"Ralph's latest book ushers in the second wave of the Internet. . . . Bottom line, this book provides the insight to help companies combine Internet-based business intelligence with the bounty of customer data generated from the internet."--William Schmarzo, Director World Wide Solutions, Sales, and Marketing,IBM NUMA-Q.
Receiving over 100 million hits a day, the most popular commercial Websites have an excellent opportunity to collect valuable customer data that can help create better service and improve sales. Companies can use this information to determine buying habits, provide customers with recommendations on new products, and much more. Unfortunately, many companies fail to take full advantage of this deluge of information because they lack the necessary resources to effectively analyze it.
In this groundbreaking guide, data warehousing's bestselling author, Ralph Kimball, introduces readers to the Data Webhouse--the marriage of the data warehouse and the Web. If designed and deployed correctly, the Webhouse can become the linchpin of the modern, customer-focused company, providing competitive information essential to managers and strategic decision makers. In this book, Dr. Kimball explains the key elements of the Webhouse and provides detailed guidelines for designing, building, and managing the Webhouse. The results are a business better positioned to stay healthy and competitive.
In this book, you'll learn methods for:
- Tracking Website user actions
- Determining whether a customer is about to switch to a competitor
- Determining whether a particular Web ad is working
- Capturing data points about customer behavior
- Designing the Website to support Webhousing
- Building clickstream datamarts
- Designing the Webhouse user interface
- Managing and scaling the Webhouse
The companion Website at www.wiley.com/compbooks/kimball provides updates on Webhouse technologies and techniques, as well as links to related sites and resources.
In this groundbreaking work, authors and data warehousing visionaries Ralph Kimball and Richard Merz explore a next-generation Web site architecture that exploits the unique nature of the Web's interactivity to dramatically improve an organization's understanding of its relationship with users.
The Data Webhouse Toolkit isn't a how-to manual; it is a high-level look at an ambitious new approach to system design.
The foundation of the concept of Webhouses is the "clickstream"--the plethora of information that can be gleaned if only a system could capture and accurately analyze all of the interaction (or lack thereof) that occurs between Web users and the sites they access. The authors take a careful look at all of the valuable information in the clickstream and point out the complications of compiling this precious information from various gathering sources such as the user's machine, ISP, and Web site.
The book argues strongly for the application of data warehousing and dimensional analysis to the clickstream to radically improve the strategic knowledge of customer motives and actions. While there are no real-life case studies yet to illustrate the concept, this book is bound to whet the appetites of creative entrepreneurs and system architects. --Stephen W. Plain
Topics covered: "Clickstream" concept, opportunities and barriers to information, Web site user tracking, clickstream-driven decisions, clickstream data marts, user interface design, data mining, international concerns, scalability, and project management.
