Monday morning, IBM (IBM) announced that it has reached an agreement with data storage firm Netezza (NZ) to purchase the company for $27 per share.

Netezza helps companies examine data housed on corporate servers in order to help reach a decision about businesses. Netezza boasts some heavy hitters in its clientele, including Time Warner (TWX) and Virgin Media.

The internet is wonderful for marketers. Traffic can be measured really finely and the whole marketing-sales loop actually can be measured. Unlike TV or radio, internet firms know exactly what they spend on bringing traffic to their websites and how much these firms make off of each visitor. Metrics is super-important and is a differentiator.

Of course, Google (NASDAQ: GOOG) has its long tentacles everywhere. Google has been providing many websites with free analytics software integrated with its paid-links AdWords, so website operators can measure the effectiveness of search engine marketing efforts, as well as measuring traffic into and out of their websites. Omnitron (NASDAQ: OMTR) is a big player in this space following its purchase of competitor Visual Sciences.

So, it's interesting to read this morning that Google is now making its Urchin software available for public beta use. Google's Urchin is similar to Analytics except that the software is installed on clients' servers, instead of just plugging in some code on a website. Urchin seems to be a beefed-up version of Analytics, and now organizations with a lot of content behind a firewall can use Google software to analyze their web metrics. As more and more companies rely upon Google's marketing arm to drive internet traffic, Google's monetization arm to help monetize traffic on websites, Google's shopping cart, and Checkout, metrics is the grease that makes all these things work in harmony.

This means more money for Google's clients, and ultimately more money for the internet's Big Daddy, Google.

Zack Miller is the Managing Editor of IsraelNewsletter.com and a former equity analyst for a leading multinational hedge fund. Author owns a long-term position in Google stock and uses Google products to manage his firm's website.

Question: what does every e-commerce site need to enable it to sell more merchandise?

If you answered more giant Whoopi Goldberg ads, you're only half right.

What every Google (NASDAQ: GOOG), Yahoo! (NASDAQ: YHOO), Microsoft (NASDAQ: MSFT) and Ebay (NASDAQ: EBAY) needs is better metrics. Why?

Search engine marketing (or SEM) is about paying for traffic. By bidding on keywords, advertisers with Google or its competitors are paying to bring people to their websites. Once there, a website needs to convert traffic into sales. Not an easy thing to do and clearly, some traffic is more valuable than other traffic. The better Google gets at valuating the traffic and providing these metrics to their advertisers, the more profitable everyone becomes. Google makes more money because it optimizes the bidding on keywords by really valuating a click. Advertisers win because they have the tools to bid on the most profitable traffic. For an unbelievable treatise on why analytics are so important, check out Dave McClure's great work on the industry and why investors should take note (Warning: Dave uses some strong language).