Ok, so I admit it, I’m a massive (borderline obsessive) brand advocate for Omniture (now the Adobe Omniture Business Unit), and I’m definitely not alone, but we’ve been dealt a harsh card.
The card? The migration to SiteCatalyst v15. We’ve been told we can’t migrate for probably up to a year. In my opinion, quite frankly, Omniture that just sucks!
Many of us sit on the Customer Advisory Board for Omniture, where we talk about the product and roadmap and features and upgrades that we’re looking for.
Many of us were involved, at least over the last 6 months, beta testing SiteCatalyst v15 – quite frankly because we all tend to be power users, have multiple products and really push the envelope to what the product can achieve. And during the beta test we helped Omniture “real world” test the product in readiness for launch. And what an incredible new version it is. Segmentation on the fly, full subrelations by default, more accurate visitor counts, a whole new architecture, better UI and usability…the list just goes on and on.
And now we’re told we can’t migrate because we’re either too big, too complex, or have to many integrated products (all Omniture products) and as that complicates things, the migration simply isn’t possible.
Part of the customer benefit to sitting on CABs and participating in Beta tests, which is very time consuming, is the promise of early adoption to the new product when it becomes available.
Omniture has some serious brands relying on their products for insight and optimisation…these are high net worth clients to Omniture, and yet, these are now the same clients that cannot migrate and cannot leverage the new capabilities, which we’ve all been loyally waiting for.
New clients can go straight onto the platform…but they’re not yet the brand advocates. They’re not the ones paying the big bucks for insight. They’re not the ones who have brand loyalty yet. They’re not the ones who have stuck with Omniture for years. We, the bigger clients, are. And yet, we, the ones who have invested a huge amount of time, effort, resources and money into the platform cannot get value from the new release, for at least 6-12 months, and in some cases, projected 18 months.
That makes no sense!
In Murdoch’s case, it’s because we use SearchCenter+. In other cases, it’s if you use DataSources (a key advanced feature), Video measurement is another…in fact there’s a bit of a list involved that “qualifies customers to migrate”.
Now, I know, through participating in the beta and sitting on the CABs, that this release has a very complicated and new backend, but IMHO you’ve failed to looked after your number #1 clients…the clients who are pushing the boundaries, or who invest a lot with you. They’re the ones who have been taken in to the candy store and told they can’t buy – having helped you set up the candy store in the first place!
Despite all of this, I’m still a massive brand advocate. I think Omniture does an amazing job and has amazing products…but I really think the priority for this launch is all wrong!
Are you frustrated with this too…tell me what you think?
