5 Things That Only Desktop Analytics Can Do For You (And Web Analytics Can’t)

Sometimes people ask our team why they should use DeskMetrics' analytics service, and maybe pay for it, when they can use Google Analytics for free. That would be a tricky question to answer if both options offered the same functionality, but they don’t. Contrary to many people’s expectations, desktop and web analytics are not direct competitors, but rather complementary software that can be used together. To learn the differences, and take better advantage of both services, check out five things that only desktop analytics can do for you:

1) Track information about software installed on a computer

Desktop analytics monitors the use of software installed on a computer, while web analytics monitors usage of websites. Thus, if you develop an application that needs to be downloaded, you should use desktop analytics to monitor its use and web analytics to monitor its website. By using both, you should improve your application and monitor its demand on the internet.

2) Provide specific data about user environment

By using desktop analytics, it’s possible to discover information about users that web analytics won’t tell you. More than just information about browser, operating system, screen colors, screen resolution and language, desktop analytics also tells you such attributes as processor cores, architecture, memory (RAM), hard disk size, and whether VMs like .NET or Java are installed on the computer (including their versions). With this information on hand, you can develop an application that better suits your users’ needs.

3) Help to understand software usage

With web analytics, you can perhaps discover how many times your software has been downloaded, but you won’t receive any information about how it’s used. Good desktop analytics let you know the top-used features, the time spent using each feature, and which events are used most often during the application’s execution. So, you can stop guessing and start using trustworthy information about user behavior and needs to improve your software.

4) Reveal frequency of use

Another thing that only desktop analytics can do for you is to tell you how often, and for how long, a person uses your software – and how many users simply don’t use it any more – letting you quantify user loyalty.

5) Compare use of different versions

With desktop analytics, you can also find out which version is installed, uninstalled, abandoned or executed the most, thus gaining the opportunity to compare the acceptance of different versions. You can tell whether a new version is impacting your number of downloads and/or user engagement.

Conclusion

Even after getting to know the differences between desktop and web analytics, some people will still think that doing work around Google Analytics will be sufficient, since it allows them a way of tracking desktop information through a free service. Well, if you are satisfied with the use of an unsatisfactory tool that’s free but incomplete, that’s OK. But if you want the best quality service and data, keep in mind that the goal of most desktop applications isn’t to compete with Google Analytics but to offer software that’s complementary to web analytics and that can help developers to create better applications!

Quick Tip

If your problem is financial, don’t worry! You are invited to use our desktop analytics for free! Try it out and tell us what you think!