Last week Yahoo announced that it was buying IndexTools, the web analytics company, to add a stronger analytics platform to the Yahoo Marketing and Yahoo Business Services offerings.
Yahoo’s strategy with IndexTools is to upgrade the analytics technology for Yahoo advertisers and then go more widespread, possibly with a Yahoo hosted version of the analytics solution.
Today Yahoo and IndexTools announced that they have taken the price tag off of the IndexTools Web Analytics Enterprise, but only for some current clients and customers.
Dennis Mortensen, COO of IndexTools writes on his blog :
Yahoo! currently intends to provide the IndexTools Web Analytics service FREE of charge to clients and partners who accept the standard Yahoo! agreement.
Today we will communicate that we’ll require our partners and clients to accept a new standard Yahoo! agreement and that Yahoo! (we) currently intends to provide the service FREE of charge to clients and partners who accept the Yahoo! Agreement. It is however important to note that our clients and partners must accept this agreement to continue using the service.
I think this is a fair tradeoff for an Enterprise class Web Analytics system?
Further to this, it should be noted that Yahoo! (I should probably teach myself to say – we – at some point) does not intend to add any new partnerships or direct clients in the short to midterm, while we prepare for the next rollout wave. This means that our current partners and clients will be in a unique position to either provide a service or use a service to which the rest of the market will not have ready or immediate access.
