In November 2005, Google revealed a re-packaged version of Urchin, now renamed Google Analytics. The biggest news about Google’s new offering was its price. FREE! The power of Urchin for free? It sounded ludicrous to some, but it was true. Google turned the entire analytics industry on its ear, offering a competitive solution for nothing. Google has since released a new version — Google Analytics 2.0 — that has advanced graphing and upgraded features.

I have used many tools from Omniture, WebTrends, Hitbox (HBX Pro), NetTracker, Harvest Solutions, E.piphany, Urchin — the list goes on and on. And the reality is, Google Analytics is the best ASP/Hosted solution out there (and did I mention – it’s free!). There are some features it lacks, but even if it weren’t free, I’d still say it was the best available option for almost everyone, short of some very specific-needs users.

We use it for PPC and SEO clients of all sizes, from 500 visits a day to 1 million+ and it functions beautifully. If you don’t mind sharing your data with “The Man” (aka: Google), and you’re looking for something that can give you an accurate, sophisticated picture of your site traffic and usage trends, then Google Analytics is the right solution for you.