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I switched my website analytics from Google Analytics to Fathom Analytics. You may be wondering, why?! Well, I’ll tell you. First, a little backstory.
I received an email with the subject line “Is Google Analytics illegal? Are there alternatives?”
I thought, Whaaaatttt??!
Turns out, it is!
This email I received was from Hans Skillrud from Termageddon, the company I get my policies (Privacy, Terms of Use, Disclaimer, and—if needed—an End User License Agreement) from. He went on to say this:
A recent decision by the Austrian Data Protection Authority determined that the use of Google Analytics violates the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) which protects the privacy of residents of the EU and EEA.
Following this, Hans included a link to an article from the International Association of Privacy Professionals®. This article went into detail about this issue.
Seeing this, a red flag immediately appeared over my head where the lightbulb usually is. I thought, Well, what am I supposed to do?
In that same email, Hans advised of a webinar Termageddon was hosting with Paul Jarvis and Jack Ellis, the founders of Fathom Analytics at UseFathom.com, I knew my answer. I immediately signed up for Fathom Analytics.
What is Fathom Analytics?
Fathom Analytics is a privacy-focused analytics tool that is affordable, agency friendly, and can help you obtain the website analytics data you need while also respecting your website visitors’ privacy.
Paul and Jack “pioneered the world’s first ‘privacy-focused visits method’ that’s now become an industry standard. We’ve invested heavily in privacy law compliance and even supported amendments to existing privacy laws. Digital privacy isn’t just how we market – it’s how we operate” (About | UseFathom.com).
I think it’s refreshing to see a company who, like Termageddon, cares so much about user’s privacy and their data—unlike Google who has “mined our private habits and targeted us with ads for years,” seemingly without issue. Until now.
Google is Under Attack for Privacy Issues
Attorneys General from three States plus Washington D.C., are suing Google over their use of data to track users. Specifically, “four AGs are suing Google for allegedly misleading users about when the company was able to track their location” (Four AGs sue Google for allegedly tracking you without permission | CNBC).
According to Google’s website, they collect the following data:
- Details about the computer and browser visiting the site, including hostname, browser type, referrer, and language
- Details about the system visiting the site, including Java and Flash support and screen resolution
- Information about how the visitor spends time on the page, and advertising campaign information
- Advertising information, via a DoubleClick cookie, including IP address storage
- The last point is huge because it means that Google doesn’t just track visitors on the site they’re on, but can track visitors across any website on the internet with Google Analytics or Google advertising. This is used to determine things like interest, gender, age, etc. Google then uses this information to sell more ads, and generated more than $40 billion dollars in the first quarter of 2020 alone through targeted advertising (Privacy-focused website analytics | UseFathom.com).
With the above in mind, I wanted to move away from using Google Analytics as quickly as possible. Luckily for me, Hans was hosting a webinar, and I switched to Fathom Analytics immediately afterward.
I have no doubt the reasons above are also why Apple came out with their privacy protections starting with iOS 14, because they wanted to stop companies like Google from harvesting data about users that we didn’t consent to give them in the first place.
Anyway, all tangents aside, now I want to give you my thoughts on Fathom Analytics, and why I think they’re the best route to go when thinking of leaving Google Analytics.
Fathom Analytics is faster than Google Analytics
The reason for this is because it’s only one single line of code that you put into your website and that’s all that’s needed for Fathom Analytics to work correctly.
Fathom Analytics only collects data that’s necessary and none that’s not.
One thing that Fathom Analytics does very well is only collecting data that’s needed, and none that’s not, so you can make important business decisions.
Fathom Analytics collects data anonymously.
They also anonymize the data they collect, so no one’s personal data is at risk.
You have the ability to switch between Light and Dark Modes.
When you’re looking at your dashboard, you have the ability to switch between Light and Dark Mode. You can either have it automatically choose which mode you use (based on your operating system’s settings) or you can force it into Dark Mode. You can change this at any time under your Account Settings.
You can go between site dashboards easily.
This is especially useful if, like me, you have multiple websites you’re utilizing Fathom Analytics on. You can easily switch between dashboards on the main screen of the software.
You can change the order of your multiple sites within the dashboard.
It’s as easy as clicking and dragging. You can change the order the websites appear on your dashboard dropdown to best suit your needs.
You can see very specific date ranges of analytics.
Much like you can with Audacity when you are editing audio flies, you can select a section of your analytics from within your dashboard (by clicking and holding/dragging on the part you’d like to see). By doing that, you’ll also pull up all of the data within that date range, so you can see it up close and personal.
In this same window, you can also choose between the following options:
- Today
- Yesterday
- Last 7 Days
- Last 30 Days
- This Month
- Last Month
- This Year
- All Time
- Custom Range
I love that you can see your analytics for the lifetime of your account by using the All Time date range!
Ready to test it out yourself? Sign up for a 7-Day Free Trial today!
If you want to take Fathom Analytics for a spin, I suggest you sign up for a 7-Day Free Trial to take it for a test drive yourself! You’ll be happy you did!