Today’s blog-monitoring kudos go to Clickshift
After a recent post about Clickshift being acquired by WebTrends and voicing my concerns, and a previous experience with Omniture monitoring blog posts, I did get a call (voicemail) and e-mail follow-up from Clickshift. Let me go on a slight tangent by saying how much I love how powerful blogs can be and how easily accessible the information is for research and brand protection. I think there's a definite future in this way of servicing new and existing customers and really allows companies to obtain candid feedback from real-world users, and not just people who are so fed up that they call customer service to complain -- and quite frankly, I don't have the time to do this as it's typically easy enough to go to a competitor. Here I am now, championing their efforts and feeling important to them.
I digress. Back to the WebTrends aquisition of Clickshift. Not to worry says Clickshift: same service, just a new logo. So I'm back to looking at their very attractive SEM model again. With 2007 budgets nearing finalization, whichever route I choose can't begin until January, so I have some time to look over it in a little more detail and learn how exactly they will integrate with our site -- and how it can co-exist with Omniture. I realize that technically speaking, the code easily co-exists on each page. It's the data analysis and path-to-conversion process that is going to be somewhat of an overlap.
On one side, I will have Omniture reporting data on non-SEM conversions and then through Clickshift, I will have SEM-based conversions. Not having this data centrally managed requires me to consolidate both sets of data either in a spreadsheet or by some other means. This was the beauty with the Omniture model is that all SEM data and web analytics data could be rolled into a single report. While they haven't exactly made that process painless (and I'm considering going to Omniture University to learn how to get the most out of their application), I take comfort in knowing that it's all there if and when I need it. Time will tell. If Clickshift truely works, then the time savings alone in bid management rules and the day-to-day babysitting of SEM will far outweigh the temporary inconvenience of rolling data from 2 sources into 1 report/spreadsheet.
kudos to omniture for monitoring blogs
Bonus Points for Omniture
Unbeknownst to me, last week as I was testing out this new installation of WordPress blogging software, a post I made which referenced Omniture would make its way into a few blog feeds and someone from Omniture would actually take notice -- and better yet, take action. In the post, I indicated some frustration with the UI and setting up reporting and that I was considering giving Clickshift.com a try at SEM needs. Today I received a call from our SearchCenter contact and we talked through some of the details of the post and he showed me how to create some business rules to solve a problem I was having.
In the business of tracking: clicks -> conversions to free samples -> offline sales
I explained that my goal right now, since we do not sell products via our website, was to maximize the conversions from visitor to free sample ordering. From the sample ordering data we collect, we can determine the percentage of sample orders that convert into offline purchasers. Fortunately for our business model, we sell custom products, which means orders are placed directly with us, regardless of retailer. The manufactured blind makes its way to the consumer, so we can simply match the shipping address of a product order against our database of addresses we collect for free sample ordering. (All of this is obviously done under our privacy policy and consumer data is kept under lock & key.)
Ahhh...the cost/conversion metric I had been looking for
Anyway, since we do not sell products online, we thus have no online revenue to track, which makes some of the default reporting within Omniture's SearchCenter product useless to us -- in particular ROAS (Return on Ad Spend). What I am looking to do is reduce our cost per conversion (cost per swatch order). This metric did require our account rep to setup a custom setting on his end to enable us to better report against it, but at the end of the call, I had cost/conversion reporting setup and was on my way to creating business rules for our search engine bids.
FWIW, cost/conversion is a default metric available in Google's free web analytics. It seems like somewhat of an oversight to omit this metric from the default reporting, but I guess that Omniture's clients typically are e-commerce businesses that rely on ROAS metrics since they have online revenue to also inject into reporting (at which point cost/conversion is less critical).
Herein lies the delimma: OPTIMIZING keyword campaigns on cost per conversion
Clickshift.com's model automatically optimizes entire campaigns based on keywords that drive the best cost per conversion. Additionally, Clickshift.com also optimizes based on landing page.
Omniture's system is not so automated or all-encompassing (yet). Omniture's reporting is able to TELL me what keywords are driving for cost/conversion, but only through arbitrary automated increments (that I specify based on no data/research) can I enforce increases or decreases in bid spending. Furthermore, Omniture's support for A/B(/C/D/E...n) landing pages is a little more involved that Clickshift. Technically, it can be done, but requires tagging pages specifically, and doesn't really offer the complete solution that Clickshift.com is selling businesses on. I would have to separately test landing pages and keyword campaigns and assemble my own findings between the two. I can't just automatically disable landing pages or move my bids to another style of landing page automatically. Omniture's business rules currently allow one action to be taken at a time...and landing pages can only be manually changed.
Net/Net: I'll make further attempts at creating additional business rules (within Omniture) for bid automation based on average ad position, cost/conversion, and other criteria I deem necessary. We'll see how much further I can drive down cost/conversion. And I'm very pleased at the level of customer service from Omniture.
Blog by Eric Long
I'm an experienced online marketer, information architect, digital strategist, and social media enthusiast. I'm passionate about providing outstanding cross-channel experiences for considered purchases (with a focus on mass customization).
About Eric Long
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