Serengeti Communications » Analytics

Rethinking Your Google Content Targeted Campaigns

Nate Linnell — Thu, 14 Jan 2010 14:00:16 +0000

Getting great results from the Google content network doesn’t have to be difficult, but it can get tricky if you treat it the same way you would a search campaign. Too often people either just turn on content in a search campaign or duplicate the search campaign as a content targeted campaign. This often leads to less than optimal results. In order to avoid creating a content targeted campaign that isn’t setup for success, there are a few easy steps that can be taken which involve using free tools.

The first step relates to your keywords. In the content network, you can generally use broader keywords than you do for search targeted campaigns and still get great results. This will allow your campaign to have a greater reach within your target audience. Finding these broader keywords is simply a matter of using the keyword research tools that are available from the search engines.

Once you have your keywords set, the second step is finding specific sites that are relevant to your campaign and can be targeted through the content network. A great tool to use is Google Ad Planner. Ad Planner can be used to find similar audiences to your site and find sites that relate to the keywords in your campaign.

To find sites that relate to the keywords in your campaign, simply add a list of keywords from your campaign into the tool and it will return related sites. You can then refine the list of sites using a variety of filtering options to find the most relevant sites for your campaign. You then simply add these sites in as managed placements in your campaign.

You can also use Google Ad Planner to find sites that have a similar audience to your site. To do this, you enter in your domain and it will return demographic data for you site as well as other sites visited by visitors who come to your site. This will allow you to then use the tool to find sites that have similar audiences to your site. These can then also be targeted as managed placements in your campaign.

Lastly, you should make use of your web analytics data to find relevant sites to target through the content network. Go through your list of top referring sites and see which ones are driving high quality traffic. Put a list of together of those that are driving great traffic and then see if you can target them specifically through the content network.

Once you’ve gone through these simple steps, you’ll be ready to launch your content targeted campaign. Once the campaign has launched, you’ll have to make sure you’re very vigilant in optimizing the performance of the campaign in order to maximize your results.

Beware of Yahoo “Search” Partners

Nate Linnell — Mon, 07 Dec 2009 14:00:17 +0000

Have you ever really taken a hard look at where your Yahoo PPC traffic is really coming from? Recently I was working on a web analytics project for a client and was doing a deep dive into their referring sites. I noticed a number of sites that were driving a fairly high number of visits, but none of them were converting. I dug deeper and began to notice some strange abnormalities.

These sites appeared to be some of the “made for adsense” type sites that only have ads. They had some navigation and a search box, but everything always led to ads. I could see that all the traffic coming from these sites had PPC tracking strings so I figured it was from the Google content network.

Google AdWords, however, wasn’t reporting any clicks from any of these domains. I was a bit perplexed and so I went back to take a closer look at the tracking stings. I was very surprised to see that they were from Yahoo. The reason why I was so surprised was that the client isn’t running on the Yahoo content network.

I figured somehow the content network had been turned on by mistake, but that was not the case. I kept poking around Yahoo and to my surprise found a Referrer report (which apparently is new as of the middle of October). There I could see all the sites that Yahoo apparently deems to be “search” partners when in fact the only available content on the site are Yahoo ads.

In a few campaigns well over 50% of the monthly budget had come from these so called “search” partners with zero conversions. These domains are now blocked, but that doesn’t mean the client or I am happy.

There will need to be follow-up calls with Yahoo to figure out how these sites can possibly be regarded as “search” partners. In addition Yahoo only allows you to block 500 domains, so what is the client supposed to do once they reach that threshold?

Many questions still need to be answered, but I would strongly suggest doing a deep analysis using your web analytics data to see where exactly Yahoo is showing your ads.

Effective Marketers Drive the Boat – Guest Post by Joy Brazelle

Nate Linnell — Mon, 07 Sep 2009 13:00:16 +0000

Recently my husband and I joined a boating club. I can’t tell you how great it has been. If you are thinking of buying a boat, I recommend re-thinking that idea and looking into Freedom Boat Club. You show up, the boat is ready for you, clean and full of gas. You take it out for a few hours and just return it. No hassle of towing the boat back home or cleaning the boat, etc. You get the picture.

For the past few weekends we’ve gone out on the boat. Being a nice guy, my husband has been ‘captain’ each time, allowing me to hang out on the bow (front) of the boat, enjoy a few cocktails and get some sun, while he responsibly drank bottled water and drove the boat.

I knew at some point I have to actually learn to drive the boat. Although I passed the online boating course, I had not ever driven a boat. Not being the best (car) driver, I was not so excited to learn how to drive the boat. This was largely because many vacationers who rent a pontoon boat or jet ski don’t have to know anything about the boating rules and regulations. So driving a boat is a much more proactive, defensive experience than driving a car.

But to be fair I had to learn. Suffice to say this past weekend was not my favorite boating experience or my finest moment. Paying attention to the other boaters, trying to prepare for and then react to their actions is a LOT of work.

Take one example, the wake. In my previous, front of the boat experience wake made the ride fun. My only concern was to make sure the cocktail was in the cup-holder so my drink didn’t spill. My ‘at the helm’ example was completely different – slow down if I was going too fast so I wouldn’t flip the boat (probably wouldn’t have happened, but in my mind it was a possibility), steer into the wake (what?) and then speed up to get through it as the boat shook and bounced from side to side. To me that feeling was completely out of control. The ‘going fast as the boat shakes from side to side’ was fun while lounging comfortably on the front of the boat. The experience at the wheel, terrifying!

But I will, in time, get better and more comfortable with driving the boat. And even become able to take the boat out myself with friends. It definitely will be worth it.

Now how does that long story relate to analytics? Many companies are still in front of the boat mode with their analytics. Each month the marketers present a powerpoint with their web reports – visits, unique visits, year over year or quarter over quarter, and maybe some revenue (revenue that if you compared to actual sales data was not even close). Everyone left the meeting happy since the lines on the charts were slightly larger and the trends were moving in positive direction, even if ever so slightly, or if there was a bad month, everyone understood, the economy is bad.

But effective marketers drive the boat. It is scary. It takes time and work. But the results are worth it. These data-driven companies excel at using information from their web analytics, teaming it with actual sales and maybe even competitive information and creating a plan that is fluid. They analyze what is working and what is not. If they can’t fix the ‘what is not’ they stop spending on those campaigns and move their budget to what is working.

Their presentations go beyond simple metrics. They explain their results in business terms that executives can understand and appreciate. They get bigger budgets (and even raises…even in this bad economy).

So what is it going to take to get you off the bow and behind the wheel?

3 Resources

John Rhea — Tue, 01 Sep 2009 13:00:49 +0000

Over at Take it in-house, we just posted an audio interview with Philip Maher, founder of Intuitive Investments and former Director of Interactive Strategy at RH Donnelley.
Check out Li Evan’s latest article on Search Engine Watch, Can Social Media Be Measured?
And if you haven’t downloaded it yet, grab our newest white paper on measuring social media, Social Media Impact: Unicorn or Elephant?

Google Analytics and Website Optimizer in 60 Seconds

Nate Linnell — Mon, 06 Jul 2009 14:00:20 +0000

Are you using Google Analytics? Are you currently doing any A/B or multivariate testing on your site? I’d be willing to guess that the number of ‘yes’ answers to the second question is a fraction of the first. By not testing, however, you’re missing out on a large opportunity to increase sales, leads, sign-ups, etc. Google would like to change this in hopes that it will benefit your site and in turn benefit their bottom line.

If your site can convert traffic (especially PPC) at a higher rate, then the cost-per-conversion of your marketing campaigns will decrease. Google hopes that you’d then either be willing to bid more for those PPC keywords that drive conversions or expand your marketing campaigns into other Google revenue sources such as banner ads.

In order to facilitate this, Google has recently released a short video titled Google Website Optimizer in 60 Seconds. It basically tells you how to use Google Analytics to find the landing pages that you should initially focus your efforts on and then gives you a very quick 30 second “how to” on using Google Website Optimizer.

Check it out and happy testing.

Choosing a Web Analytics Package – Google Analytics “Myths”

Nate Linnell — Mon, 08 Jun 2009 13:00:31 +0000

Recently we’ve had a number of clients who’ve come to us wanting to evaluate their current web analytics package to see if it’s still the right package for them. Sometimes they’ve done a bit of research on their own and have a basic understanding of a few options and the capabilities of each. In other cases they don’t know anything about the differences between the packages. One aspect that seems to be true for all of them, however, is that they all want to know about Google Analytics.

They know it’s free and that can be very attractive to a company that is cutting costs to try and weather the recession. What they don’t know is if it will fit their needs and that is a critical question to ask when choosing a web analytics package. The topic is often brought up in forums and written about across various blogs. Sometimes the posters or bloggers view Google Analytics in a positive light and in other cases more negatively. What is constant is that there can often be information that gets put out there that may not be completely accurate. The folks over at Google Analytics have been following these blog posts and forum threads and decided that it was time to put out a post of their own. The post aims to debunk the top ten myths about Google Analytics.

The post definitely addresses many of the issues that get brought up regarding Google Analytics and can certainly be used as a reference if you’re going through the process of evaluating the right web analytics package for your company. If you’re not sure how to go about the process of choosing a web analytics package or just simply don’t have the time then contact us. We can help guide you through the entire process from choosing the right package to correctly implementing it so that it properly tracks all the metrics that tie into your site goals.

Stop the Madness; Start Measuring

Nan Dawkins — Wed, 15 Apr 2009 19:57:01 +0000

If you are in marketing, you might be a little stressed right now. The pressure is on to show ROI. You are constantly trying to accomplish more with less. Technology and digital channels are evolving at a rapid fire pace and you had better keep up if you’re going to survive. And job security? Not much of a concept anymore, no matter what your line of work.

Wouldn’t it be nice if you could turn down the noise and focus on one or two things that would have the biggest impact?

You can.

See if you can answer the following questions:
• Can you measure the actual revenue generated by specific marketing campaigns?
• Do you know which digital marketing channel currently converts the most leads or sales and costs the least?
• Does your marketing department or agency make changes to a campaign based on results while the campaign is active (as opposed to waiting until the campaign is over)?

If you answered “no”, don’t feel like the Lone Ranger. A 2007 Conference Board study found that one third of the companies surveyed were making no attempts to measure marketing ROI. In a more recent study (Alterian, 2009), less than half of marketers surveyed said they plan to use analytics to measure campaigns.

Digital marketing has, in many ways, developed faster than the tools to measure it. Add in resistance to change, lack of skilled staff trained in measurement best practices, and pressure to score a home run YESTERDAY – it’s enough to drive the sanest marketer to choose finger crossing and a Hail Mary or two over facing the measurement monster.

And yet, if you make even small improvements in your measurement infrastructure and capabilities, you can achieve big improvements in ROI.

Where should you start?

Ask yourself what it would take to answer “yes” to the questions above. How much would it cost? How would you make the ROI case to the C Suite?

Or, stop asking yourself questions (before someone notices that you are talking to yourself) and call us. We love a good measurement hairball.

Useful Information is So Overrated 7 Ways to Prepare Yourself for Marketing Success in 2009

Elizabeth Robinson — Thu, 15 Jan 2009 13:43:45 +0000

Times are tough. To say that the economy is bad is an understatement. So, in absence of actually trying to do a good job, here are seven ways to create job security for you and your marketing team in 2009 using the tried and true method of smoke and mirrors.

1. Traditional media is dead. Says who?
You can’t improve what you can’t measure. Measuring the success of traditional media buys like print, TV, or radio spots is difficult. Perfect!! You have done your job by running the campaigns. Now, it is the sales department’s responsibility. If no sales come from those campaigns, clearly it is not your department’s fault.

2. 2009 Media Plan = Unwavering
Sure, lots of time was spent in 2008 determining what was working and what was not, and shifting your spend to focus on the most effective campaigns. But…let’s face it, that was exhausting. You know that media plan you created at the end of last year for 2009?… commit and stick to your guns.

You have done the marketing research that you were expected to do and that everyone has approved. How much could the landscape really change during 2009? And, if there are problems, hey, they approved the plan.

3. Google – Are you being evil?
We all know that historically pay-per-click has been one of the most cost-efficient ways of marketing. But, it is 2009 now. Think of all of the challenges…click fraud, rising keyword costs, increased competition. It is certainly the search engines fault now if your campaigns are not successful.

4. Very, very important – Make enemies with IT
It is MUCH easier to blame the enemy. If executives want to hold you accountable for ROI, data, or analytics stand tall and point the finger at your enemies in IT. You would have certainly had the proof to show how successful your campaigns were if only IT had helped you out.

5. ROI – So very 2008
Explain to your executives that ROI is an overused, overrated metric. Just because you can track things, doesn’t mean you should. There are many more important metrics (see #6).

6. 2009 – Choose your metrics wisely
There are so many metrics available to you these days, and plenty that most executives will have no idea what they mean (read…cannot question whether good or bad, successful or not). Hits, bring them back….meaningless minutia with an explanation laden with technical jargon, PERFECT!!

Geography, another good one… usually pretty inaccurate but everyone enjoys this stat as they can mentally try to figure out who they know that may be causing this traffic. Mobile Devices….okay you and I know it probably accounts for less than 3% of the traffic, but isn’t it cool that people are looking at our site on their iPhone. We are so cutting edge!

7. Analytics – Wait, why bother?
You did not get into the interesting, creative field of marketing to be tied to spreadsheets, come on. And besides, who really cares about the numbers. If executives ask for reports or numbers, explain to them that they are not asking for Web design ideas from the accounting department…so, why is there this double standard?

I hope this list has been helpful. These are just the top ideas that came to mind. Feel free to let me know if there are more that I have missed.

Good luck in 2009!

What a Difference a Day Makes

Elizabeth Robinson — Tue, 02 Dec 2008 13:00:04 +0000

Well, maybe not a day, maybe 8 years.

When I was home for Thanksgiving this past week, I had a chance to enjoy one of my guilty pleasures.

Be Warned: The next few lines may contain the nerdiest thing you have read in a long while.

I’ve saved most all of my old issues of Fast Company and Business 2.0 and when I have spare time, I like to peruse the old issues. I know, I know, N-E-R-D-Y.

But, in my defense…marketing, like much of business, tends to be cyclical. So, I think it is interesting to look at the business trends and emerging business trends from the past, sort of a print version of the Wayback Machine. And, it’s not only the articles and ideas that I find interesting, but also the advertising.

In fact, here’s one of the best ads that I came across was in the October 24, 2000 issue of Business 2.0.

: Coremetrics 2000 Ad

How great is this ad?
“Do you think a hunch about data relationships will improve browser-to-buyer conversion?”

But, here is the best part:
“Your disjointed and incomplete eMarketing data has had you playing the guessing game for too long.”

Back in 2000, way before the great analytics growth explosion, when (WebTrends) Executive
Summaries consisted of nothing more than a few (some meaningless) metrics…

…Coremetrics had the guts to call attention to the fact that eMarketing is trackable and that marketing decisions should not be made based on hunches or worse, bad data.

The fact is that analytics have improved by leaps and bounds in the past 8 years. But, the sad fact is that despite that, many marketers are still making important spending decisions based on their gut-feelings and bad data.

And maybe, some of that is caused by the overwhelming amount of analytic data that is available now. There is a big difference between data and information. Because data whether meaningful or meaningless, without context is really no help. But in this economy, in this recession, very few companies have the luxury of experimental marketing or, in words of Coremetrics, a ‘VP of Guesstimation.”

Google Trends for the Flu

Nate Linnell — Thu, 13 Nov 2008 13:00:00 +0000

Can searches on Google for flu-related keywords predict increases and decreases in the number of flu cases? That is a question the folks over at Google wanted to find out.

After compiling the search-related data, they worked with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) to compare the data to actual flu outbreaks around the country. What they found was that there was a very close correlation between the two.

Google decided to use this data to try and help individuals across the country find out the level of flu activity in their area. They have created a Flu Trends tool through Google.org that displays the data in a chart that can be drilled into – to show individual states.

One really nice aspect of the tool is that the data is current where as the data that comes from the CDC lags by a couple weeks. Because of this, you can better anticipate oncoming flu activity before the CDC releases its data and have already begun to take preventive measure to help avoid catching the flu.

To get a better visual understanding of how the tool works, I pulled a few screenshots from the tool. The first one shows the overall flu activity throughout the country.

As you can see, the level of flu activity has been low so far this year. But, based on previous years, it is likely about to begin to increase. You can see that in certain states such as Mississippi, Arkansas, and Kentucky, the flu activity has already risen to the moderate level.

That got me thinking of what it looks like around my area.

Filtering the data for the DC area shows that flu activity has begun to increase, but is still at the low level.

This would seem to indicate that there isn’t much risk of the flu at this point. But, that it is beginning to have an upwards trend. So, I should start being a bit more careful in my attempts to avoid contracting the flu this season.

I’ll probably continue to revisit Google Flu Trends to see if what I see living in the DC area matches with what the tool is telling me. And, who knows, maybe it can be one way that I can try to avoid the flu this year.