There are a few things to remember to help you get set up with your Google Analytics Custom Reports. The set up interface looks confusing so first firmly establish what blocks does what, see the screen shot below.
- The Dimensions refer to what will be the rows of the table
- Metrics will be columns
- Sub dimensions drill down on dimensions, for example if your dimensions is a city then your create a sub dimension to drill down referal sources from that city.
First establish your objectives. Let’s use an example whereby we want the focus on results per landing page. make the Dimension “Landing Page” and the Metric “Visits” this will highlight number of visits by landing page. As per the example above we might want to monitor a particular marketing campaign for a certain sub domain or url. In this case add the Sub Dimension as “Referal Path” under traffic sources. This will allow you to quickly see where your traffic came from for each landing page. Your Custom report build will look like this,
Yesterday the family pulled together to help dad (Roger Ward) marshal his first organized run around rural Glen Parva. The run started at Glenhills memorial hall and lead off across the fields at the back of Glen Parva making use of some great running locations along the great central way and popular dog walking tracks by the canal. It was a figure of 8 course over 3 km with a water station at the interchange for a water break on the outbound and inbound route.
That evening we decided to introduce dad to the online world and set him up with a blog to tell you all about his events, classes and health tips.
Visit Roger Ward health and fitness here to find out more and see the route from the run.
The GfK Insights Calendar – Crambed full of Insights, Infographics, Animations and Research Findings
This year we have produced calendar review of the last year. It’s packed full of all the Infographics, Animated Videos and Charts we have been producing to support our PR and blog outputs. Have a browse and feel share the Insights.
We now have expanded the in house video production team with the addition of a motion graphics and 3D specialist so there’s some really exciting visuals and client deliverables just around the corner, all in a whole new league than any of our competitors.
There will be plenty more to come next year so watch this space.
This is a short video we produced in order to communicate the impact social media can have on conventional marketing practises. Enhancing the value of the initial investment and giving content the room to go viral.
If you would like to use a de branded version of the video, Powerpoint, Keynote or have any suggestion for other explanation videos, get in touch glennmward@yahoo.co.uk
Just what is the best URL structure for a large corporate international website?
This post first stemmed from a while back, I was looking into the best naming convention for an international website with regard to SEO. For example, sub domain or sub folder? Abbreviation or country name? While working on the global digital strategy it became apparent that this question routed further than search engine optimization. When the digital agency we are working with highlighted a link to the ISO website. In all honesty their website is a pain to navigate so I have used wiki links to highlight my reading. Firstly, here is a link to get up to speed with country codes Wiki – ISO Country Code then there is the Alpha-2 Wiki – ISO 3166-1 alpha-2, 2 character country standardisation you see used in the Nike example below and the Top level domain naming convention we all know and love Wiki – Country code top-level domain. Although the domain naming is based on the ISO standardisation the official 2 character naming can be found on the IANA or International Assigned Numbers Authority notice the official UK TLD is in fact GB.
You will have seen many approaches to naming of URLs while browsing the Internet. When I used to build sites I would always organize sections of the website into folders and if I included a blog or forum I would sub domain them. I had no marketing reason for this, just tidiness! During my days as a Web Manager on eCommerce sites I became far more SEO focused. See a beginners guide to SEO. I shall write another post relative to page content, title URL etc, but in the mean time lets focus on the address bar.
Another consideration is language and how we represent this in our URL, or if we don’t at all. The most popular language abbreviation is again the ISO 3 character code Wiki – ISO 639-3
Look at any international company that identifies a need to have a global presence with local focus;
Nike (look at the sitelinks to see how Nike use sub domains), Addidas (again, look at the sitelinks but also the use of url’s and auto location redirect) and my favorite Apple (Google Search).
They all take on a structure that we can learn a lot from. Maybe something you wouldn’t necessarily think about at a country level. Also, there’s language to think about many content management systems require the duplication of pages in order to deal with language and these pages require URLs. So we now have 2 dimensions, country and language. Obviously there us such a thing as regional domain names but for a company with global presence these should be forwards not separate sites if you are to develop a prominent online presence. So, what do we have? A .com address, country level content needs and a language option.
Country option 1
www.websitename.com/uk
Country option 2
www.uk.websitename.com
The second is my preferred option as it is a well structured index-able page that allows for a language change that is obvious to the reader where they reside without any need for breadcrumb trail listed in your page content. This might look like,
www.uk.websitename.com/eng
Here are a few interesting reads on sub domain vs sub folder or sub directory with varying takes,
SEOmoz – Understanding root domains, subdomains vs sub folders and microsites
Search Engine Journal – Subdomains or subfolders which are better for-seo
Matt Cutts – Subdomains and subdirectories
Your pages might so dynamic that country and language are handled on a single page but this might have indexing and crawling implications by search engines (Id have to research further)
Another consideration to take into account is microsites. They shouldn’t be used for link building and the like but there is often a case. In our particular case these are business cases which is equally as important! No matter how passionate you are about your personal skillset or individual task, respect and align with the companies business needs, this is where your wages come from and while search ranking is number one in your agenda its not someone else’s.
Just what is the best URL structure for a large corporate international website?
This post first stemmed from a while back, I was looking into the best naming convention for an international website with regard to SEO. For example, sub domain or sub folder? Abbreviation or country name? While working on the global digital strategy it became apparent that this question routed further than search engine optimization. When the digital agency we are working with highlighted a link to the a title=International Organization for Standardization href=http://www.iso.org/iso/home.html target=_blankISO website/a. In all honesty their website is a pain to navigate so I have used wiki links to highlight my reading. Firstly, here is a link to get up to speed with country codes a title=ISO Country Code href=http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ISO_country_code target=_blankWiki – ISO Country Code/a then there is the Alpha-2 a title=ISO 3166-1 alpha-2 href=http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ISO_3166-1_alpha-2 target=_blankWiki – ISO 3166-1 alpha-2/a, 2 character country standardisation you see used in the Nike example below and the Top level domain naming convention we all know and love a title=Country code top-level domain href=http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Country_code_top-level_domain target=_blankWiki – Country code top-level domain/a. Although the domain naming is based on the ISO standardisation the official 2 character naming can be found on the a title=IANA Domains href=http://www.iana.org/domains/root/db/ target=_blankIANA or International Assigned Numbers Authority/a notice the official UK TLD is in fact GB.
You will have seen many approaches to naming of URLs while browsing the Internet. When I used to build sites I would always organize sections of the website into folders and if I included a blog or forum I would sub domain them. I had no marketing reason for this, just tidiness! During my days as a Web Manager on eCommerce sites I became far more SEO focused. See a a title=Introduction to SEO href=http://glennward.co.uk/2009/04/intoduction-to-search-engine-optimisation-seo-learn-at-lunch/ target=_blankbeginners guide to SEO/a. I shall write another post relative to page content, title URL etc, but in the mean time lets focus on the address bar.
Another consideration is language and how we represent this in our URL, or if we dont at all. The most popular language abbreviation is again the ISO 3 character code a title=Language 3 Character code ISO 639-3 href=http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ISO_639-3 target=_blankWiki – ISO 639-3/a
Look at any international company that identifies a need to have a global presence with local focus;
a title=Nike href=http://www.nike.com target=_blankNike/a (look at the a title=Nike sitelinks href=http://www.google.co.uk/search?client=safarirls=enq=nikeie=UTF-8oe=UTF-8redir_esc=ei=PW6TTqvuLIWh8QOPxeHnBg target=_blanksitelinks/a to see how Nike use sub domains),a title=Addidas href=http://www.adidas.com target=_blank Addidas/a (again, look at the a title=Addidas sitelinks and URLs href=http://www.google.co.uk/webhp?hl=en#hl=encp=5gs_id=kxhr=tq=adidaspf=psclient=psy-absafe=offsite=webhpsource=hppbx=1oq=addidaq=0saqi=g-s4aql=gs_sm=gs_upl=bav=on.2,or.r_gc.r_pw.r_cp.,cf.osbfp=8c08631233d8fd66biw=1404bih=769 target=_blanksitelinks/a but also the use of urls and auto location redirect) and my favorite a title=Apple href=http://www.apple.com target=_blankApple/a (a title=Apple Google search href=http://www.google.co.uk/webhp?hl=en#hl=encp=3gs_id=cxhr=tq=applepf=psclient=psy-absafe=offsite=webhpsource=hppbx=1oq=appaq=0aqi=g4aql=gs_sm=gs_upl=bav=on.2,or.r_gc.r_pw.r_cp.,cf.osbfp=8c08631233d8fd66biw=1404bih=769 target=_blankGoogle Search/a).
They all take on a structure that we can learn a lot from. Maybe something you wouldnt necessarily think about at a country level. Also, theres language to think about many content management systems require the duplication of pages in order to deal with language and these pages require URLs. So we now have 2 dimensions, country and language. Obviously there us such a thing as regional domain names but for a company with global presence these should be forwards not separate sites if you are to develop a prominent online presence. So, what do we have? A .com address, country level content needs and a language option.
Country option 1
www.websitename.com/uk
Country option 2
www.uk.websitename.com
The second is my preferred option as it is a well structured index-able page that allows for a language change that is obvious to the reader where they reside without any need for breadcrumb trail listed in your page content. This might look like,
www.uk.websitename.com/eng
Here are a few interesting reads on sub domain vs sub folder or sub directory with varying takes,
SEOmoz – a title=SEOmoz Understanding root domains subdomains sub folders and microsites href=http://www.seomoz.org/blog/understanding-root-domains-subdomains-vs-subfolders-microsites target=_blankUnderstanding root domains, subdomains vs sub folders and microsites/a
Search Engine Journal – a title=Subdomains or subfolders which are better for-seo href=http://www.searchenginejournal.com/subdomains-or-subfolders-which-are-better-for-seo/6849/ target=_blankSubdomains or subfolders which are better for-seo/a
Matt Cutts – a title=Subdomains and subdirectories href=http://www.mattcutts.com/blog/subdomains-and-subdirectories/ target=_blankSubdomains and subdirectories/a
Your pages might so dynamic that country and language are handled on a single page but this might have indexing and crawling implications by search engines (Id have to research further)
Another consideration to take into account is microsites. They shouldnt be used for link building and the like but there is often a case. In our particular case these are business cases which is equally as important! No matter how passionate you are about your personal skillset or individual task, respect and align with the companies business needs, this is where your wages come from and while search ranking is number one in your agenda its not someone elses.
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This is an overview of how you might use keyword matching to narrow down and hone the clickthrough you might recieve on an advert in order to maximise conversion rates. Here are the tools,
Broad match
This is the keyword or phrase type that nearly everyone will use without understandning how to further optimise your campaigns. Truth is, if your campaigns are only full of broad match terms you are probably wasting money and have a low conversion rate. Time and thought should be spent on all your keywords and phrases in order to maximise your campaigns potential. With a broad match your ads will result in an impression for, your keyword or phrase with other terms or even search terms where not all your terms have been searched for, resulting in a lot of unwanted impressions.
Phrase Match
A Phrase Match is just like when you are searching for something. It groups multiple keywords and ensures your Ad will not show for searches that do not include this exact key phrase (and in that order) it will however result in and impression for this phrase plus another word or phrase, an example might be “Nike Rucksack” your ad will show for searches like, red nike rucksack, used nike rucksack etc
Exact Match
Exact Match is what it says on the tin, your advert will not appear unless exactly this phrase is searched for, in other words it will not appear if your phrase is accompanied by other search terms. Use this by putting square brackets around the [keyword] [or phrase] An example where you might need to use an Exact Match might be if you are selling a product that
Negative Match
Negative Match causes a phrase to not appear if an additional keyword is used in conjunction with the phrase. Use you phrase with -keyword to use this. My example of this the other day was in a very specific pay per click campaign. Let’s say the HR department is using Adwords to advertise jobs, my keyword phrase might be “Marketing Manager Job” this would be a popular combination but it would also result in an impression for the search phrase “Marketing Manager Job Description” this might be students or the like researching was expected of a Marketing Manager and would not result in a conversion or in this case an application. Additionally a search phrase might be so popular that you only want your ad to be displayed if it explicitly contains a certain word, let’s use the same example. Your key phrase is “Marketing Manager” you are getting a high level of impressions but your conversion rate is low, you might want to only display your ad for searches including the word “Job” or “Vacancy” this would reduce the amount of impressions and wasted clicks. Remember that unless you have an unlimited budget you shod address all your keywords in this way, it is time consuming but will save spend in the long run.
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