Item: Parse.ly
Rating: 8
Author: Verified User

Use Cases and Deployment Scope

My company uses Parse.ly in its newsrooms to track daily and longterm engagement by our readers, which can influence the type of story we cover or the amount of coverage we pursue.

Pros and Cons

Frankly, it does the simple task that it's supposed to do: track the number of people who visit a story and the average time they spent on said story, giving me a breakdown over the last several minutes, the last 24 hours, or a historical period of time.
It offers an idea of whether readership is on par for any given day of the week, or whether engagement is below or exceeding the average readership for that day of the week.

Before my current newsroom switched to Parse.ly, I used another another platform (its largest competitor), and there were things I miss from that platform. This may be more perception than reality. But with the other platform, I felt like I was getting more real-time, live data. I felt like I could see the number of people who were currently, at that very moment, on the page. While using Parse.ly, I feel like I'm seeing a count of people who visit the page over a set period of time.
Retention is also very important to me. When looking at the dashboard on a different platform, I could see not only how many people were on the page at any given time, but also how long they were staying on average. Again, this information felt like it was being offered in real time, and it was right on the dashboard. With Parse.ly, it seems I have to click on the actual article to get that information.

Return on Investment

As a newsroom reporter, I would say this is a question for someone outside of my department. I don't concern myself with company finances or strategy.

When I referenced a Parse.ly competitor earlier in my review, I was referencing Chartbeat, the platform used in every newsroom I encountered before my current employer switched to Parse.ly. Both get the job done, but as I said earlier, whether it be reality or perception, Chartbeat felt like it offered more immediate, real-time insights. The decision to switch from Chartbeat to Parse.ly was a decision made by someone in the company, not my newsroom. Both are competent analytics tools, and both work perfectly fine.

Support Rating

I've not had to use Parse.ly customer support.

Key Insights

Do you think Parse.ly delivers good value for the price?

Not sure

Are you happy with Parse.ly's feature set?

Yes

Did Parse.ly live up to sales and marketing promises?

I wasn't involved with the selection/purchase process

Did implementation of Parse.ly go as expected?

I wasn't involved with the implementation phase

Would you buy Parse.ly again?

Yes

Likelihood to Recommend

Despite the notes I made under the "Cons" section of this review, I see no reason to avoid Parse.ly if your goal is to track website analytics. It does the job and I've not had any glaring problems. If you're hoping to dip deeper than just numbers, that could be a problem. For example, I like to find out who is sharing my articles on social media, where the articles are being posted, and how much traction those social media posts are getting. Such a task is more suited for a browser extension like CrowdTangle than the Parse.ly tool.

A reliable and useful platform, with some room to improve.

Overall Satisfaction with Parse.ly