This article was originally written several years back when I was working between Marketing and Technology departments at a startup needing to recreate what I had built with Adobe Analytics at a Fortune 1000 firm. At that time I was using both. I had ran procurement processing and reviews with Forrester to help justify budgeting to help assess which solutions to go with. I had an independent, somewhat unbiased view at that time.

I have now been working at Adobe for 7+ years so I have updated the table to reflect the latest. I have been working in the client relationship covering the entire Experience Cloud. I try to focus more on the strategy and team dynamics.

Google Analytics 4 has been released so I am still working through how everything will change from the years on Universal Analytics. At Adobe the same structural changes in data storing is happening with the Customer Data Platform (CDP) Real Time Experience Platform.

I maintain this blog and write these articles to better understand the financial technology market and attain feedback from fund managers and those pushing the envelope with these technologies. I appreciate any feedback in the comments.

One of my previous colleagues from Kaspersky, Andrey Osadchuk created this great 2 part video in 2018. He has become a top contributor to the Adobe forum and goes into detail on Adobe's Analysis workspace.

Google Analytics and Adobe Analytics (previously Omniture SiteCatalyst) are both distinguished solutions for digital analytics insight.  They can provide business intelligence to determine return on investment and the ability to employ powerful optimization strategies.  Each solution has strengths and weaknesses. I now work for Adobe so know much more about the Adobe offering than Google. 

This article was originally written to address Google Analytics' free version, but Google has since produced a premium version that requires varying levels of payment.  The Adobe Analytics (SiteCatalyst) solution has also gone through changes with the acquisition by tech giant Adobe.  

Expert Analysts and Product Leads

I try to read experts like Avinash Kaushik and Justin Cutroni for information on Google. I now have greater access to the Adobe product team, whereas before I was dependent on my yearly trip to the Adobe (Omniture) Summit. If you have budget for vendors like Forrester and Gartner, they can provide detailed product reviews and comparisons.  

Google's Premium, paid for version is a better solution to compare as Adobe does not offer a free version for comparison purposes.  GA has an intuitive user interface, instant segmentation, and out of the box search engine integration for Google.  Those that are new to analytics can easily begin using the platform. It is clear Google has tremendous user interface (UI) and user experience (UX) expertise. 

Adobe Analytics (previously Omniture SiteCatalyst) purpose built for large enterprise excels with customization, dynamic classification, and deep integrations. Rich customization, designed to fit any set of requirements, allow Adobe to achieve superior levels of functionality.  Classifications allow relational data points for exponential reporting options that can be changed retroactively.  Data manipulation through excel client, access to raw data through Data Warehouse (additional cost), and importing data through Data sources allow for immense integration abilities. There are also numerous companies that offer integrations.

Conclusion

Before making a choice of analytics software offerings it is important to assess your team. Team members need to have dedicated time for analysis, driving optimization, and development cycles should be committed for tag management code updates on a recurring basis. Requirements aligning key business objectives with key performance indicators should be well defined up front and maintained. This is where I have seen waste from underutilized resources.

Some teams I have seen staff lightly and rely on external contractors or agencies. I have had the luck to work with some great agencies at a few different firms.  The team and the optimization strategy are what drive true success, less the technology solution. Let us know your opinion in the comments below.