acquisio big data_management_june_2012_final

A Digital Marketing Depot Research Report

Big DataManagement

© 2012 Third Door Media, Inc. • http://digitalmarketingdepot.com 1 Email: [email protected]

Big Data Management

Introduction

As the outlets for online interaction grow, methods of online marketing also grow. Marketers can choose from a broad spectrum of ways to spend their marketing dollars, ranging from search engine

optimization (SEO) to pay per click (PPC), and from display to social media and even email marketing.Along with it comes a torrent of digital data. Multiple data sets from disparate sources are ushering in an era of big data, such as search rankings, site visits, and click-data. When mined, these data sets reveal insights into the success of online marketing strategies, as well as consumer behavior and demography.

Big data is defined differently by different groups of people. Definitions are driven by individual and corporate goals for using the data. From an e-commerce-based company to a search marketer, from display teams within an ad agency to a luxury brand, data is at the center of business decisions today. Yet, while data is used differently, the goal is often the same: to drive more effective, efficient messages through relevant advertising.

The purpose of this E-Book is to examine data management issues, explore how data influences marketing strategies and evaluate how success can be measured through the big data lens. Acquisio and Digital Marketing Depot would like to thank the following Search Engine Land columnists for their contributions to this E-Book: Benny Blum, Director, Strategy & Analytics at eSearchVision; Nathan Safran, Director of Research at Conductor, Inc.; Frost Prioleau, CEO at Simpli.fi; and Aaron Doades, Director of Product Management at Magnetic. This E-Book was prepared by Nathania Johnson. n


Big Data Management

Data Management IssuesAccording to a 2011 IDC study, the world’s data doubles every two years. Online marketing is no exception, as massive amounts of data are being created by search queries, social signals, page visits, and more. The volume of data being generated naturally brings about issues involving collection, storage, and integration.

What Types of Data are CollectedOnline marketing campaigns are planned using a wide variety of available data. Keyword search volume, cost per click (CPC), cost per thousand (CPM), and cost per acquisition (CPA) are data points provided by an advertising network which help interactive media planners maximize their budgets. Additionally, demographic, behavioral, and geographic data helps marketers target specific consumer groups who are more likely to be interested in an advertised product.

Once a campaign is underway, even more data is generated. Performance data such as conversions, conversion rates, impressions and click through rates (CTR) inform marketers about how successful their campaigns are.

Where Data is StoredWith the sheer amount of data being collected, storage is becoming a burden. Servers are expensive, especially when considering the cost of employing IT professionals to manage them.

Cloud computing is an evolving industry where third party companies offer data storage and file sharing on remote servers. Management of the servers is included in the cost. The overall cost of utilizing cloud computing generally overrides the cost of managing data storage in-house.

Third party analytics and bid management solutions are increasingly adding cloud computing as an offering in their service packages. The advantage to the marketer is getting data management and data storage from a single vendor. Additionally, fewer importing and exporting file tasks are required, saving the marketer time to focus on conversion optimization.

Manual versus Automated DataThe ability to store and manage data through a third party vendor highlights the advantages of employing automation to manage advertising campaigns. Search marketers have a long history of importing data sets into Excel, and manually setting up formulas to evaluate campaigns and create strategies. With the onset of big data, the spreadsheet method is increasingly becoming an archaic one.

Automated optimization eliminates the time required to manually pull reports, analyze them, and implement changes. Another major advantage in analytics systems is de-duplication across channels. Again, marketers benefit from solutions that offer both bid management as well as analytics, instead of resorting to juggling multiple tools from several vendors.

Combinations of individual components can be used to identify weaknesses and opportunities for future efforts, embracing a more predictive approach. When understanding of your optimization factors has been attained, marketers can then venture further into performance analysis.

According to a 2011 IDC study, the world’s data doubles every two years.

Third party analytics and bid management solutions are increasingly adding cloud computing as an offering in their service packages.


Big Data Management

How Data is IntegratedMarketers are transitioning to a holistic big data view of their marketing channels because consumers do not operate in channel silos. Today, online users encounter multiple digital channels together in one place, even within the search engine results page. You might see display ads next to your search query results, for example. A similar process exists on via social media channels. The experience is a singular, fluid one, and that is the way marketers are beginning to think about their online marketing.

Modern enterprise search engine optimization systems now integrate with enterprise-level PPC systems, enabling the marketer to view paid search data alongside natural search data and make paid search bid decisions with natural search data, providing a holistic view. Additionally, the marketer can now see social data together with natural search data on the page level in the enterprise SEO platform. This enables the marketer to gain a more complete view of how earned media is driving traffic both on an individual page level, and in a holistic sense to their web properties.

Building a Data Management Strategy Once data is collected, stored, and managed, it can now be analyzed and actionable goals may be set. While search marketers tend to view data as it pertains to lower conversion funnel tasks, large swaths of data offer the opportunity to optimize upper funnel events, as well. First, data must be organized into valuable, accurate reports.

Measurement and AnalyticsIn order for the marketer to truly gain insight, data must be segmented. Strategic data segments include brand versus non-brand, geography, device, advertising network, and marketing channels. Tactical data segments include keyword sets, sites, advertising networks, geography and demography.

Once segmented, marketers can observe how data is trending. Evaluation of trends should occur within the context of a six to twelve month time frame. Filtering minimum conversions and generating visual presentations should prove useful to the analyst.

When data has been aggregated, segmented and trended, performance reports can be generated. Brands should map out what they wish to do with the data and what types of reports should be delivered to various departments and executives.

Actionable GoalsSearch marketers are familiar with using data to create actionable results in keyword level bidding, optimization, and reporting. While search data drives response, it’s also become a vehicle for targeted brand awareness.

Search retargeting, the intersection of search and display uses data to capture users who have expressed interest in a brand or service through search or site visits. To run a search retargeting campaign, a partner deploys cookies to track a user and then subsequently target them once they detect them within their display network.

Search data provides detail into what search term the consumer conducted, and site retargeting enables advertisers to see which pages within a site the consumer visited. The two strategies work together as one drives customer acquisitions while the other drives retention.

Unique selling propositions can be aided by the data search retargeting produces. For example, a display ad can include the term that a user searched for in a display ad. With the retargeting duo working in tandem, marketers can achieve a higher level of ad personalization, serving up ads that tailor specific messages to consumers based on search and site activity.

While search marketers tend

to view data as it pertains to lower conversion funnel tasks, large swaths of data offer the opportunity to

optimize upper funnel events, as well.


Big Data Management

Understanding keyword order in searches can help marketers leverage sequencing to further improve campaign performance. Since consumers often perform multiple searches prior to making a purchase, knowing where searchers are in a given sequence can help marketers allocate spend accordingly. If a consumer has already ruled out a competitor, for example, a brand may capitalize on the increased odds that upper funnel decision affords.

Customers demand and respond to the delivery of the most relevant information at a time that is closest to the point of purchase. Ads need to respond with customized messages. If a customer searched for a brand or product and did not convert, then the logical next step is to retarget them with sequential messaging that directly relates to their sequence of searches.

Examining the sequences of customer events helps marketers to make more informed ad campaign decisions and impact the end consumer result.

Evaluating the Success of a Data StrategyWhen AdWords, or any other channel using a proprietary cookie or pixel tracking system, takes credit for all conversions that were touched by a Google paid search click at some point in the conversion funnel, conversion values reported in AdWords always skew high.

One solution is to monitor multiple referring channels. However, this often leads to double counting of conversions if we were to add up conversion counts across all paid traffic channels. Conversions are totaled up across all proprietary marketing tools, and the total is much higher than the numbers in an analytics tool. Using an analytics system is the only way to ensure conversions are not being double counted and optimization efforts reflect true conversion data and revenue.

Campaign management tools and analytics provide fundamentally different information. The fundamental difference between the two unique types of reporting systems is conversion attribution.

An analytics system leverages day-of-conversion attribution. Conversions and events that happen on a given day are associated with that day regardless of when the click occurred. Conversely, a campaign management system uses day-of-click attribution, in which events are associated with the day the click occurred regardless of when the conversion occurred.

There is a place for both day-of-click and day-of-conversion attribution models. Each one provides unique insights into the performance of a brand’s marketing efforts.

Day-of-Click AttributionDay-of-click attribution is useful for bid management. To understand the value of a click, marketers need to know the number of conversions and events driven by common clicks, such as clicks driven by a given keyword, query, or demographic target.

Moreover, to understand hours of the day which drive more valuable clicks, for use in processes such as day parting, marketers need to be able to associate the time of the click with the conversion. What time a user converts is not relevant to the value of a click, as the only concern is whether or not a user executed a conversion after the click.

The limitation with day-of-click attribution is the possibility of underreporting performance. Clicks made a few weeks ago may have driven conversions that occurred yesterday. In the day-of-click attribution model, those clicks would be associated with two weeks ago and would not be visible in report for today.

When AdWords, or any other channel using a proprietary cookie or pixel tracking system,

takes credit for all conversions that were touched by a Google

paid search click at some point in the conversion

funnel, conversion values reported in AdWords

always skew high.


Big Data Management

Day-of-Conversion AttributionWhen reporting on what happened in a given time frame, a business operates on an accrual basis, money spent and revenue received in a given week is associated with that week. Hence, day of conversion attribution is useful for reporting. The CEO and CFO needs to know how much the company made and spent for a given date range. Without day-of-conversion attribution, this would not be possible.

Compensating for the ongoing historical attribution requires a complete cookie cycle view of performance data as the accrual of conversions occurs. Daily reports can be prepared for all performance monitoring to understand trends and expected performance on a single day’s events.

The window of data analyzed should account for the vast majority of conversions as observed in the average time for click to conversion, if not the entire observed cookie window up to a reasonable period of 14 to 30 days.

ConclusionMarketers must begin to give due attention to plugging the available data into their marketing strategies. For some, this begins with starting to think about their marketing channels in a more holistic fashion. For others, it means taking action on a cross-channel line of thinking already in place by going after the tools and technology that will enable them to make the transition into marketers leveraging cross-channel data.

The growth in the volume and breadth of data across online marketing channels combined with the maturation of marketing technology to leverage that data cross-functionally means the era of big data is officially upon us. n


Big Data Management

The leading performance media platform for agencies, Acquisio helps agency marketers buy, track, manage, optimize, retarget, and report on media across all channels—including search, display, and social media. Acquisio provides the industry-leading technology for agencies buying ads on any online channel, helping them handle all tasks associated with performance advertising within an integrated platform. Unlike other solutions, Acquisio hosts its own third-party ad server and employs single tracking functionality across channels, allowing marketers unparalleled conversion and revenue attribution modeling and reporting.

Learn more at www.acquisio.com

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