“Me want cookies!”   This is what I hear many of my Government clients say – more specifically they want to understand cookies in relation to their web analytics.  I have come to call this the “Cookie Monster” issue since there is so much confusion.  So for my post here (and with many thanks to DJ) I thought Let’s start with dessert first!

Below I have listed from most accurate to less accurate the ways visitors are identified on-line:

1. Authenticated:  The technique by which access to Internet or intranet resources requires the user to enter a username and password as identification.  This is the only way to count visitors “across machines”, as no matter where they log in they are identified correctly.  Cookies are really just tracking unique computers!
2. Persistent Cookies :  A text file containing a random identification string that “lives” on the visitors computer.  Using the value stored in this cookie, WebTrends can identify if you’ve been to the site before and identify you as a “new” or “returning” visitor (but can’t tell anything else about you… it’s a random number after all!).  This is also used to provide “unique visitor” counts in WebTrends.
3. Session Cookies : A text file containing a random identification string that only remains in the computer’s memory for the length of the visit, or “session”.  It does not live on the machine after you navigate away from the site that set it, so there is no way to identify visitors that have been to the site before.
4. IP Address : Internet Protocol Address is used to identify a computer connect to the internet.  Since there are only so many IP addresses to go around, more often than not individual machines end up sharing the same IP address due to the use of proxy servers (used by large organizations like companies and universities), internet service providers or even home wireless routers.

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Scorecarding has been an analytic passion of mine for a few years now.  In my last position before I started working here at WebTrends I developed an extensive scorecard that stretched across multiple channels and was so rich in data that it was in fact intimidating to nearly everyone but a data freak like me.  What I forgot to do then and what I am working on now as I move forward with scorecarding is to condense the wealth of data down into an easily digestible format and customize it to the specific business users.

Who is your audience? When it comes to dashboards and scorecards one size does not fit all.  Learn from my experience, before you go about developing one first figure out who your audience is and what it is they want to know. The information an executive team is interested in is far different than that of the marketing team and ecommerce certainly has different needs than IT.  Everyone one wants (or should but that is another blog) the data.  The key point for each business user is this data you are presenting to them will help them make decisions.

What questions do they want answered? When I was deciding today between writing either about gathering business requirements or scorecarding I had one of those ah ha moments realizing you really can’t be successful with your scorecard if you don’t first gather your business requirements so let’s take a look at what that looks like. (more…)

If you haven’t used the new WebTrends Tag Builder yet – you’re missing out. I love it!

The 2.0 version of Tag Builder contain all sorts of awesome functions that you can chose to include or exclude, so you optimize the script based on your reporting requirements. Out of all these optional functions dcsAdSearch and dcsOffsite have to be my favorite. With a little tweak to dcsOffsite, together these functions can make tracking onsite ad impressions and click through so much easier. No more messing around with onclick event handlers in ad link tags.

Provided you have a unique identifier already in a query string parameter in the address of your ad link, which most ad placement software will use, for example ‘n=’ in Double Click ad’s. You no longer even need to worry about amending WT.ac or any other parameters to your link addresses.

Under the additional settings tab in Tag Builder you simply need to check the ‘Create ad view from links containing this parameter’ option box. This will ensure the ‘dcsAdSearch’ function is added to your script. The function will trawl through all the links in a given page via the DOM looking for the ad click parameter. Every time a matching ad link is found its ad click parameter value is added to the ad view parameter (WT.ad) list (semicolon separated). Yeah – it builds your WT.ad parameter value/list for you too! (more…)

I spent most of this past week in Washington, D.C. with many of my colleagues at eMetrics.  The show was abuzz with forecasts of the future,  press releases, announcements and a even a few proclamations.  From our own declaration of data independence to John Lovett & Bill Gassman agreeing in a joint session that “the future of web analytics is data integration” (as Tweeted by @jdersh) -  the buzz was heavy.

One buzz-worthy event was Avinash’s announcement of the latest enhancements to Google Analytics (GA), which include custom reporting, new visualizations, segmentation, an export API, and AdSense integration.  Following the announcement, much was made in the social mediasphere about the now certain impending failure of, as ClickZ’s Anna Maria Virzi called us, “the big guns like Omniture, WebTrends, and Coremetrics.”  GA was even referring to themselves as “enterprise class” on their booth and the less formal “enterprisey” on their sponsored eMetrics badge insert.

This begs the question, though – What makes a web analytics solution an enterprise web analytics solution? (more…)

Content groups are probably the most common dynamic parameters I see people setting up when tagging their site. By dynamic parameters I mean something the logging script doesn’t grab automatically and you have to actually put some effort into. Yes WT.cg_n and WT.cg_s are standard parameters not like DCSext, and Content Group reporting is in the standard report package. But defining and then implementing content groups is a very non-standard process.

The recommended practice for defining Content Groups, Sub Groups and how they will be organized is to use your site map or navigation tree. Your average to medium-sized web site will have at least a two tier navigation represented by drop down, fold out, or sub menus. So if you’re lucky enough to have a typical web site you can pretty much just replicate this structure. If you’re really lucky (or rather if the site developers are lucky) you can even leach the values you are assigning to WT.cg_n and WT.cg_s from the little Java Script function that builds your navigational menu or bread crumb navigation. (more…)

Last month WebTrends hosted a Web Analytics Wednesday in Portland at our corporate headquarters. If you ever get a chance to attend a WAW, please don’t be shy -come on up for some beer or wine and of course the excellent opportunity to bond with your fellow analysts. The special guests last month were Eric Peterson and Thomas Bosilevac, who spoke about the X Change Conference. 

I received an invite this last summer to the X Change Conference right when I was switching positions from InFocus to WebTrends, it was a very busy time in my life and I opted not to go.  What a foolish mistake that was, because now with regards to the conference I am no longer considered a practitioner. I am considered a vendor now and to keep things fairly balanced for the X Change Conference, only 2 people from any vendor organization are invited to attend.  This is fair, and I have no personal argument with the decision and it makes sense. Of course here at WebTrends where analytic talent abounds it isn’t likely I will again be invited to the event anytime soon, so I will adjust and deal with the inevitability of a yearly disappointment when the next X Change Conference rolls around. (more…)

Someone never asked me this week “What do you think is best Parameter in WebTrends Analytics?” Without hesitating for even a moment (I didn’t even blink) I was able to answer straight from (my man sized but well toned and shaped) gut with 100% conviction and certainty that WT.Seg_X was definitely THE all time best ever WebTrends parameter.

From my very first day in WebTrends boot camp I knew that WT.seg’s was very special. Its values get assigned to the field “WT.vhseg_X” in the Visitor History table which means they are attached to every hit of every subsequent visit that is associated with that particular visitor identifier.

Also WT.seg_X has an X in its name which is always cool and probably stands for eXtream or something like that like in the X-Games, DMX, or the X-Files which are all also cool. But the X is for far more than just aesthetics, it’s actually a number! WT.seg_X is actually 4 parameters; it’s a quadruple threat, the four brothers Grimm: WT.seg_1, WT.seg_2, WT.seg_3, & WT.seg_4. I know… sweet. (more…)

It’s a very exciting time right now at WebTrends as we continue to demonstrate the value of “freeing your data.”  We’re making it simple and easy to get data out of WebTrends products and into the enterprise in ways that are meaningful to your business.

For some of our customers, that means easy connection to the data for use in external desktop applications.  For others, it means pulling our data into business intelligence systems to drive forecasting for non-web portions of the business.  For still other customers, this means pulling visitor-level data from our Warehouse into their enterprise data warehouse to create one view of the customer enabling them to drive true, cross-channel customer marketing. This is connecting web analytics to business intelligence in the real world.

WebTrends, Teradata, Stratigent and Brulant are going on the road to share stories of how this is being done right now with current customers.  I’ll be speaking in at least two of the cities, maybe more.  I’d love to see you there. Details are here at the Connect site.

In the mean time, if you’ve got a story about using web data in the enterprise (outside the analytics solution) I’d love to hear it.  Tell us what’s working and what isn’t working.  What processes are you enabling?  What business decisions are you making?  What do you wish you could do? Post your stories and questions here, and come to Connect ready to talk about making your vision a reality.

I’ll see you on the road at Connect 08!

Are you going to eMetrics?

As I was booking my travel for eMetrics in DC next week I was pleased to see a number of our partners are going to be in attendance. Of the sponsors: ForeSee Results, Interwoven, Technology Leaders, SiteSpect, Stratigent, & Unilytics are all partners that I’ve met with recently.

Given the amount of Fear, Uncertainty, and Doubt in the macroeconomic situation right now, the value WebTrends and our partners provide is a bright spot: nobody is doing more to ensure that the digital marketer can optimize their operations, and prove their worth in what will be an increasingly competitive market.

If you’re coming, look me up! You can find me on the floor, at Alex’s presentation on Connecting Digital Marketing and Business Intelligence or Web Analytics Wednesday.

We just wrapped up another successful show at SMX East in New York.

Increasingly, we see two types of visitors at these show: industry veterans and people who are just beginning to learn about online advertising and analytics. It’s great to see more new people/faces – their interest and enthusiasm continues to fuel the growth of SEM!

The availability of more easily accessible and increasingly free applications for SEM is helping this growth. The easy setup and low cost of AdWords is encouraging more and more businesses to start advertising online, while Google Analytics and now, Yahoo Analytics, is allowing more users to start analyzing their site traffic.

Many attendees asked what the rise and availability of free tools like Google Analytics means for providers like WebTrends. While we don’t serve the same customers, Google Analytics has been a positive force for the industry by serving the mass market. Thanks to Google Analytics, sites with lower traffic or lower budgets are becoming educated about the benefits of SEO and best practices for online marketing.

We’ll see you at AdTech New York next month!