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Year: 2006

Defining Success Metrics for Corporate Blogs

Published September 20, 2006

I was recently asked to help someone define success metrics for a corporate blog. I thought this was such a great topic that I’d share my answer with a wider audience.

Many of the success metrics for blogs are similar to those that might apply to a Website, since blogs are a variation on a Website.

These ‘shared’ success metrics include:

Blog/Website Traffic

  • Unique Visitors
  • Unique Visits
  • Repeat Visits
  • Page Views
  • Page Views per Visit
  • Average Time Spent on site

Blog/Website Brand/Content Interactions

  • Content Page Views
  • Content % of Page Views

Blog/Website Responses (if applicable)

  • Number of Desired Responses
  • Conversion Rate from site visitor to Desired Response
  • Cost-Per-Desired Response
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5 Questions For Ross Rader, CIRA Candidate

Published September 18, 2006

Ross Rader
Ross Rader is Director of Research and Innovation at “Tucows”:http://www.tucows.com/. A long-time contributor to the ongoing governance of the domain name system, he has made substantial contributions to CIRA, ICANN and many of the predecessor organizations that define the way the internet operates. In a former life, Ross was the Director of Marketing for one of Canada’s first successful ISPs, Internet Direct. Ross is a mostly-devoted blogger writing on a variety of topics at byte.org .
Note that I work with Ross at Tucows so I’m not completely unbiased here.
*One Degree: Does domain name governance impact marketers? My guess is many of our readers will do a “whatever” at the mention of the topic but I sense this might be short-sighted.*
“CIRA”:http://www.cira.ca/ sets all policy related to how internet users interact with and register dotCA domain names. For example, CIRA is in the process of implementing new privacy policies that have a direct impact on how much domain name information is available to and can be used by marketers.
In the past, similar policies have been implemented outlining who qualifies to register dotCA domain names (which is of a high level of interest to companies who operate as subsidiaries of foreign-owned companies but want to be accessible on the web using a dotCA domain). CIRA has also been responsible for raising the awareness of the availability of dotCA names to Canadian internet users. All of this comes from CIRA’s governance mandate. Fortunately, CIRA involves its membership when it makes these decisions, so being involved really has its advantages if you are doing business on the internet in Canada.
*One Degree: What is the role of the CIRA Board?*

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Behavioural Targeting – "Smart" Marketing or Dangerous Privacy Violation?

Published September 18, 2006

Is the application of online behavioral targeting through the portal players an example of “smart” marketing, as a recent One Degree interviewee suggests or a “hornet’s nest” of potential privacy issues as Cyber-lawyer Eric Goldman suggests. You decide.
“Yahoo!”:http://www.yahoo.ca/ Canada’s Hunter Madsen stated in Ken Schafer’s latest “5 Questions interview”:http://www.onedegree.ca/2006/09/14/5-questions-for-hunter-madsen-marketing-director-yahoo-canada that:
bq. Most advertisers are dabbling in BT [Behavioral Targeting] these days … but the smartest players dived right in more than a year ago, and they’re pulling results that would surprise you.
Leaving aside Mr. Madsen’s objectivity in deciding which “players” get to be considered the “smartest”, I find it interesting that he is the second employee of a major portal to pitch me on “BT” in the last 2 weeks (albeit Madsen’s was an indirect pitch). Clearly, BT is all the rage in the portal community and it’s a race to see which portal player gets the most companies onto their proprietary system.
But, before we all run out and sign deals with the portals in an attempt to be one of these “smartest” players let’s do a quick review of what exactly is being proposed so we can make a marketing decision that is best for our companies and not for one that is best for the portals.

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