Matomo Analytics

What is Matomo?

In short, Matomo (formerly Piwik) is an open source analytics tool that has been on the market since 2007. It is available in two different versions: cloud based or hosted on own servers (on-premise).

Do you have questions or need help setting up Matomo correctly? Contact our Data & Tracking Manager, Alexander Kobberø here

Why choose Matomo?

1. Significantly better data (up to 99% better) than Google Analytics
2. Cookieless tracking + annoying cookie pop-up banners can be omitted if you don't use other third-party tools that use cookies for tracking. Read more here
3. No data sampling = accurate data
4. 100% anonymised - Does not use fingerprint. Read more and here (for "tech geeks")
5. 100% data ownership - Read more
6. 100% GDPR compliant - Read more
7. Full flexibility - Custom Tag Manager very similar to Google Tag Manager - Read more
8. WordPress plugin for easy setup in WordPress - Read more
9. It is possible to import historical data from Google Analytics (not moonlight in GA4)

Challenges of Matomo:

1. Requires customization to interact with Google ad platforms. Although Matomo offers many nice features, some workarounds need to be made for it to interact with Google's solutions, especially Google Ads audiences, targeting and remarketing.
2. No Google GTM setup can be reused, and therefore must be set up from scratch in Matomo GTM.
3. Complex Ecommerce sites require some setup via Matomo Tag Manager
4. UTM codes need to be adjusted to optimally support the Matomo data structure. Read more
5. Datastudio integration is a bit limited and works in through paid third-party connector - Read more
6. There are relatively few user-friendly integration options for reporting tools such as PowerBI, Tableau, Databox, Klipfolio, Google sheets, etc. It can be done through data integration via API, but is quite complex.

What does Matomo cost?

The cloud version costs as little as €145 a month. The price varies according to. the amount of traffic. The on premise version is free, but does not include all modules. These can be purchased separately. See prices and specifications here: Matomo prices

Contact Data & Tracking Manager, Alexander Kobberø here to get a price for a full setup of Matomo for your company.

Matomo vs. other tools

Matomo vs. Google Analytics

Matomo analytics is a good alternative or supplement to Google Analytics. Here is an overview differences between the two.

Matomo vs. PIWIK Pro

Matomo (formerly Piwik) is the root of Piwik Pro, but are two completely separate entities. Piwik Pro is a clone of Matomo and is based on the Matomo base code. The Piwik trademark is owned by the owner of Piwik Pro and for the same reason, Piwik had to change its name to Matomo. Read more

Matomo vs. Plausible Analytics

Plausible is a newer player on the market, launched in 2019. With an ultra-light tracking script and simplified analytics, Plausible is another popular privacy-centric web analytics solution. Read more

Matomo vs. Server side tracking with Google Analytics

Google is working to make GA 100% legal through EU data agreements. Therefore, Google Analytics (GA) is not doomed. In the short term, however, steps need to be taken to make GA legal, and this is being done by setting up Server side tracking. The disadvantage of GA is that the data quality is still significantly worse than Matomo. This is because GA uses sampled data and it is not cookieless. This means that 30% data is lost on average due to visitors' choice not to accept cookies.

Our recommendation

We recommend that you get set Matomo as a complementary tracking/analysis tool to ensure optimal data and performance insights.

Next step

• Get a free quote and estimate for setting up Matomo Contact Data & Tracking Manager, Alexander here
• Talk to an expert if you have questions - Contact our Matomo expert here
• Try to install Matomo yourself and try Matomo for free for a period of time.