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As a non-web developper, I always wondered: Are these alternatives fully able to replace Google analytics? I sort of thought Google analytics would tell you m

As a non-web developper, I always wondered: Are these alternatives fully able to replace Google analytics? I sort of thought Google analytics would tell you more about your visitors since with Google cookies, they could map them to other visited websites, centers of interest, age group, etc. Are you loosing all that when switching to a less intrusive analytics platform such as this, or is Google analytics not leveraging their ability to disclose more about the visitors?

dustinmoris 6y ago
Due to the amount of people blocking Google Analytics with browser extensions, Pi-Holes and other tools I find GA increasingly lacking good analytics.
- wartijn_ 6y ago
  I assume most tools will block Matomo as well. I know uBlock origin with the default blocklist does.
  - mattmcknight 6y ago
    This is why you self host it, to avoid a third party cookie.
    - y42 6y ago
      Still not help if you consider GDPR et al. rules, at least in the EU.
      - vntok 6y ago
        In some countries (eg France), there are exemptions for tracking purposes if the tracking is done only to the benefit of the site's editor.
      - XCSme 6y ago
        I think that using a self-hosted platform where you don't store any PII or cookies allows you to store visitor statistics without explicit consent.
        y42 6y ago
        Only half the truth and a common misunderstanding. Define "visitor statistics". GDPR is about personal information, yes, but the cookie directive is also about tracking features in general. See the current so called "cookie verdict". To break it down: If you just count page impressions, you should be fine. Everything beyond is complicated. (Besides that, it does not matter where you host the data, on-premise or on foreign soil or if you use cookies or any other storing technology.)
      - mattmcknight 6y ago
        I meant it helps with uBlock type rules against domains.
jeroenhd 6y ago
Google Analytics tells you more about your audience because it stalks people across the web. Matomo can never provide that without having a broad range of websites from which you collect data and writing custom code to annotate visitors with your own interest tags. Matomo purely tracks analytics: who visited what page, for how long, from what device, from what location, from what inbound website, and what outbound links did they click. It also provides a log of pages requested per session so you can analyze people's flows through your website. It's certainly not a replacement for Google Analytics if you use it to collect background information on your visitors. Even though Google's information is very broad (you mostly get ranges and the interests aren't that reliable), some marketeers use it to make decisions about their marketing strategies. Matomo won't help you there, your alternative would probably be Facebook or another big tech tracking solution. It does provide a replacement for the type of tracking that I personally find acceptable, assuming the IP addresses are anonymized sufficiently. Matomo recommends shortening IP addresses to /16 after analysis, which I consider good enough, but that's a setting administrators can change.
- XCSme 6y ago
  What information exactly does GA tell you from stalking people across the web? I don't think Google sharing with you accurate information about the people visiting other websites would be completely legal (GDPR). Where exactly do you find this information in the dashboard?
  - marvinblum 6y ago
    Even if they don't share it with you, they do it for themselves.
    - XCSme 6y ago
      Yes, that was my point, probably they get this data for themselves and improving their own services but as a webmaster you don't get all this data yourself.
  - iamacyborg 6y ago
marvinblum 6y ago
Hey there, we are working on Pirsch [0] (another GA alternative). If you can replace GA depends on your needs. GA collects more personal data, you get better insight of your audience. This is important if you do online marketing and like to see how well your campaigns perform. GA does track visitors across days and you can therefore see if someone came back after a week and made a purchase. In case you don't do that or are simply not interested in specifics, all the alternatives are good enough right now, I think. You can still tell how visitors navigate your page, what content they visit most and all that stuff. We are currently thinking about what we can add to gain more insight for businesses, without invading privacy as Google does. [0] https://pirsch.io/ https://pirsch.io/
johnchristopher 6y ago
The real kick is when you link both google ads and google analytics https://blog.littledata.io/2019/02/25/why-link-google-ads-adwords-with-google-analytics/ https://blog.littledata.io/2019/02/25/why-link-google-ads-ad... Something you can't do when leaving google land.

dustinmoris 6y ago

Due to the amount of people blocking Google Analytics with browser extensions, Pi-Holes and other tools I find GA increasingly lacking good analytics.

wartijn_ 6y ago
I assume most tools will block Matomo as well. I know uBlock origin with the default blocklist does.
- mattmcknight 6y ago
  This is why you self host it, to avoid a third party cookie.
  - y42 6y ago
    Still not help if you consider GDPR et al. rules, at least in the EU.
    - vntok 6y ago
      In some countries (eg France), there are exemptions for tracking purposes if the tracking is done only to the benefit of the site's editor.
    - XCSme 6y ago
      I think that using a self-hosted platform where you don't store any PII or cookies allows you to store visitor statistics without explicit consent.
      - y42 6y ago
        Only half the truth and a common misunderstanding. Define "visitor statistics". GDPR is about personal information, yes, but the cookie directive is also about tracking features in general. See the current so called "cookie verdict". To break it down: If you just count page impressions, you should be fine. Everything beyond is complicated. (Besides that, it does not matter where you host the data, on-premise or on foreign soil or if you use cookies or any other storing technology.)
    - mattmcknight 6y ago
      I meant it helps with uBlock type rules against domains.

jeroenhd 6y ago

Google Analytics tells you more about your audience because it stalks people across the web. Matomo can never provide that without having a broad range of websites from which you collect data and writing custom code to annotate visitors with your own interest tags. Matomo purely tracks analytics: who visited what page, for how long, from what device, from what location, from what inbound website, and what outbound links did they click. It also provides a log of pages requested per session so you can analyze people's flows through your website. It's certainly not a replacement for Google Analytics if you use it to collect background information on your visitors. Even though Google's information is very broad (you mostly get ranges and the interests aren't that reliable), some marketeers use it to make decisions about their marketing strategies. Matomo won't help you there, your alternative would probably be Facebook or another big tech tracking solution. It does provide a replacement for the type of tracking that I personally find acceptable, assuming the IP addresses are anonymized sufficiently. Matomo recommends shortening IP addresses to /16 after analysis, which I consider good enough, but that's a setting administrators can change.

XCSme 6y ago
What information exactly does GA tell you from stalking people across the web? I don't think Google sharing with you accurate information about the people visiting other websites would be completely legal (GDPR). Where exactly do you find this information in the dashboard?
- marvinblum 6y ago
  Even if they don't share it with you, they do it for themselves.
  - XCSme 6y ago
    Yes, that was my point, probably they get this data for themselves and improving their own services but as a webmaster you don't get all this data yourself.
- iamacyborg 6y ago

marvinblum 6y ago

Hey there, we are working on Pirsch [0] (another GA alternative). If you can replace GA depends on your needs. GA collects more personal data, you get better insight of your audience. This is important if you do online marketing and like to see how well your campaigns perform. GA does track visitors across days and you can therefore see if someone came back after a week and made a purchase. In case you don't do that or are simply not interested in specifics, all the alternatives are good enough right now, I think. You can still tell how visitors navigate your page, what content they visit most and all that stuff. We are currently thinking about what we can add to gain more insight for businesses, without invading privacy as Google does. [0] https://pirsch.io/ https://pirsch.io/

johnchristopher 6y ago

The real kick is when you link both google ads and google analytics https://blog.littledata.io/2019/02/25/why-link-google-ads-adwords-with-google-analytics/ https://blog.littledata.io/2019/02/25/why-link-google-ads-ad... Something you can't do when leaving google land.