As you probably heard, Google announced last week that they are working on a browser plug-in to let users opt-out of Google Analytics tracking. But this is more about Google having something to point to when users complain about privacy concerns than actually a tool to help people opt out of Analytics tracking. Here’s why the new opt-out software won’t affect your Analytics:
Too Big To Fail
The biggest reason this plugin won’t take off is because Google won’t let it. Google Analytics is simply too important a product for Google and its customers. They simply could not afford to kill it.
Plugins Are A Big Hurdle
Google doesn’t want people to opt out of Analytics and they aren’t going to make it easy. The average user doesn’t really know what plugins are will have a tough time installing one. Most will not find it worth the bother.
These People Are Already Invisible
This is the first time Google has created a way for people to opt out of Analytics tracking, but others have devised methods in the past. People who are very concerned with their privacy can already disable javascript and cookies, thus blocking Analytics. In fact, the people who will be installing this plugin probably already disabled their javascript and aren’t being counted by Analytics, anyway. So, webmasters won’t notice much change in their numbers.
It’s A Short Bus
Frankly, the number of people who are concerned with their privacy to the point that they want to block Google Analytics simply isn’t very big. Don’t expect a lot of people to install this plugin.
But What If It Takes Off? Don’t Worry…There’s A Backup Plan
Of course, there is a slight possibility that this thing could take off. For example, if a bunch of high profile users started advocating using it. It wouldn’t be too far of a stretch to imagine a talk show host going on a rant about privacy advocating his/her followers install the plugin.
So what’s Google’s backup plan? This plugin is definitely about pleasing a few privacy advocates and not about giving users an easy to opt out of Analytics. If the installed base gets to the point that Analytics results are tangibly impacted, Google will probably pull the plugin and announce that it is being replaced with a “better” solution. They’ll argue that they have a new solution, which better protects everyone’s privacy and that will allow them to anonymize the data. They might even announce that they’re rolling it out across all Analytics.
Regardless of what happens, you can be sure that Google will not let privacy concerns get in the way of Analytics.
