We notice the things we think about, we overlook the rest. Say you’re buying a car and are looking at a 3 Series Sedan from BMW. I know, nice! Suddenly, you start seeing the 3 Series everywhere. Now that I think about it, I saw a couple just the other day. See? Because we pay attention, we tend to see what we’re thinking about.
The reality is that we are often thinking about many things at once. It’s not even multitasking – they call it continuous partial attention. That is a state in which most of one’s attention is on a primary task, but where one is also monitoring several background tasks just in case something more important or interesting comes up.
We browse the Web that way, too. You set out to find something, hit the search button, and lo,lots of background information and links that take you to different destinations. How is a marketer to measure your attention, then?
WebMetricsGuru Marshall Sponder takes you to the streets of New York to explain.
Depending on your purpose – and the purpose of your customers – your attention will be broken down differently. Let’s take a look at how a Web analyst looks at the information. He writes:
If my purpose is to transverse – to get from one place to another quickly – then gazing for a micro second might be considered “engagement” and tracked as such. But this would generate any immediate action – nothing happened this day – though I may act on it at some future time, like next week.
If I saw something, like a store front and liked it and came back at a later time, I’d be much more likely to transact, or do something.
This means that engagement for the same individual/ same segment needs to be tracked over time – it’s much harder to make any sense of it from a single session – and that’s often what we’re trying to do in Web Analytics.
It’s actually an “interruption” of my “pace” or gait that really marks that I was engaged – my engagement here is the fact that my attention on the street went from 20% to 40% for a moment – and that marked some interest in my part of what I was looking at.
In other words, attention is marked by an alteration in pace of my gait, of my “click-stream”, movement, etc.
Online behavior is not typically measured that way. As Marshall says, web analysts currently take all of the paid (SEM) and organic (SEO) search data and compile it in a report that tries to make something useful out of it. Some days it probably feels like divining tea leaves – a marketer sees what they wish to see in it.
I was thinking of his story when I searched for the new 3 Series Sedan. Let’s say that your customer searches for “sedan”. This is a general key word and is just like the brisk walk he describes.
The normal behavior for someone putting in these terms is to quickly transverse search listings, the point may not be to stay at any particular site – just to find something relevant.
If I apply Marshall’s logic to that, the way to measure attention in Search Behavior would be to track those people who start at generalized search, like sedan or silver sedan, and end up on a much more detailed keyword phase, for example “reviews of new silver sedans”.
Now you can say, with some authority, if the same searcher came to Cars.com and put in the search “new sedans” then later, came back and put in the query “reviews of new silver sedans” that searcher is engaged, she is definitely paying attention with an action in mind.
If this happens in the same search session, that works. But, continues Marshall, we need to begin tracking those searches across sessions. That presents challenges. His conclusion:
So while thinking about “attention” and if it really is “engagement”, it’s more like breaking browsing behavior and search behavior into basic types of activity – and then, measuring the attention span based on that kind of activity, probably against an average.
The good news is that all of our behavior online is trackable and we are just skimming the surface. As we continue to make strides in interpreting all of the data we collect (see my review of The Numerati for more on that), some of the answers will become indeed clearer.
If as marketers we were able to track and measure attention as outlined in the example, we’d be much closer to understanding when our customers are ready for a purchase. We would also be much better equipped on having the appropriate copy and information on the page when they land there.
Now back to looking at that marvelous feat of engineering that is the new 3 Series from BMW. Are you with me? Who’s buying?
Tags: attention, Marketing, Web analytics
Super article. For those with a Google email account Google automatically signs you in when you go to Google.com. This might seem like a nice convenient feature but it also enables session-over-session tracking by Google, allowing them to do pretty much all the things discussed in Numerati.
How come we like to know what our prospects and customers are doing, but when the tables are turned, we don’t want anyone tracking us?
Privacy anyone?
Thanks Valeria, excellent post. This is why we try to market to people going through lifestyle changes (marriage, college etc). I also believe that is why social network (media if you like) marketing works so well. People who become a fan or friend of a page or profile you create on Facebook or Myspace obviously have an interest in our company or product.
If a company, marketing through a social network, creates relevant and interesting messaging that provides value, they will be able to create a relationship with the consumer. That relationship will have a positive effect on results achieved from other media. While this is not scientific, I have noticed that clients we help market though social networks get better email read rates. This increased attention comes from the fact that you are building a social relationship with the consumer. Think about it, when you see an email from a friend or family member you open it 100% of the time.
The problem is many companies who have spent the time and effort to build a social network fan base are not providing relevant, interesting and valuable information. They are treating social networks like magazine ads.
Thanks again for the post.
BetterRetail -
Google tracks a lot of movement online. It would be fascinating to see how and if the information converges between Analytics for blogs, DoubleClick for ads, gmail, maps, and all sorts of other products they have. I had a demo of the maps capabilities at a recent conference and was blown away at the interactivity one can build in 3D.
Elaine -
Privacy is a big issue. I wrote about it extensively at Conversation Agent and at Fast Company. Part of the dialogue needs to be around disclosure. As well, providing prominent opt out features – I tend to opt out any newsletter where I am signed up automatically, yet I opt in content that is relevant and useful.
Last week I discussed how micro-targeting can make your customers happier at Fast Company, if that is of interest [http://tinyurl.com/4nuc3y ].
Harry -
I’m glad you mention Facebook. That gives the opportunity to share Jason Falls excellent post on Facebook Group and Brand Page Best Practices http://tinyurl.com/3m8sza
Attention *is* given to messaging that is relevant and interesting and thus provides value, as you put so well here. Kudos on identifying the problem of time starved marketers: valuable and relevant content. Context plays a large role in discovering the so what part and building on it. Nice to meet you, virtually.
I agree when I was in the market for a car last year I too saw the model and make everywhere. The world is full of distortion and much info — so learning to filter down to what is important is key.
Levon -
In creating content for online interactive experiences, visualizing how people filter and providing clear paths to what *they* may be looking for is important. That’s why “search”, along with “linking”, is such a key function in a dynamic environment. It allows us to adjust to and help users.
So are you buying this car? You stopped right before you told us…
“It would be fascinating to see how and if..” my hunch is Google has been doing just that for a long time.
Neil – probably not
BetterRetail – you might be correct in that assessment.
Valeria,
Darn, I was hoping you’d take me out for a spin.
MLS Search
Filed under: MLS – 01 Oct 2008
You can browse through for sale by owner properties by going through the MLS listings or using the MLS search facility. Whether the property you own is a residential one, a kennel property, a horse farm, a ranch..
MLS
@Neil – better I stay with slower, automatic cars. No Autobahn here.
@Williams – care to give me some context here?
Well, Valeria, if you took me for a spin you would not have to go fast.
All joking aside, your post was excellent. There is not a day that goes by that I do not look at Google Analytics.
Some of the data I look at has fairly obvious meaning but much of it does not. Your post and those you reference are very helpful in advancing Web analytics, which now has the technology to show you the data but turning that data into useful information is an area where we need a lot of forward progress.
Nice post.
Thanks for sharing.
We would also be much better equipped on having the appropriate copy and information on the page when they land there.
This of course is the next big challenge after we solve the measurement piece. The current process for getting a simple banner ad approved at a client, sometimes requiring the CMO (!), can seriously take weeks, especially when a couple of rounds of revision are required.
There is technology to address ad variations for sure. But until we talk clients down from the ledge, we might not have that infinite mix of “right ad at the right time” to spring on the prospect.
Sorry,,,the first sentence from my prior post was supposed to be in quotes to reflect the author’s insight, not mine. Apologies.
@Neil – I would love to take a peek behind the scenes at Google Analytics. Do they compile trends on topics people write about? How do they leverage the information?
@SEOServices – Thank you for reading.
Kevin -
Approval processes are still based on paper/print cycles. I agree with you, we can/should move faster through approval cycles to be more responsive – or in sync, just in time – with the marketplace.
Well, Valeria, I am not sure exactly all that Google Analytics can do but (in a nut shell):
Who came to your Web site, from where, and what did they do when they got there.
You can also see where people, in the aggregate, went on your site, what they clicked on, and what they did not click on. You can tell where they left your site. It tracks things like conversions, however you define them, as well so you know what is working and not working from natural search engine searches, Google AdWords, etc.
As far as I can tell, there is nothing on what people wrote about anywhere (do you mean like google alerts or whatever type thing?). To do a better job on this, I would probably need to write a longer post here or even write an article about Google Analytics.
As far as I can tell, they only show you info regarding your Websites so not much about what is going on beyond your sites (e.g., the writing you mentioned).
What specifically do you want to do know about Google Analytics and I probably can tell you?
I am thinking of just sitting down and writing a Google Analytics primer article as I think everyone should be using Google Analytics. I do write articles fairly regularly and will check if this topic is over-covered or under-covered in writing.
Neil -
I think an article on Google Analytics for beginners would be read. Maybe others share the same opinion. I was actually thinking that all that data we all look at in Google Analytics, Google actually collects and stores, and potentially analyzes for itself. It’s all information it can cross reference with search, etc.
Also, if interested, see the follow up post by Marshall Sponder – http://tinyurl.com/4oqc7s
I will write the primer on using Google Analytics.
As for your question on what Google does with the data, only God and Google know the answer to that one. Well, I think so anyway, maybe the info is out there somewhere. I will look.
By the way, before I start my article on Google Analytics are there any things in particular people would like to know about it?
My qualifications for writing the article is that I have been using Google Analytics before they were Google Analytics (They were called “Urchin” before they were purchased by Google). They used to cost around $800/month. Google bought them and they became free immediately.
But there is a lot there so it would be nice to have some thoughts on what questions people would like to have answered in my article? If I do not know the answer, I will research it before I write.
I think most people problems comes from never seeing from there left eye.I close mine to see the world in a new light.The brain always looks from the right eye. Try looking at a telescope, most look with there right eye, try it with your left one for a change.