Ask IH: Tool to replace Google Analytics
I'm running a SaaS site, any suggestion for a tool to replace Google Analytics to learn more about our users? Ideally, something that can also track events and gather information about the site and features usage in addition to the regular visits, page views, etc.
I feel Google knows too much of us 😅
The budget is $50/month max.
Depends what you need. If it's just pageviews and referrers, Plausible is great. If you want more depth, like heatmaps, session replay, conversion funnels, and the ability to ask your data questions in plain English, I'd check out Zenovay. I'm biased since I built it, but the all-in-one approach saves a ton of time vs running multiple tools.
I have found mixpanel (https://mixpanel.com) good for tracking user behavior in addition to a "normal" analytics like Google Analytics or plausible.io.
I'm currently building an alternative to Mixpanel (a combination with GA) that focuses on user tracking, conversion improvement & A/B testing (splitbee.io)
Splitbee looks interesting and will definitely take a further look into this 👍
Yep we use the free version of Mix Panel as well. It’s really cool, however I feel like I’m only using about 1/10th if it’s capabilities.
Hey @shanefromfargo you might be interested in my book.
I do billion-dollar analytics in the day job. The book shares a set of best practices events to implement (including sample code), and then shows you how to build reports based off of those.
The goal is to give you enough to get to product-market fit (and to get way beyond 10% of the tool). Mixpanel is one of the main tools covered. signup.analyticsforindies.com to be notified when it's out.
Can't wait until the release! Looks great
https://matomo.org you can also self host I hope.
Another vote for matomo.org . We switched to it over a year ago and haven't looked back. I love having full control over our data too
I love matomo - gives all the information I need, gives me control, and isn't invasive to the user.
I've been trying Matomo for the past 3 days. It doesn't have the prettiest UI but it's fine for some basic information I currently need.
Hi @ajimix
I'm currently building splitbee.io, an (product) analytics & A/B testing platform.
Its like a mix of GA & Mixpanel. It supports user event tracking for building funnels and regular stats/chart.
It's free for up to 1000 users/month, after that we could find a special deal for you if you need even more :)
I am using Simple Analytics on my product UpStamps
Thanks for mentioning! ❤️
So many suggestions, but Google Analytics can track events, feature usage, cohorts, etc.
https://support.google.com/analytics/answer/7126596
https://www.chargebee.com/blog/google-analytics-for-saas-subscription-businesses/
FYI you can programmatically add custom events in Google Analytics. However, If you don't want your code to get cluttered with analytics tags, then you can use Google Tag Manager, which allows you to set up fully customizable events in their UI and only requires you to add that 1 GTM script tag.
Yeah, it is still Google but you would be able to spend that $50 budget on 5 months of Netflix subscription. Again, just an FYI.
I have given up and build it myself.
We are IndieHACKERS right? ;)
simpleanalytics.com has been around from some time. Built by indiehacker @adriaanvanrossum
Thanks for mentioning! 🙌
We use clicky.com on a couple of our sites and it works really well. We have GA on most of our web assets and really looking to make a change too, as their handling of data leaves me with a bad feeling.
Also heard lots of good things about Fathom Analytics all over the web, so might scope it out as well.
I'm using Clicky too and it's great!
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Yeah, they are not the 'prettiest' analytics tool out there, but as far as bang for bucks goes, I haven't really seen anything else that comes close. While our marketing team like studying GA reports, I always just go to Clicky to spot trends and make quick assessments of how things are travelling - the interface is so much more simple to navigate and to do comparisons compared to the mess that is GA.
Agreed, and it doesn't matter. Their product works well. There are much uglier B2B landing pages out there where the product is driven by sales.
I was just lurking in the PH for posts like these, haha. For now, I have sticked with Google Analytics, I really am looking to switch. Mixedpanel seems like a great alternate. I have been hearing about Fathom Analytics from a lot of people here. You may want to check that too.
I recently started using Fathom and would recommend it. Super easy to just look at it for 30 seconds to get up-to-date with everything instead of digging through the massive behemoth that is Google Analytics. Also appreciate the weekly emails as well.
Thanks Richard :) We love the weekly email and, funnily enough, we were discussing where we'd improve it today (e.g. top pages etc.).
Simple Analytics is another one in the pool of 'ethical analytics' (along side Fathom and Plausible).
Thanks for mentioning us! 🙌
Thanks for the shoutout Rosie. And I've just hovered over your name and saw you're in Brighton, that's awesome. I lived there for a few years before I moved to Canada. Even had the chance to work with the local chamber of commerce and built the website before this one. You've probably met a few of the ladies who work there (they're a great bunch). Small world, after all :) I miss the UK a few times a week!
ANYWAY, back to the topic. It's great to see so many options popping up after Fathom launched. It's keeping us driven. You always want competition, as it pushes you to do your best work. People need privacy, and alternatives to Google Analytics, and now they have plenty of choices.
Oh, maybe we crossed paths, haha. Sarah Springford? And Julia Chanteray?
That’s right! I got to work with Sarah for a number of years. Abby Moreton too. Good people. I miss Brighton :(
What year was that?
I helped set up a coworking space around the same time (The Werks), this was around 2010.
I tried leaving Brighton, we lasted 18 months, had to come back. :)
I remember hearing about The Werks, that’s cool that you helped set it up! And I was involved from around 2013 and then we just finished up last year when I had zero time due to other things. And they have a great new website now :)
I run https://usefathom.com with @pjrvs. We're used by individuals, small businesses, governments and Fortune 500 companies. I actually found this thread from our dashboard using our Current Visitors feature, thanks to @wardsandler.
We might not be for you. We don't invade privacy, we don't follow individuals around the site building a profile of everything they do. We track data in aggregate, and have no "journey tracking" as it's against everything we stand for. If you're looking for user journeys, we're not for you. If you're looking for simple, reliable analytics, we're for you.
Jack, I really love the concept behind Fathom. But one of the reasons I haven’t thought about switching yet is because we’re pretty heavily invested in Google Ads as a growth channel and use Analytics to measure that. Do you find similar people have switched and succeeded using Fathom?
Hey @iammarcthomas can I ask how your experience is using GA to measure Google Ads?
Typically, no. The majority of our customers don’t like Google and won’t spend money with them. We certainly don’t do all the tracking with advertising pixels. Sorry Ian!
Cool. Makes sense. I get it.
P.S. No-one ever called me Ian before 😂
This is what happens when I reply to Indie Hackers before my coffee. I ream "I am" as "Ian". Sorry Marc ;)
https://usefathom.com is great and has event tracking 👍
I highly recommend Plausible.io
It's built by our friend IndieHacker, Uku.
You can pay for it, and you can self-host it if you feel like doing so.
Check it out here
I'm working on the "Google knows too much" part, but where you can replace Google by any alternative you can name.
Chiffre.io is an end-to-end encrypted analytics service: not even I would be able to know what you'd learn about your traffic, it's for your eyes only.
What's your average number of daily visitors ?
We are using https://www.replaybird.com/ to understand user behavior. It replays the entire user session so we can understand how our users are interacting with our site.
https://kinsta.com/blog/google-analytics-alternatives/
hotjar
I'm using https://statcounter.com but it is nothing spectacular.
give postHog a try, its open source
We're using heap to track features usage.
We dog food our own analytics https://versoly.com/features/analytics, also comes with a website builder :)