Google has launched a beta program for Google Analytics providing a real time data stream for your website’s performance. It is so real time that when we tested it, there was only about a 5 second delay.

Even this Flash Mob is impressed by that kind of speed

For a long time, many of us analytics lovers would have to wait hours to find out if a particular filter or change went into effect. Patience may be a virtue, but in the world of internet marketing everyone expects “now now now.”

The real time function of analytics will definitely be a helpful tool, if used properly. We can already anticipate too many people looking to see how many leads or sales came in the last 5 minutes. This would be an enormous waste of time.

Nobody likes a waste of time

With social media now playing an important role in organic search results, the results of efforts that happen in real time need to be analyzed in real time. Monitoring traffic from social media posts in real time will allow you to gauge some important factors towards your online presence.

One of these factors could be how long your content remains relevant and engaging on each respective social platform. For example, how long is your tweet effectively bringing traffic to your site, or is it bringing traffic at all?

Click for a look at the new Real Time Analytics in action

This will give you important information as to when to reengage, what engagement is too much, and what engagement isn’t enough. Obviously, measurements will change dependent on your goal for each post, tweet, or update.  However the point remains the same: Real Time is a valuable tool to let you know within seconds whether or not a planned social campaign is providing data that you want.