Google Analytics is becoming an issue for an increasing number of European countries. The way data is gathered and regulated in the Unites States conflicts with the European GDPR-legislation. Using Google Analytics as a European organisation isn’t completely forbidden yet. But looking at the increasing number of questions, it’s very clear for us: organisations are searching hard for a privacy friendly alternative. That’s why Maglr will soon be switching to a privacy- and cookie friendly statistics tool.
Support will continue
In order to measure statistics in the Maglr dashboard, we used the anonymous version of Google Analytics for years. These dashboard statistics will be replaced with the completely privacy- and cookie friendly Pirsch. For organisations that are already using Google Analytics and Tag Manager, we will continue to provide support.
Cookies
Placing cookies is only possible after activating a ‘cookie consent’. Google Analytics places a cookie when visiting a publication for the first time, which is necessary to recognise returning visitors.
However, what’s forwarded to Google, and how Google handles this data (after accepting the cookie consent), is not known precisely. Therefore, more and more organisations are looking for an alternative tool for gathering statistics.
Privacy friendly statistics
With the new privacy friendly statistics in Maglr, we now know exactly what happens with visitor data. We will use an open-source system called Pirsch, which provides a detailed overview in how data is gathered and saved. The public code shows exactly which steps are taken to anonymously process visitor data, with plenty of details for useful reports.
We started gathering these statistics since 1 January 2022, which can be recognized by the measurements that are sent to stats.maglr.com
No cookies, no consent
Thanks to the anonymous processing of visitor data, it’s not necessary to place a cookie anymore. The visitor therefore doesn’t have to accept an annoying cookie, while statistics will be measured more accurately than before. A win-win situation!
To read how this anonymous technique works exactly, click here.
A slight difference
There is a slight difference in comparison to the earlier situation with Google Analytics. With this new statistics tool, it’s not always possible to recognise ‘returning’ visitors. Because of the missing cookie consent, it's harder to separate ‘unique’ visitors from the returning ones. However, we are now able to show 100% accurate measurements of the amount of pageviews per visitor for example. That’s because there’s no cookie consent required to gather these statistics anymore.
What does this mean for you
With the new, 100% anonymous and accurate measurements, we will soon be able to provide real-time insight in visitor behaviour. We can then directly display the performance of your publications, in the form of average reading times and the number of pages per session.
Sounds good! Where do I sign up?
As we mentioned, these new statistics have been measured (in the background) since 1 January 2022. In the upcoming weeks, we’re working on finishing up the visual dashboard, which we’ll make available in May 2022 for our customers. We’ll update you on this in due time, after which we’ll make these statistics available in your Maglr dashboard. In short: no action required!
But what will these new statistics look like?
To already reveal what these statistics will look like, you will find a few visual examples of these new statistics in the Maglr dashboard below:
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