For the purpose of this post, I am describing how to track dynamic content from a CMS system using Google Analytics and Event Tracking.

I am tying GA Event Tracking to dynamic promotional areas where the content is pulled from a Pull CMS system and rotated in sequence by an AJAX timer.    The rotating content is mixed text with some graphics and links and the client wants to track content impressions and clicks associated with the relative content depending on which content is being displayed.  All of the content is loaded into the page simultaneously and an AJAX script rotates what is being displayed.     Tricky part is that we can’t tag anything in CMS because the client changes it fairly often and you can’t embed Javascript into the content areas in this CMS.     

The first thing I did was create an Event Tracking Object for this specific dynamic area and loaded it above the dynamic content area.  I then created a function that is called when the timer function completes and displays the first content in the cycle.  The function dynamically determines which content is being displayed by searching the document for the specific div plus an array generated from the timer.  It then appends another function to all the links within that div that loads onclick (Similar to Brian Clifton’s hack for Tracking Outbound Links).  The first function also grabs the content title by id and loads it into the GA ET Label and sends the info to GA as the content rotates.  The issue I found with this is that when you try to put a JavaScript variable or HTML DOM objects into the Event Tracking label, it makes the GA Event tracking just quit.  No errors or anything, the rest of the function just quits which makes it hard to diagnose.  A way around is that ASP variables seem to work just fine so by making the javascript that pulls the title equal an ASP variable, I could then substitute the ASP variable into the label.  Now every time the content rotates, it fires a GA Event Tracking snippet that creates a “Views” action and associates the content’s title as the label.   

In order to track clicks, I use the onclick function that was appended to the links within the div that also uses an array to dynamically determine which content we are on in the cycle and fires the GA ETC with “Clicks” as the action and pulls the ASP variable again as the label.  Now when I go into GA, I can go to the Event Tracking area, view Objects, select the specific object I want and change the “Detail Level” to “Label” versus action and it displays all the dynamic content pieces within that specific Object.  I can then click on each of those and view the “Views” and “clicks” associated with each specific content piece within the given dynamic rotating CMS feature.

I might not have described this process in perfect detail but the logic is somewhat simple, implementation was a little more difficult. Even if the CMS content isn’t being rotated through a timer, you should be able to use a similar approach using Javascript to find the specific div and append either an Event Tracking or pageTracker snippet to track either views or clicks.

If you have any question, feel free to shoot me an email or post it here.

Thanks,

Brad Henry

When using Google Analytics new Event Tracking feature, when you click on an item, it produces an action. The action is then associated with a previously defined object. Each action can also associate a label such as a store or user ID. When you click on the following item it creates a test action called success!

This post is dedicated towards testing the ability to segment visitors who submit forms to access specific pages.

I have a situation where a client needs a ton of segmentation and I had an idea to manually tag internal links with campaign names for the internal tracking.   However, I don’t know whether when a visitor clicks on these if they will be tracked as a new visit because the campaign tracking would probably overwrite the utmz cookie but I don’t know how it will treat the other cookies.  I think it would not count the visitor as new but would just segment the visitors who click on the link into that campaign so I could view the activity, goals, and ecommerce of just the visitors who clicked on that internal link.   I am thinking it may be a way around the limited single user defined variable that we currently have.  To test this theory, I am providing a link here that is manually tagged and I will be accessing my site through an obscure method so I can isolate it and then view the results.  So if you want to take part, go ahead and click on the link.

Thanks,

Brad Henry

As many of you already know my company sent me and some other folks to the WebmasterWorld Conference in Las Vegas this year.   It was a good time and the sessions were good even it not for a ton of new useful information but to confirm some of my current strategies.   I did pick up a couple little things that I brought back with me to test and I am in process of determining if I think they are viable ideas or not.

I stayed at the New York New York hotel which was very nice.  It was on the other end of the strip so it took me a while to get to the convention center but that was not that big of a deal.   I am not really a big gambler but it was fun to watch everyone I was with gamble and have a good time.   One of the people I was with won a couple hundred dollars which was cool to see.  I did try some of the slots and electronic blackjack though which was fun.  I think I lost a total of $20 over the week so as you can tell I don’t really gamble.

I am pretty sure that I got pick pocketed while out there but nobody believes me because they must have put my wallet back in my pocket after taking my cash.  I lost $40 that way.

The last session of the conference which was PubCon was where everyone met in a pub for drinks and fingerfood.  It was a great time, probably my favorite session but I ate some of the shrimp rolls which made me violently ill on the plane ride home.  Totally not worth it.     I was sick for about 4 days and still scared to eat anything seafood related.    My advice.. Don’t eat the shrimp in Vegas.   I would curious to know if anyone else got really sick as well.

Now I am playing catchup at work and mostly caught up now thank God.  The year is close to over and 2008 is looking like it is going to be a busy one.  I have been very bad about updating this blog but hope to be a little more consistent in the future.   Well that’s about it for now.  If you have any questions, let me know.

Thanks,

Brad Henry