Challenge
A media and entertainment company published a feature-rich website to promote its high-quality videos and live events. Management subscribed to Coremetrics Analytics to gauge the popularity of videos and sales of branded merchandise.
However, with its out-of-the-box implementation of Coremetrics, the company couldn’t track in any detail actual video viewership, product sales, or other conversions on the website, much less usage of its cutting-edge Adobe AIR application. Additional measurement blind spots included live events, social sharing of content, viral email campaigns, and mobile usage. But the expense of Coremetrics prevented the company from investing in talent to interpret reports or customizations to capture the data needed for decision making.
Approach
At the client’s request, Empirical Path conducted a vendor selection engagement to determine the best analytics solution to match the client’s requirements and budget, resulting in their selection of Google Analytics. The company had already installed the standard Google Analytics Tracking Code on its website, providing over a year of historical data to build upon and compare against. We proposed customizing Google Analytics to extend tracking to the publisher’s social, rich media, mobile, and e-commerce features.
Our consultants – all with Google Analytics Individual Qualifications -- enhanced the client’s legacy Google Analytics implementation to enable measurement of every important online initiative. Then we wrote the weekly, monthly, and ad-hoc reports that senior executives replied upon/required to make tactical and strategic business decisions.
For the Product team, to gain a deeper understanding of content engagement, we initiated measurement of play duration and social sharing in the site’s custom Flash video player. To support a new premium video strategy, we expanded e-commerce tracking to include digital downloads, revealing the channels and keywords that led to purchases. To help evolve their rich Adobe AIR application, we expanded Google Analytics tracking beyond the website to report on content engagement, sales, and social activity within that downloadable application.
For the Marketing team, to guide the company’s email and social media efforts, we created a campaign tagging methodology to attribute website conversions to each platform and topic. To establish the benefits available only to registered and logged-in visitors, we anonymously tracked and compared these audience segments using Custom Variables. To validate the investment in expensive regional events, we correlated online activity and conversions to live event times and locations using detailed geographic analysis.
Results
Empirical Path’s customizations of Google Analytics gave the three key functional areas within the client’s organization (Executives, Product and Marketing) the detailed insight they needed of actual video viewership, product sales, and other conversions on the website. We helped the company smartly execute multiple product launches and marketing campaigns by delivering rapid feedback on what worked and what needed improvement.
As promised, the final cost to customize the Google Analytics implementation and reports fit within the client’s budget requirements.
Please see capsules of other Web Analytics or Media Industry projects.
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