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Google Analytics Alternatives: 9 Different Tools To Track Your Metrics

Google Analytics is one of the most famous web analytics platforms in the market today. As the name suggests it is a service of Google Marketing Brand. Google Analytics tracks and reports website traffic by using numerous sales and marketing metrics (such as bounce rate and conversion rate).

Efficient use of Google Analytics can increase your sales, growth and increase your success in marketing campaigns.

Google first offered its Analytics platform back in 2005 after acquiring the web analytics software Urchin.

Since 2019 Google Analytics is the most widely used tool in tracking marketing and sales metrics. However, there are various different alternatives with different strengths that can be used for tracking marketing and sales metrics.

If you have been looking for a GA alternative, this article will help you choose the best one for your SaaS.

HockeyStack

HockeyStack is an analytics and attribution platform trusted by over 7,000 companies. With a 5-minute set up , numerous integration possibilities, and an unlimited number of customizable dashboards, HockeyStack’s code-free interface allows you to quickly monitor every metric you need. Moreover, it lets you combine product, sales, and even marketing data, giving you detailed insights into everything from the customer journey to the channels most users use.

With HockeyStack, you can answer cross-departmental questions that you cannot answer with any other tool on the market, such as:

  • How many users did each blog series bring us?
  • At what point do most users drop?
  • What is the activation rate of users from LinkedIn ads?

and more.

Some of the most prominent features of Hockeystack are:

Comprehensive yet easy-to-use dashboards

HockeyStack lets you easily monitor every metric you need with dashboards that are easy to understand and have rich visualizations. It also allows you to track metrics that will offer more value in a single report when analyzed together, making it easier for you to analyze. That gives you a comprehensive view of your website or product and allows you to dive deeper into key areas of concern.

You can visit the live demo here to see how HockeyStack works for yourself.

Attribution

HockeyStack is not only an analytics tool but also serves as a complete attribution tool. There are several reasons why HockeyStack’s attribution features stand out:

  • It allows you to automatically collect every interaction on your website and products and visualize them.
  • HockeyStack helps you link your CRM to revenue, sales, and marketing tools.
  • The tool effectively consolidates pre and post signup data for increased clarity into user actions.

Account-level journey

With HockeyStack, you can easily visualize each user’s journey. HockeyStack allows you to automatically collect all the actions on the website and the product. Thus, you can visualize the customer lifecycle from beginning to end.

HockeyStack integrations

Hockeystack offers integration with many different tools you use. Here are some of the tools that you can integrate with HockeyStack:

  • Paddle
  • Stripe
  • Hubspot
  • Crisp Chat
  • Mailchimp
  • Salesforce

HockeyStack pricing

HockeyStack has 2 paid plans: Boost and Dominate. These plans have a 14-day trial with a 30-day refund guarantee.

HockeyStack pricing

You can check out the pricing page here.

HockeyStack Pros and Cons

HockeyStack Pros

The unique benefit of HockeyStack is its ability to unify your marketing, revenue, sales, and product data using no code. This allows you to uncover unique insights that you wouldn’t be able to by using multiple tools as they cause you to have fragmented data.

  1. You can integrate with Stripe, Paddle, and Hubspot and build every single dashboard that you can think of, using all sales, marketing, revenue, and product metrics.
  2. You can create funnels, goals, and surveys, which are rare to get with other tools on this list.
  3. You don’t need any developers, tracking is cookieless, and the script is small, so it doesn’t increase your site loading time.

Kissmetrics

Kissmetrics is a web analytics tool whose primary function is delivering key insights and user interaction on your website. It tracks users’ activities on your website and collects acquisition data of your website’s visitors. 

Kissmetrics was founded in 2008 by two entrepreneurs named Hiten Shah and Khiladi Poswal. Currently, its total amount of funding is around 16 million dollars.

Features

Kissmetrics is a strong Business Intelligence platform. This strength comes from the platform’s ability to provide various tools effectively.

Some of the main features Kissmetrics includes are:

  • Real-Time Data Monitoring Tool
  • Funnel Reports
  • No-Limit Conversion Periods
  • Testing/Staging Sandboxes
  • Group Contact Lists
  • Multi- & Cross-Platform/Device Support

Use Cases 

  1. You can have detailed reports about your revenue

Kissmetrics helps SaaS companies to understand their revenue with the use of relevant metrics.

  1. You can see the full sales funnel

By focusing on the trends in the sales funnel Kissmetrics helps you where the friction happens and which features would be useful to convert trial users.

  1. You can achieve detailed customer activity reports

SaaS companies can track their users to see how their features are being used over time, review, and make changes whenever it is necessary.

Pricing

There are two different buying options for Kissmetrics: E-commerce and SaaS. Under these two options, there are three different billing options: Silver, Gold, and Platinum.

Screenshotted from kissmetrics.io

Mixpanel

What is Mixpanel?

Mixpanel is a web-based digital platform. You can track your users’ interactions with web and mobile applications. Another function is tools for enhancing communication with the users.

Mixpanel is an application that is focused on user engagement and retention. It collects the relevant data and builds custom reports for SaaS companies.

Mixpanel was founded by Suhail Doshi and Tim Trefren in 2009. 

Features

Mixpanel is said to be a web-based digital platform, but this does not change the fact that it also focuses on mobile technology. 

Similar to Kissmetrics, its aim is not gathering information about the website itself and its performance, but user experience and user actions. Some of the main features Mixpanel includes are:

  • Versatile Data Visualization
  • iOS & Android Compatibility
  • Point and Click Analytics
  • Visual Coding
  • Customer Engagement
  • Mobile Surveys

Use Cases

  1. You can perform A/B tests

If you want to make changes to your website or product, but don’t know what its outcome would be, Mixpanel is there to assist you with its A/B testing feature. You can decide on the website version you want to go, by testing which one of the website versions is better with respect to important SaaS sales and marketing metrics for you.

  1. Find retention drivers

With Mixpanel, you can find out which features or aspects of your product leads customers to stay with you and increase your retention rate.

  1. You can classify users based on their actions

Mixpanel helps its users to create cohorts according to certain behaviors. Knowing customers is very important for SaaS. Therefore this feature of Mixpanel can sort and group the visitors of your website. This helps SaaS to identify their power users and gives them a chance to create specific marketing campaigns.

Pricing

Mixpanel has three different pricing options. It offers a free version too. This free version enables businesses to track up to only 100K users. 

Mixpanel also offers an enterprise version of its service. In this option, enterprises can customize Mixpanel in the most suitable way to meet their needs.

Screenshot from mixpanel.com

Matomo

You might not have heard about Matomo, as it is the newly named version of Piwik. Piwik was released in 2007 by a group of developers. Then in 2018, it was renamed Matomo.

Matomo is a free, open-source analytics tool that is being widely used today. Similar to Google Analytics, it tracks the website visits and releases reports of these visits for analysis.

The most surprising and different characteristic of Motomo is that it does not use any data of its users for advertisement or any other purposes. Motomo gives “100% data ownership,” to its users. On Motomo’s website, they highlight this property again and again, in order to build bonds of trust and have 100% clarity between customers and itself.

Features

  • Real time data updates
  • Analytics for Ecommerce 
  •  Goal Conversion Tracking
  • Track traffic from search engines
  • Media Analytics
  • Multi Channel Conversion Attribution

Use Cases

  1. With Intranet Analytics you can gain insights

Matomo enables its users to increase their productivity by tracking user engagement. Matomo believes data safety is one of the key features and they provide a service that assures data privacy.

  1. You can minimize customer churn due to pop-ups.

I have canceled many purchases and subscriptions due to pop-ups that constantly pop and block my screen. I am pretty sure most of you had similar experiences in the past. Therefore by avoiding consent screens on your website you can decrease your customer churn especially if your customer profile consists of people who are sensitive about privacy.

  1. You do not have limits

When a SaaS reaches a scale that requires big amounts of data, tracking, and reports Google Analytics becomes very expensive. However, Matomo offers you a service with no limits. In Matomo there is no limit to data, email reports, data export, data storage, etc.

Pricing

Matomo is a free tool if you do not need to use its features. If you need specific features that are only offered as premium features; you need to pay an amount starting from 29EUR/year, as your need for more sophisticated tools increases your yearly payment can rise up to 499 EUR/year.

Screenshot from matomo.org

Pendo

Pendo is web-based product management and digital analysis tool. It was founded in 2013. Pendo has two main focuses: customer and employee. For users, Pendo’s main goal is to increase product management and create the most efficient SaaS marketing strategies possible. SaaS companies also use Pendo to increase the productivity levels of their employees.

Features

  • Audience Targeting
  • Behavioral Analytics
  • Churn Management
  • Cohort Analysis
  • Engagement Tracking
  • Funnel Analysis

Use Cases

  1. You can track your product engagement

By tracking the product engagement Pendo lets its users understand which features are important for website visitors and which they ignore. So that SaaS companies can increase awareness of valuable, but underused features.

  1. You can provide In-App Support

It is pretty common to see users struggling at certain points using your app. You can provide the necessary help to your users when it’s needed with Pendo which increases your customer retention.

  1. You can collect feedback

With the feedback collection, Pendo allows SaaS companies to understand the user sentiment and make more informed decisions based on this feedback.

Pricing

If your company has less than 1000 monthly users Pendo’s free version is available for you. However, other pricing options’ prices are not available on Pendo’s website. According to online reviews, I read prices are high.

from Pendo

CleverTap

Clever Tap was founded in 2013. It empowers SaaS companies with the use of data, personalization, and automation. CleverTap aims to increase user retention and ignite growth.

Features

  • A/B Testing
  • Personalization
  • Product Experiences
  • Lifecycle Optimization
  • SMS Messaging
  • Campaign Optimization

Use Cases

  1. You can classify your audience

You can group your users by tracking their past behaviors and real-time actions. Grouping of users can be made with respect to actions, inactions, and properties. An automated segmentation engine is a tool for this purpose.

  1. You can optimize the lifecycle of your customers

Using the lifecycle optimizer of CleverTap,  you can move your users from one lifecycle to the next one.

  1. You can use cross-channel messaging to keep your users captivated

CleverTap offers its users ready-made, customizable HTML templates to create interactive campaigns. With CleverTap messages are connected across channels.

Pricing

CleverTap has two different pricing options: Startups that have less than 100k monthly users need to pay amounts starting from $200/month after a 14-day free trial. Enterprises with more than 100k monthly users need to contact CleverTap’s sales team to choose the most suitable plan for them.

Screenshot from clevertap.com

FullStory

Founded in 2014, Fullstory is a platform that focuses on user experience. SaaS companies can review users’ visits to their websites to detect and resolve any issue in their experience.

Features

  • Collaboration Tools
  • Conversion Tracking
  • Customer Segmentation
  • Data Import/Export
  • Data Visualization
  • Funnel Analysis

Use Cases

  1. It gives an insight into UX

As the name Fullstory suggests, Fullstory provides its user with an in-depth analysis of user experience with the smallest details.

  1. You can provide your customer team with real time data

FullStory enables its users to access real-time data of its users. The utilization of this feature decreases the workload of SaaS companies’ customer relations teams.

  1. You can use important metrics to enhance customer engagement

Tracking important SaaS sales and marketing metrics can indicate your website’s strengths and weaknesses. According to data derived from those reports, necessary developments can be made.

Pricing

FullStory offers a free trial for 14 days. After the free trial, you need to choose between two paid plans. There is no price info on the website of FullStory, you should contact FullStory’s sales team.

Screenshot from fullstory.com

Countly

Founded in 2013, Countly is an analytics and marketing platform offered for mobile, web, desktop, and IoT. Similarly to Matomo, Countly ensures 100% data ownership for its users for privacy concerns.

Features

  • AB Testing
  • Campaign Management
  • Compliance Management
  • Conversion Tracking
  • Data Collection and Management
  • Funnel Analysis

Use Cases

  1. You can use drill and segmentation feature for specific questions

SaaS companies are likely to have complex questions since they work closely with data. At this point, Countly’s Segmentation abilities are there to answer these difficult questions.

  1. You can increase your retention of users

Countly offers its users a sophisticated retention tool. The utilization of this tool reduces customer churn and keeps the revenue at the possible maximum level.

  1. You can classify your users based on acquisition sources

Attribution analysis lets SaaS companies create custom-designed campaign links according to their acquisition sources.

Pricing

Countly offers a limited free version and comes with a customizable paid option for enterprises.

Screenshot from count.ly

Amplitude

Founded in 2012, Amplitude is a web and mobile analytics platform. Its main focus is digital optimization. As a result, they aim for high retention rates and customer loyalty. Amplitude is an innovative platform that started the first and the largest database of customer behavior, Behavioral Graph.

Features

  • Campaign Management
  • Conversion, Engagement, In-App Events, Page view and Referral Tracking
  • Customer Journey Mapping and Segmentation
  • Funnel Analysis
  • Machine Learning
  • Multiple Site Management

Use Cases

  1. You can monitor your employees

In addition to customer tracking, Amplitude enables its users to monitor employee actions too. For example, if a user’s name is changed or deleted you can track down which one of your support team members did it and when.

  1. You can use funnel trends

With the efficient utilization of funnel trends offered by Amplitude, you can clearly see at which stage of the sales funnel your customers churn. After the identification of this step, you can create more specifically targeted marketing campaigns.

  1. You can track and understand user behaviour

With the utilization of Behavioral Graph, Amplitude offers its user a chance to understand how certain types of customers behave under certain conditions. Then, Amplitude can derive future behaviors of its users from trends of their historic data.

Pricing

Amplitude offers a free version for up to 10 million events per month. The sales team should be contacted for the pricing of more inclusive options.

Screenshot from amplitude.com

Heap

Founded in 2012, Heap is a digital insights platform. Heap offers products in four different categories: Heap Data Capture, Heap Data Engine, Heap Insights, Heap Actions.

Features

  • User Behaviour Analytics
  • Conversion Rate Optimization
  • Channel Attribution
  • Customer Tracking and Segmentation
  • Campaign Management and Tracking
  • Multiple Site Management

Use Cases

  1. You can have a better insight into user experience and actions

Heap helps SaaS companies by delivering instant and advanced signals on customer behavior. This feature of Heap converts leads into sales and increases the retention rate.

  1. You can optimize your conversion 

With the utilization of Heap’s sophisticated conversion tracking tools, you can increase your conversion rate which increases the MRR of your company.

  1. You can base your company’s growth on your product

Heap offers SaaS companies tools that can be used to have insights into where and how their product is being used by their customers. With these reports, SaaS companies can have sustainable Product-Led Growth.

Pricing

Heap offers a free version for up to 10k sessions/month. Inclusive packages have free trials, but for pricing options, the sales team must be contacted.

Screenshot from heap.io

Conclusion

Google Analytics is a powerful tool in the market today, and its domination indicates that. The main reason for this is that it is a free tool with which you can perform simple analytical tasks. However, when you need more complex tools, which is quite possible, increasing Google Analytics will not be enough.

In this article, I presented 8 alternatives to Google Analytics. If these options meet your needs, why not try them out and save some extra money? These alternatives may not meet your needs from an analytics tool. If so, you can check out HockeyStack for your different needs with different pricing options.

Does Google Analytics have a paid version?

Yes, it does. Google offers two versions of its Analytics tool. The standard version is free, but the more sophisticated Google Analytics 360 is the paid version of Google Analytics.

Where does Google Analytics store its data?

Google Analytics stores its data on remotely located servers, most of which are located in the US.

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