Top mobile app analytics platform challenges and how to address them.
May 10, 2022
Summary:
- Traditional mobile analytics tools rely on custom tracking code that slows apps, delays releases, and limits the questions you can ask of your data.
- Writing and maintaining tracking code creates developer bottlenecks, requires frequent app updates, and introduces performance, security, and reliability risks.
- A lightweight SDK that minimizes tagging can transform analytics into a logical structure on the device, improving performance, security, and the accuracy of user session replay.
- Siloed mobile and web platforms, differing implementations, and unreliable SDKs make it hard to get a single, trusted view of the customer across devices.
- Quantum Metric uses autocapture and codeless precision events to automatically track every user action, configure new events without code or app updates, and deliver immediate, cross-platform insights.
If you’re looking for a new mobile analytics tool, you’re probably wondering about the top mobile app analytics platform challenges and how to avoid them.
To set up event tracking in mobile apps, most mobile analytics providers require writing additional tracking code in your app. But this approach can slow down your application and negatively impact mobile app performance.
Here are the 3 top mobile app analytics platform challenges organizations face.
- You must decide what specific user actions you want to track. This means you can’t ask questions of the data that you haven’t premeditated.
- Some providers require engineers to implement the tracking code. This introduces a developer bottleneck to the analytics process, and also steals engineering resources away from core product development.
- Users need to download your latest app update in order for new events to take effect.
Why writing tracking code leads to challenges.
In addition to installing the SDK, tracking customized events (such as a button tap) often requires additional custom development in mobile apps. In fact, tracking user engagement typically requires that multiple lines of tracking code be built throughout the app, which involves additional time and resources.
Once developed, code must be extensively tested and deployed to production via releases to the app store (iOS or Android). This can take anywhere from 3–4 weeks, and involves a different publishing process for different stores. Next, users have to update their apps, if they don’t have auto updates turned on.
Addressing mobile app analytics challenges with a lightweight SDK solution.
To avoid complications of traditional mobile analytics SDKs and vendors, enterprises should seek out a more reliable, lightweight SDK that minimizes mobile app tagging. This way, analytics can be transformed into a logical structure on the customer’s device, giving you better performance and a more precise way to replay the user experience.
Not only is it faster, but the data is more secure and compliant.
Mobile analytics should offer a single view of the customer across mobile and web.
In most companies, website and mobile development live in different worlds. Whether working with native or hybrid apps, mobile app teams tend to be siloed. They run code on separate platforms, requiring unique engineering skill sets and processes. This traditionally made tracking a single visitor across platforms a challenge.
Here are a few common objections to capturing cross-device mobile analytics from the enterprise perspective:
- There are higher priorities. Mobile product teams tend to be lean, focused, and either optimizing experiences or putting out technical fires. Without dedicated “mobile tagging teams,” analytics has often taken the backburner to solving more urgent and complex issues around APIs, security, and performance.
- Platforms are siloed, so is data. There are technical differences in how analytics are implemented across platforms. Mobile uses software development kits, or SDKs, while web uses JavaScript. Due to these differences, companies have been forced to either deal with limited or even no mobile analytics, or they’ve had to try and “stitch” visitors across platforms.
- SDK failures are common. Non-performant or insecure SDKs have resulted in diminished trust by mobile teams. If they fail, teams are forced to wait for a vendor fix, re-install, and wait for the next app store release.
But fear no more.
Quantum Metric helps address top mobile app analytics platform challenges.
The state of mobile analytics is always changing. The days of making trade-offs between either optimizing or analyzing the mobile app experience are over.
Quantum Metric addresses these challenges with the following features.
- The platform’s autocapture tracks every user action automatically, meaning that you have the data you need to answer key business questions.
- Quantum Metric codeless precision events means you can configure tracking of specific user actions remotely through our UI. This means you don’t need to depend on developers to get your answers. Codeless precision events can be created directly from a replay.
- Quantum Metric autocapture + codeless precision events take effect immediately. We do not rely on users to download the latest update in order for events to start tracking.
If you’re interested in learning more about how Quantum Metric can help you your mobile workflow, watch a product tour or request a demo today.