THE DATA THAT WE THROW off as we move around the Web-browsing habits, navigation paths, origins and destinations-have always been enormously valuable for the sites we visit. The software to analyze Web traffic is a $500 million business and growing, dominated by Google, Adobe and IBM. Consulting and services to help people parse the data is another $150 million, by Gartner's estimates. But Facebook is eating into big swaths of the measured Web. As people spend a larger portion of their time on Facebook, the social network is developing tools that make it easier for marketers to reach their targets, and customers are increasingly interested in engaging with brands on Facebook. In switching their emphasis to Facebook, marketers give up control over much of the valuable data that their users leave behind.
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