Yahoo Unleashes Answer to Google Analytics

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Yahoo has launched its formal answer to Google's Web site analytics product. Called Yahoo Web Analytics, the service is a free, re-branded version of IndexTools, the paid analytics platform the company acquired earlier this year.

When Yahoo bought IndexTools in April, many described it as a superior product to Google Analytics. As with Google Analytics, it gives Web site owners insight into sales, ad performance and traffic sources. It also provides traffic alerts, custom reporting structures, and live cost analysis that incorporates dynamic pricing data from search engines.

Yahoo Web Analytics will be rolled out in stages. It will be available first to 13,000 customers of the company's Yahoo Small Business hosting service, as well as to advertisers through Yahoo Custom Solutions and Yahoo Buzz Marketing.

Other Yahoo ad customers will gain access to it this year and next, according to a spokesperson, who added the service became free for pre-existing IndexTools customers shortly after the acquisition.

"We intend to provide a full suite of analytics to our head and tail advertisers, agencies, publishers and development partners," Bassel Ojjeh, senior VP and head of Yahoo's Strategic Data Solutions group, told ClickZ News when the company acquired IndexTools.

As such, Yahoo may reach a different set of marketers than have migrated to Google Analytics.

"This is really good for display advertisers, said Jeffrey Eisenberg, co-founder and CEO of marketing consulting firm Future Now, back in April. "The people who are not using Google AdWords -- this will make those people more aware of results."