In case you were in any doubt over the importance of internet marketing, new figures have estimated that the UK web analytics technology market will be worth £78 million by the end of the year, growth of 12 per cent.

The numbers come from e-consultancy, which broke them down into £40 million for vendors' revenues and the rest on investment on client-side employees and third-party online marketing services.

However, because Google and Yahoo are so generous and offer analytics technologies for free, they're upping the game for vendors to either lower the cost or improve the value of their offerings.

"Vendors have continued to grow their revenues because many businesses, particularly larger organisations, are using the free tools in addition to paid-for services, rather than as a replacement," said e-consultancy's head of research, Linus Gregoriadis.

"However, as free tools offered by the likes of Google, Yahoo and Microsoft become more sophisticated, it will be interesting to see how the established vendors defend their territory."

Of course, given recent reports they may only be up against Google and a combined Yahoo/Microsoft monster in future, but how should they counteract the threat from the giants?

Online Marketing specialists Business Feet help create value from business websites