Shouldn't that title be "Chartbeat is to Google Analytics as Blogs are to Print Newspapers"<p>As in, Chartbeat is a more up-to-the-minute version of Google Analytics in the same way blogs are a more up-to-the-minute version of newspapers?
Note that the 30-day trial is free ONLY if you give them your credit card number. Why should I worry about them having that information if I decide not to do it? Why shouldn't they do the work on their end of just killing my trial account if I don't sign up after 30 days? "Free" should be FREE. Not provisionally so.
Sensei taught me two things about web analytics, when it comes to making money online:<p>(1) Checking your stats too much is a disease: if looking at stats isn't going to changbe your behavior, it's a waste of time
(2) Monthly revenue is the one web statistic that matters
That analogy not only works for speed, but for depth of content. Google Analytics isn't used so you can stroke your ego during your lunch break, it's used to optimize your site over the long haul. Conversion/goal tracking is pretty much the entire reason it exists. It would be nice if they had a real time component so you can see spikes in traffic (and more importantly where they are coming from), but GA is all about maximizing your sales and thus making you spend more on AdWords.<p>Alos, using spammers like Mahalo as a use case isn't a great sales pitch. They have to react in real time because their phony content doesn't have lasting impact.