produced very quickly."

Conclusion
The University is continually developing its website as an effective marketing tool. eVisit Analyst will help the University realize its full potential by being used to test new innovations such as an online prospectuses and direct applications for courses. Dr Sean Figgis understands:

"The real benefit is being able to give good quality reassurance to University management when investing in the website. It can measure how successful aspects of the navigation are, and anticipate how people will use the website. This information will help to constantly adjust and improve the website. If we hadn't looked at eVisit Analyst and seen the technology now available for website analysis we would probably have continued using log files, or have considered developing our own system, which would probably cost more. The implementation of eVisit Analyst was a good business decision."

Background
Holiday.co.uk is an entirely Internet based travel agent employing over 50 staff and offering over 12 million package holidays direct from the UK's leading tour operators.

Founded in 1994 Holiday.co.uk is part of the Holiday Express group and is ranked among the top five Internet travel brands in the UK.

The Case
Holiday.co.uk needed a website analysis solution to determine the performance of online marketing. They wanted to generate higher returns from investment in pay-per-click campaigns. The solution would also be required to monitor general traffic and user choices such as holiday destinations and travel dates, to support marketing decision-making.

The Solution
Holiday.co.uk began using eVisit Analyst in September 2003, replacing a leading log file analysis solution.

First, traffic tags were added to the website to track where visitors came from, which pages were viewed and how visitors navigated throughout the site.

KeyData was then added to each of the fields in the 'quick search' to identify what visitors were searching for.

Next, campaign codes were added to the links of pay-per-click campaigns. This enabled eVisit Analyst to measure the value of each keyword in terms of holidays booked and visitors retained, helping Holiday.co.uk identify which keywords gave the highest return on investment.

Finally, tickers were placed on large screens within the call centre to monitor site traffic in real-time. This ensured that immediate changes could be made if a PPC campaign was under-performing.

Results
eVisit Analyst's campaign management tools have helped holiday.co.uk reduce the cost of their search engine marketing by 70%. Changes prompted by eVisit Analyst have increase website activity from 15,000 visitors per month to 25,000.

eVisit Analyst also monitors the 'quick search' facility and provides Holiday.co.uk with a better understanding of what their visitors are looking for, which has helped boost the effectiveness of their weekly email newsletter. Dave Dibble, E-Commerce Manager at Holiday.co.uk explains:

"Previously we only knew what was being booked. Now, eVisit Analyst tells us what people are searching for and the email newsletter contains deals based entirely on search results."

The 'quick search' tracking has also proved that visitors often hit the search button without entering data into the fields, causing no holiday destinations to be displayed. This has now been changed to ensure that a holiday destination will always be served. As a result customer retention has increased by 29%.

Over all, since the introduction of eVisit Analyst total revenue from the website has increased by over 100%.

Conclusion
eVisit Analyst has helped Holiday.co.uk a obtain a greater understanding of their visitors' behaviour and provided them with an effective solution for managing their campaigns. Dave Dibble reveals:

"We chose eVisit Analyst for its flexibility, accuracy and ease of use to assist in marketing campaigns and user interface analysis. We love it! It has over-turned long ingrained opinions about online travel and allowed us to make evidence based decisions, which have ultimately doubled our traffic for half the cost. eVisit Analyst is huge for us and no doubt others would gain similar benefits."

The Business Challenge
North Tyneside Council brought the hosting of the web site in-house as they went through some major redevelopment work. As a result, they no longer had a detailed measurement system in place. The web site team had no figures for the number of visitors to the website. They had no systems in place to record downtime, or which parts of the web site were being used heavily and which areas were redundant. More importantly, the team did not know whether the changes were meeting government service delivery and accessibility targets and it needed to ensure that upgrades to its functionality and customer service levels were working.

The web site team needed to understand how its customers were using the site and what they required, as well as measuring traffic and improving reporting processes. It needed a system that would provide information to increase visitor numbers and achieve delivery targets, as well as providing a single link to the site's public access area for automatic publication of web site reports. Information needed to be downloaded for central government reporting, council management and data for the annual IEG report.

The team needed the accuracy that could not be provided by any log analysis tools, counting page impression even when they were served by a cache server.

Using eVisit Analysis Government
"Our website provides information and online functionality to our residents, visitors and people working in North Tyneside. We needed to be collecting accurate stats in order to find out more about our visitors and their needs." Said Barry Jackson, Web site manager North Tyneside Council.

North Tyneside had adopted the stringent 'AAA' accessibility standards. One of the key requirements was that the tags used to communicate with the eVisit Analyst server conformed to these standards.

eVisit Analyst allows the team to measure the effectiveness of areas of the web site, using the Key Data functionality. For example it instantly reports on the number of planning pages accessed, rather than having to trawl through individual page impressions, adding them together.

By having the managed server on its network, the Council is also able to measure internal traffic on its intranet and internal applications without traffic leaving the Council network, utilising precious bandwidth.

North Tyneside Council has many web sites, eVisit Analysis has allowed the team to report on multiple domains.

Results
"We find the support staff at Maxsi very responsive, we have recently asked for some new reports and they have been produced for us in a very timely fashion. The same can be said when we ask for new reporting domains to be added." Barry Jackson

North Tyneside Council now has up to date statistics readily available and has used eVisit Analyst to meet the OPDM Priority Outcome for providing usage statistics to the public. ICT customers are now able to access statistics themselves.

The web site team now understands how its customers are using the site and what they require, and it has introduced many changes to the web site as a result. By using eVisit Analyst to monitor the most popular pages the team is able to regularly update the home page listings which makes navigation a lot easier and much faster. Many parts of the site previously retained by the team, which devoted a great deal of time and effort maintaining, have been removed as they were simply not being used. This has achieved major savings in time and cost.

John Harrison CEO of Maxsi said, "eVisit Analyst Government has been developed specifically to meet the unique requirements of local government website analysis. Many of the features we have introduced on eVisit Analyst Government have been suggested by councils themselves."

The Business Challenge
The company's web site had high traffic volumes searching for up to the minute information on property listings. A system for measuring basic statistics was in place but the information did not go further than basic numbers - the web site team needed a system that enabled them to clearly understand how visitors were using and experiencing the online service.

More specifically, it needed to see clearly and consistently the number of visitors, page requests and traffic patterns for each of its 5000+ agents. The company needed to be able to provide its agents with the tools to configure their sites in change content in order to draw more prospective clients online and keep them there for longer periods. Prudential also needed a comprehensive reporting system to show traffic and trends, visitor interest and results from search marketing campaigns.

Using eVisit Analysis and Results
"We found eVisit Analyst ePortal to be the only system that allows thousands of real estate agents to monitor traffic on their individual websites in a cost-effective manner. Maxsi was able to meet a very aggressive start-up time table, including an onsite visit for training and further customisation. Their online technical support is highly competent and extremely responsive." Ken Cook, Prudential California Realty's CIO

Prudential selected eVisit Analyst ePortal, the web analytics system from UK company Maxsi. Managed by its existing intranet system (Webtop5), eVisit Analyst ePortal provides a live window for each of its five thousand agents. The number of visitors, requested web pages and traffic patterns are available for all agent websites. Agents also now have a live "ticker tape" to show current activity on their websites at any given moment. eVisit Analyst reports provide feedback on the most popular aspects of their sites, including which of their property listings are getting the most attention.

The eVisit Analyst reports enable Prudential Realty to focus search engine optimisation efforts to maximise results and monitor the effectiveness of various fee-based lead programmes.

The company also uses eVisit "key data" technology to track visitor interests and trends, such as:

The most common home price ranges selected in property searches

Popular geographical areas searched

The areas where school information is more frequently requested when searching for homes

This data is used to forecast trends and market opportunity.

eVisit Analyst Portal is also used to monitor website availability. An email alert is transmitted to key personnel on a 24/7 basis upon a period of time - designated by Prudential - where no web pages have been served. This reveals any problems with the system. Traffic reports such as "file not found" reports are used to troubleshoot "dead" links and other potential problems.

The system allows the company to define a wide range of reports in multiple formats and schedule automated delivery to many stakeholders, such as marketing managers, estate brokers, business affiliates, financial managers, estate agents, and technology professionals.

The Business Challenge
The web site is the main source of information for all of the University's many and various activities; aimed at prospective students, current staff and students, research and enterprise partners and many more.

The team responsible for the site had very little information about how successful the various pages, sites and structures were. Ensuring that the pages are as informative and usable as possible was taking up a great deal of the team's time but they had no firm information on whether the pages were actually being visited. The team was not able to make plans and work towards objectives without a clear picture of the changing patterns of site usage and visitor behaviour.

"We are now able to report the headline figures and, more importantly, trends, to Senior Management and University Committees, helping to inform strategic planning in several areas." Rob Mitchell, Web Editor, University of Exeter

Using eVisit Analysis and Results
Using eVisit Analystthe web site team is now able to analyse the usage patterns of each distinct site within its web presence. This information has informed re-designs and reorganisations in several areas. One example is the University's Library and Information services using the information from the traffic analysis facility to determine which pages receive most traffic-specifically looking for the pages, which were less important, but because of their positioning received more traffic than required. They then demoted these items and gave more prominence to the pages with equal or more importance, which were previously visited less frequently. The team uses key data for an informed review of its search engine results. Using the visitor and e-commerce analysis reports it is able to capture and analyse the search terms used on its homepages. This data has been used as the basis of a comparison of various possible search solutions. The team is now able to report the headline figures and, more importantly, trends, to Senior Management and University Committees, helping to inform strategic planning in several areas.

"We hope to improve all aspects of our site over time. For now, it is a big step forward just to be able to find out how the site is being used day by day." Rob Mitchell, Web Editor, University of Exeter