Continuing my series of interviews with 
marketing (which is a widely mis-used term), but I believe that as the true value of social marketing emerges, the demand for solid, actionable metrics will also increase. And I think web analytics is the most likely place for that need to emerge.
How did you find your new job? How long did it take? Did you interview a lot?
Like most people in most circumstances, I found my first job in WA through various social networks, and just searching job boards. At the time, I knew little about web analytics, but was fortunate to have been "found" by a manager who recognized that I could be "trained" for the role quickly and easily, so it worked out well for everyone involved.
My current position I found through meeting people at Jim Sterne's eMetrics Marketing Optimization Summits(
What are the skills that you think are important for a web analyst?
Analysts work at various levels -- the most fundamental level requires some understanding of basic statistics, such as linear regression, seasonality, and simple trend forecasting, combined with an understanding of how the web "works." In other words, what do we know about browsing behavior, combined with cookie
deletion probabilities, web server caching, and other artifacts of the web experience, to put our data into a reasonable context, from which we can draw useful conclusions?
Beyond that basic level, though, is an understanding of organizational politics, and some fluency in "managing your message" so that the analysis you've worked hard at creating actually influences managers in making better decisions. Otherwise, you're just creating "doorstop reports," that don't help your organization, and don't really justify your efforts.
Like most people in the field, I discovered it accidentally - only in the last couple of years has web analytics become a recognized position for which there are training programs, reasonably standard job descriptions, and expectations which are fairly common to measure an analyst's success in an organization. As recently as a couple years ago, these weren't really in place, nor was it clear which job boards were the best for new opportunities. Today, I'd say Eric T. Peterson's board at Web Analytics Demystified ( those different lenses, and had your "Aha!" moments, you continue to hone your analysis in other ways -- creating more compelling presentations, for example, to increase the decision-making influence of your analysis.
What are the major challenges you are facing in this industry?
I think the entire industry is at a point where our ability to analyze goes beyond the ability of the tools to deliver unified data in a cost-effective manner. In other words, we can imagine many different data sets we'd like to correlate, but only very few of us can get the various data sources to play nicely with each other without spending an inordinate amount of time, effort, and money, most of which we don't have access to.
Beyond that, most organizations aren't yet at the point where they know how to take advantage of the insights web analytics, or rather, an analytics-framed mindset, can offer. As a consultant, I see mos firms struggling to implement a tool correctly, and after that, maybe to figure out some truly useful KPIs, then do some basic campaign analysis. Few organizations are at the point where multi-channel measurement is common, or where web analytics is used to help allocate marketing spend most effectively, or where true ROI is being captured, and good business decisions made accordingly.
Web analytics will mature as an industry, but part of that means that the skill sets will become better defined and more widespread, so that any firm that really needs an analyst will be able to hire one. Beyond that, web analytics and business intelligence will merge in terms of an aggressive approach to data analysis being applied to many areas of an organization -- not just their web site, or even their online marketing, but all of the marketing, production, sales, and other operations. It's neither easy nor cheap to get there, but I'm sure that those firms which can execute well on an analytics vision will certainly see unparalleled success.
How do you make sure you are learning and growing in this field?
I'm a little biased here, but as someone who reads nearly every message in the Web Analytics Forum (the free Yahoo! Group that Eric T. Peterson founded, and which I now serve as the primary moderator
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