Changing Company Culture

In reviewing the outlook of web analytics for GM it looks very promising. Earlier this year GM made a public announcement that they were pulling Facebook ads. They cited the lack of return on investment. These actions lead me to believe that they are constantly reviewing their web presence and are concerned about the direction they take. I do however think that they may be slow to act on emerging markets and are still overly cautious with making web related decisions. The company is very traditional and is accustomed to working in a particular manner, these ideals will be difficult to change.

I think that it would be beneficial for GM to try to do some smaller campaigns in smaller niche web markets that are generally youth oriented. Even if the ads don't bring direct sales from the youth, they can influence their parents to create sales. It will also raise the "hip-ness" factor of the company to bring a desire back to the brands. GM once tried to market Oldsmobile with the "This isn't your fathers Oldsmobile", but they still targeted an older generation, and it never took off.

Hiring Analysts

I did a search of candidates on LinkedIn to fill the Web Analysts position for AutoAnything and found Kevin Eggers. His background is in managing teams, projects and web products at a company that does similar work. He is currently working for Dataium where he describes them as "Dataium is the largest aggregator of online automotive shopper behavior data, and the only provider of streaming, in-market shopper intelligence. Dataium provides an unprecedented view of the shopping stream by offering a cross-source, multidimensional view of online activity from almost any point of origin."

His background of working in the web realm at a company that specializes in data acquisition and aggregation seems very relevant.

In an interview I would try to isolate ways that he creatively worked with the data. I would also try to see how specific he was with recommendations that he might have provided for growth scenarios.

I would really like to see creativity when dealing with the numbers to get fresh ideas for growth. The attention to detail also needs to be high.

Web Analytics Jobs

I did a quick search of Dice.Com to look for a web analytics position that looked interesting. The one that I found for AutoAnything seemed promising. They are looking for a Web Analytics Manager. The position covered much of the work that we have done in class as well as included some other skills that I have acquired from my current position.

The first thing that made me choose the position was that it was in a field I find interesting. I enjoy most everything related to cars, working on them, racing them, or just talking about them. The company has also been around for several years, since 1979, which makes it more attractive compared to a small start-up.

The key skills needed for the position are to be able to analyse the data coming in, and be creative in the interpretation. The person also needs to be a good communicator to be effective at being a liaison between several departments.

The biggest hurdle with this position is that they are looking for a specific amount of experience in the field. To make myself more attractive, I would have to find a way to relate my current career experience to apply to this position. Also, by doing some preliminary scenarios for the company prior to an interview could be useful.

Communications Across the Sales Channels

When communicating across franchise and parent companies their is often a disassociation between them. This can often wreak havoc in building a corporate brand and being successful in the market. On the other hand a cohesive group will be strong and successful.

I recently purchased a new vehicle from a Chevy dealer. At the time they were under construction with a renovation, but I didn't think much of it. During the discussion with the sales person it can to light that this was a corporate driven initiative. The dealer wasn't given much choice other than to renovate or lose their franchise. It was then that I realized that all of the local Chevy dealers were going through the same transformation.

The idea for Chevy was to get a consistent look for all of the dealerships across the country. The dealers would then be brand identifiable, even without looking at the sign above the lot. While there was a great cost for the dealers, it was made up with marketing from a corporate level that made it look like it was custom for each dealer (due to the consistency).

I haven't reviewed the exact sales numbers since the dealership overhauls, but from the little news I have read GM sales have been increasing.

Blue Cross Blue Shield Case Study

When Blue Cross Blue Shield of New Hampshire revised their communication strategy they had already done interviews with several of the important stakeholders, including the subscribers. To understand the results of the change in communications they will need to re-interview many of the same demographics to see the change.

Additional measurements should be taken to see how comprehensive the reach was. By doing interviews or surveys of prospective insurance purchasers they can see if they have moved above any of the competition as target providers.

The communications with local offices can be done with satisfaction surveys. They could also review locations to see if the local offices are compliant with broadcasting the new messages.

Measurement Plan for Higher Learning

I decided to review Michigan State University due to the size of the institution. I find that sometimes these larger institutions will try to rest on the reputation of prior years instead of pushing to greater things.

The first item that needs to be looked at is the mission of the university. Without this we don't know what we need to measure or where we want to go. The following is an excerpt from the mission statement:

As a public, research-intensive, land-grant university funded in part by the state of Michigan, our mission is to advance knowledge and transform lives by:

• providing outstanding undergraduate, graduate, and professional education to promising, qualified students in order to prepare them to contribute fully to society as globally engaged citizen leaders

• conducting research of the highest caliber that seeks to answer questions and create solutions in order to expand human understanding and make a positive difference, both locally and globally

• advancing outreach, engagement, and economic development activities that are innovative, research-driven, and lead to a better quality of life for individuals and communities, at home and around the world

 When identifying the audiences that are important we need to look foremost at the students, past, present, and future. Those audiences will determine everything that MSU is. If the past students fail or all become disenfranchised it will become difficult to recruit new students. If current students leave, you have no legacy. If future students decide to go elsewhere there is no reason to have a school.

Other audiences such as staff, parents, and the media all have additional stakes in the process as well but in a lesser role.

The objective will be to connect with the mission to as many students as possible. By making a connection to the students that the university is focused on research and philanthropy they can recruit the and guide students to be better people.

The initial benchmark will be to compare news coverage of current achievements of MSU students both past and present.

To determine a measurement tool I went to Google News and did some searches for MSU related topics. The thought is that MSU is a prominent institution and that they will likely be covered by larger news agencies that are included in the Google News section.

In my research for this to get an idea of their success I filtered through pages of results from Google News and was a little disappointed  in the coverage. I realize this is sports season, but it took a page and a half to find the first non sports related article. While the one article I did find outside of sports seemed on target to the mission of the school. It was focused on a study performed at MSU. The second article I found was unrelated to the school directly but was about a students living conditions off campus.

If feel that while the sports coverage is good for MSU (as long as they are winning) since it gives a sense of pride to all students, the administration needs to focus on getting more publicity for the achievements of the school.

Distance Learning Case Study

When reviewing the effectiveness of an online program there are several considerations that can be used. Items such as the employment rate of graduates, the average salary of graduates, or the number of students enrolling specifically due to the added feature of online studies. 

For Lawrence Technological University I would suggest two measurements, the graduation rate of those attending online classes versus those using on campus study only, and secondly the alumni donation rate of campus only versus online students. These measurements will provide an insight into the number of students that are committed to the university. If a significant number of students drop or transfer before graduation that was using online studies, there may be issues. Also, the number of donations or lack thereof from online students could create future issues with funding the university. 

Outside of internal measurements that can be made, LTU can also rely on studies from USNews and other evaluation sources. USNews did rank the Online Graduate Engineering studies one of the "Top Online Graduate Engineering Programs".

The audiences that they need to target with the measurements are prospective students from high schools and  transfers from other colleges. They should also target LTU administration that gives online directives as well as the IT support teams. If the students are not targeted or a bad relation exists the students will not enroll no matter how good the program is. Likewise, if the LTU staff don't have confidence in the program they will make the experience poor for students. 

The communications from LTU seem to be somewhat effective for me. I am a transfer student that attended a local college and am attending LTU remotely. If they didn't have effective communications I would never have considered them an option. 

Content Analysis for Nonprofits

In reviewing the content analysis for the Capital Area Humane Society (CAHS) I found that they are positively received by most everyone. There were a couple news articles relating to them and all responses were positive. They seem to be making an impact in the community through getting addition legislation passed to stiffen penalties for dog fighting related crimes and changing the attitudes towards this activity.

The social media items that I found were also quite positive. The reach in Facebook seems quite well with nearly 11,000 people "liking" them. Each individual post is getting around 100 likes as well, with good conversations of several comments.

One area that I had concern with was the YouTube presence. The have very little content and what they do have posted is around a year old. The videos contained some information on specific pets, but nothing about the operation. They were not getting much traffic for the videos either.

The recommendations that I would have for them is to expand on the YouTube coverage. Get more active content available for both the pets and the operations. The videos could be easily linked to from the Facebook feed that is already successful. The attachment that a person can have over video would seem greater than that of a picture. By gaining the attachment for specific pets, they could create greater adoption rates.

Measurement Plan for Nonprofit

I will be identifying a measurement plan for the Capital Area Humane Society (CAHS). This organization runs a local animal shelter and places animals in approved homes.

The first step in the process is to identify the mission of the organization. The CAHS states their mission statement as:

"At the Capital Area Humane Society, we are passionate about animals. Our mission is to promote the humane treatment of companion animals through protection, placement, education and example. Our wide variety of programs and services exist to serve the animals and the people of the mid-Michigan community."

 The objectives are then to take measurements that will identify promotion of humane treatment of animals and the placement of abandoned animals. To accomplish this, the rate of incoming animals can be compared to successfully placed animals. Another measurement could be the education level of ethical animal treatment to animals done through a survey.

The next step is to identify the audiences or stakeholders to the CAHS, then to prioritize them. For the CAHS the audience can be focused on several groups. From the most to least important are: Individuals that shop at pet stores are visit the zoo, also known as animal lovers. Area families with children, this will target the education group.

To establish a benchmark of success or failure the CAHS should be comparing the adoption rates and attitudes of the community compared to similarly sized cities. Surrounding cities should also be compared to account for geographic reasons, but the similar cities will be important as well even if not local.

The metric that should be chosen for the mission would be an adoption ratio of those animals that are successfully adopted compared to the number that are either euthanized or moved to other shelters. The metric for the education of ethical care would be the results of a survey that gets opinions on topics of dog fighting, what constitutes neglect, or proper care for animals. Other media coverage could also give insight on this.

By measuring the change in perception from before and after a given time period results can be analyzed. Changes can then be made to counter the results found. After the changes are completed another round of analysis should be done to confirm gains or losses.




Capital Area Humane Society, http://www.cahs-lansing.org/index.php/about

PR Crisis Discussion

  In a blog post, discuss a company that had a PR crisis.  What was the crisis and how did they handle it?  How could they have measured their communications effectiveness during and after the crisis? What could they have done differently?

The crisis in question was caused by a Bank of America decision to charge $5 per transaction when using a debit card. The decision was made in an effort to raise revenue after the banking issues in 2008. The changes were not unique for the industry but new for a large institution. The push back from the general public was greater than anticipated. The discussions went viral and were transmitted with only half truths.

The discussions on the issue needed to to be monitored more closely during the initial announcements. The company appeared to be unprepared for the lash back from the public and wasn't monitoring or addressing the issue until it got out of hand.

Ultimately they changed course and decided to not implement the fees after the bad publicity dragged on for over a month. If the end result was generate more revenue through the process they should have been been more interactive with customers to address their concerns. By getting to the news agencies and trying to better explain the situation immediately the negative discussion wouldn't have went viral.

Multichannel Campaign Analysis

I feel like the marketing of GM currently is misguided. From what I can find they don't have much in the way of tracking the conversions of many of their marketing investments. This is being manifested in them looking for their fifth marketing chief in just over 3 years.

Some tracking that they have done compared the number of people looking to purchase Chevy cars on the edmunds.com web site and compared it to the newest marking campaign. Unfortunately for them the potential sales has fallen from the beginning of the campaign.

Other tracking that they have done in the past was with their paid Facebook ads. They were tracking the number of clicks vs cost. This was a lost cause as well and they have since changed direction.

One opportunity that GM has is to track custom car builds on their brand sites and seeing if they result in purchases. By using specific codes on the custom build they would be able to track an online shopper with the purchase in a dealership.

Krisher, T. (2012, July 31). Gm's ads aren't getting the job done. Retrieved from http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/08/01/joel-ewanick-gm-ads_n_1727859.html 

Long-Tail Search Strategies

When looking at the below search budget distribution it is similar to what I would expect. There is little search engine money being dedicated to the brand specific keywords. These keywords will direct traffic anyway since they are more highly tied to our brand.

The tail key phrases are receiving a larger portion of the budget since the keywords would not normally generate traffic to the site. By purchasing ad placement for these keywords I would expect the traffic from them to come from those advertisements and not organically.

As a recommendation I would think that they may want to try to get a better ratio of hits from their Head key phrases. If their top performing key words are only producing 33% of traffic they may need to work more on both ads and organic search traffic to better identify high performing keywords.

Path analysis

I agree that path analysis can get cloudy very quickly. Depending on what the target of the data is will ultimately determine if the process is worth it.

I think trying to guide your visitors through an optimal set of screens is noble it is also unreasonable. To use path analysis to try to optimize your site for a specific path is not worth it. You would be trying to optimize your site for a small percentage of users since you would never get all users to use it the same. It is more useful to use path analysis to group page areas to see where users bounce between. This could be in grouping all product pages, support pages, checkout, and other pages. Then you can see if product pages are leading to checkout or if users are reviewing support documents before making the final purchase. This way you can see more how the users are using the site instead of getting bogged down in specifics.

When looking at this for GM this path analysis could be quite difficult. Most of the site is available from sub menus and a user cold bounce around the site without taking any determinant path. Since there isn't much in product information and nothing about purchasing vehicles directly from the GM site the tracking would be more directed to see what drove a user to go to a brand site. The best path analysis that could be use would be in seeing if a redirection from the GM site ultimately resulted in a purchase decision. GM would need to decide if they are trying to use GM.com as a landing page or for a more corporate direction (that I believe they have).

Context is Queen

Below you will see a hypothetical report on search traffic for my site. There are several things that need to be done to make the information useful. 

The report shows 6 months worth of data for visits to the site. As the report sits there is little to see other than there is a weekly dip and that traffic is consistent. Unfortunately it is hard to tell if this is good or bad. A comparison to competitors or a year to year comparison would make this more effective. Without a context it is hard to tell if this weekly trend is good or bad. The competitors may not see this same type of traffic difference which could lead us to try to find solutions for the weekend dips such as add new content or offer weekend exclusive sales.

Building an Action Dashboard

Creating an action dashboard for GM would including KPI metrics for those users that continued through to the specific brand site vs those that exited on the brand landing page.

The first quadrant would show the the trends in traffic comparing each of the brands and their conversion rate to the brand specific site. This would give a comparison and show if there was a particular brand that was having issues getting traffic to complete.

The second quadrant could show the trends over time for each of the brands. This allows them to identify any changes that were made compared to successes.

The third quadrant would summarize the changes that have been made with dates as well as future changes for consideration. The consideration list should also outline proposed dates of action. The changes could identify specific holiday times or beginning of summer when people are more likely to be buying cars.

The fourth quadrant can give summary information of goals that changes should have on the site. This would tie the proposed changes to outcomes.

Measuring Influence with Employees

Choose a company that is using social media effectively to communicate with their employees, explain in a blog post:

The company that I have done most of my discussions on is General Motors. While I didn't necessarily find anything directly relating GM to social media and influencing employees I did find some good information on the UAW.

The UAW has taken to social media to keep their members informed of progress during each of their contract negotiations. "During the Big Three negotiations, the UAW brought instantaneous communication to its members through social media using Facebook, Twitter, robo calls, secure websites for members and e-wire messages letting them know what’s been going on behind-the-scenes and in real time." (Pietro, 2011)

By using the social media they were able to blanket their membership with information much quicker and more accurately than they could previously. Social media also allowed them to get feedback from the membership as well that wasn't possible before. The member base was very supportive to those that were in the negotiations giving them more confidence to get a better contract.

In the future the UAW will need to be diligent as to what gets posted on their social media outlets, especially during negotiations. While they are adamant that they want to be transparent with their employees, the new agencies are also picking up that information which could be misconstrued.

Pietro, D. (2011). Never has bargaining been this transparent. Retrieved from http://www.uaw.org/story/never-has-bargaining-been-transparent 

Behavioral Targeting & Predictive Analytics

  For your company, explain in a blog post:

• How could your company use behavioral targeting to improve their customer experience?

To use behavioral targeting GM could utilize the knowledge of the keyword that brought a user to the site. If they had used a search for a particular brand of GM cars that brand could be highlighted immediately on opening. Other tactics could include listing some of the top press release headlines in a message box on the screen for that brand. 

• How could your company use predictive analytics to improve their customer experience?

The data that is compiled can show trends of what sets of screens the users proceed through. There could be optimization done to make sure that each of the clicks from one to the next is efficient. They can also see if those clicks make sense of if the user is getting lost. If a user normally clicks news, then clicks press releases, they could give a summary view to those that click on news of the press releases instead.

Measurement Best Practices

In reviewing the best practices guide that Avinash Kaushik published on the site HERE, there was a list of nine items that should be kept in mind when implementing tracking.

The items listed are: 
# 1: Tag all your pages.
# 2: Tags go last (customers come first :).
# 3: Tags should be inline.
# 4: What’s your unique page definition?
# 5: Use cookies intelligently (they are delicious).
# 6: Javascript wrapped links might be a issue.
# 7: Redirects, be aware of them.
# 8: Validate data is being captured correctly.
# 9: Don’t forget Flash, Flex, RIA, RSS, Videos etc.

Using these rules and applying them to the GM web site there are several difficulties I can see. For the most part the GM web site is entirely Javascript based or Flash. For them to track the site traffic they would need to make sure that they implement a custom tracking of either event logs or use custom tags.

However in reviewing the source code of the page they are in fact utilizing a Javascript as they should at the bottom of the page, just before the </body> tag.
(<script type="text/javascript" src="/etc/designs/gmcom/js/gPageTracking.js"></script>)

There is also some custom tracking built in to the page that is created from a tracking XML file.

From what I can tell in the source all of the items are accounted for. They are tracking the traffic as they should be.

Twitter Measurement

I chose to review the GM twitter account. The posts that I reviewed all seemed very corporate oriented and not much pizzazz. The discussion focused around sales numbers, corporate money, and executive positions. While this is not relevant for the majority of the public this is consistent with who would be following the auto maker. For those that are more of a car enthusiast they would follow a particular brands feed instead.

Using TwitterCounter, comparison of GM to Ford and Chrysler, GM has grown from nearly 63,000 followers to almost 73,000 followers in the last 3 months. Meanwhile Ford has grown from 144,000 to 166,000 and Chrysler has grown from 37,000 to 43,000. All three of the companies have made growth in the three months and the numbers are to be expected. While the Ford blog is larger, they have brand loyal followers that GM would only have on their Chevy, Cadillac, or Buick brands.

To compare the retweet and message amplification I used Retweetrank and found that GM is ranked 63,59 while Ford and Chrysler are ranked 111,141 and 35,056 respectively. I wan't clear as to how the ranking was calculated but it seemed odd that GM and Chrysler would be higher ranked than Ford unless the number of followers was calculated into the equation.

Blog Measurement

I reviewed the GM Fastlane blog http://fastlane.gmblogs.com for a review of the content created and its conversion rate, and authority rating.

The first calculation is the Raw Author Contribution of Posts per Month. I reviewed the last two months of content on the site to get a number of posts created. This number is 22 posts of new content, they we divide this by the number of months counted (2). This calculation generates a RAC of 11 posts/month.

The next calculation is the Conversation Rate. This is calculated by visitor comments divided by the number of posts. I reviewed the 22 posts that were made in the last 2 months and counted each of the replies to those posts. The number of comments was also 22, this calculates out to a coincidental rate of 1. (22 comments/22 posts). Some of the posts had 4-5 replies, while others had zero replies.

The last item was to find the Authority rating for the blog using Technorati. I did several searches and browsed the listings but couldn't fine this blog listed. This leads me to believe that it is a lesser recognized blog and has a lower authority.

They may want to analyze the cost effectiveness of this particular blog. They first would need to calculate the cost of the actual blogging (time to post, research, hosting, etc) then compare to what they are benefiting from it. The traffic may be better suited to redirect to another of the GM blog sites or to try and increase the exposure to try and make this one relevant. Such steps might include having links directly from the home page, or to link to it from another high profile location.

Mobile Measurement

When a mobile user tries to use the GM web site they are most likely not going to be looking for the same information as the desktop user. When a user is connecting from a mobile browser they will be likely looking for a specific piece of information. They may be looking up certain model features or pricing. When you are on a desktop a person is more likely to be doing more in depth research and looking into the company.

The mobile experience on GM.com is quite poor from what I could tell on my phone. The main site is jazzed up with a flash experience that doesn't work very well on mobile devices.

To measure the mobile experience on their site they can get a browser breakdown of the pages viewed by mobile browsers. This can show the areas that are trying to be used by mobile users.

I would suggest that GM redesign the mobile site to simplify the menus so that it is more user friendly. They should shrink the layout to fit on smaller screens easier. Some of the images need to be resized as well to better fit the screens as well. Once they perform analysis they can also put some of the more common requested pages put on the home screen as well.

Content Consumption

Over the last 5 years the content that I consume has changed somewhat. In the past I mostly read static pages on the web or occasionally listened to books on tape. Now that the web has become more robust and the speed of connections, especially remotely, has sped up find that I watch more videos or use interactive sites.

I have never been one to read many of the traditional medias such as magazines or newspapers. The amount that I read physical media has become even more scarce. I find that most of the physical media is out dated compared to the web content. I also don't like having to carry with me a dedicated piece of media when I could read it on my laptop or mobile device that I already carry for other reasons.

Most of the content that I read is on my laptop but I do have a tablet and a smartphone that get used on occasion. I find my laptop to be the most convenient for reading. My tablet isn't usually with me and my phone is a bit small to read much on.

Measurement for Influencers & Thought Leadership

In trying to create a program that measures the amount of influence that identified sites would have key metrics need to be identified. For each site the number of Tweets, Facebook mentions, and comments on blog posts have to be included with the number of hits the site has. Using a grading tool for blogs, Twitter, and Facebook can show how much conversation the posts generate. 

For GM the goal would be to identify those areas where either they can do damage control and spin bad publicity, or to find sites that can generate hype for new or upcoming products. By identifying those sites, maximum impact can be had by catering to those sites and giving them exclusive content.

Finding Influencers

To identify those outlets that have a large influence on the auto industry I did several searches to get lists of top web sites. I also did a Google search of blogs and compiled a list of those sites as well. After getting a comprehensive list I evaluated the sites to identify the amount of traffic that they were receiving as well as the number of comments generated for each article.

The results of the search ended up with the following:

Cnn.com

nytimes.com

autoblog.com

caranddriver.com

jalopnik.com

autoobserver.com

cartalk.com

businessweek.com

motortrend.com

edmunds.com

Some of these sites are more traditional news outlets while others are more grass roots built sites that have expanded to have a high influence in the industry.

Competitive Intelligence

When reviewing GM on a regional basis versus its competitors both GM and Ford have a lot of traffic in Michigan. GM has a higher presence in the Midwest, while Ford has higher results in the south. Dodge on the other hand has a very high presence in the plains states and very little presence on the East coast. When including a GM sub brand, Chevrolet or Buick it shows that there is little traffic from New England or West coast.

When reviewing the related terms, bot top and rising, for the specific brands,all of the results seem to focus on whatever the brand is. There is very little cross brand related searches. Once I change the search terms to  "Cars" the top hits are for used cars and related ideas such as craigslist. What did seem insightful and could use some work is when searching for "hybrid cars", those returned Honda, Toyota and Ford items and was missing any GM brands. "Electric car" returned similar results of Tesla and Nissan but missing any GM brands. The Volt however did make an appearance on the rising related list but was in the middle.

Key Competitors

In researching the key competitors for General Motors I did some searches of keywords in Google Trends. I used a variety of different key words to get a different listings. I started with "General Motors", "GM", "Cars", "Trucks", and then went through some of the individual brands that are under the GM umbrella.

The most common related term through all of the searches was Ford, or Ford related. When searching for just Cars the top competitors that showed up were Ford and Honda and GM and all of their brands were missing.














When I switched to Trucks, Ford was the highest rated brand being searched followed by Chevy and Dodge.

I didn't expect much to show up specifically for GM since they act as more of a holding company with direction than a face for the product.

One thing that GM may want to look into is how to get each of their brands to be more relevant in the generic searching.

Measuring Sponsorship

The event that I attended was a  Lighted Pumpkin Trick or Treat Trail. For those that sponsored the event they should try to measure the impact of the sponsorship towards success.

The first thing that those involved would need to do is to create a goal of success. Since this is a community event and there were little opportunities to sell products or services they would have to rely on gaining better exposure and attitude.

To measure changes in attitude or recognition in this setting a sponsor could do simple before and after surveys. They could run a survey through parents of small children in the area to gauge interest and satisfaction in the company both before and after the event.

Another process that they could do is to pass out special coupons that are only used for this event. This would give them an idea of the number of people that they may be reaching and the interest in products they provide.

Effects of Sponsorship

Effects of Sponsorship

 In this assignment we are going over a recent event that we attended, discussing any changes in perception towards the company because of the sponsorship, and find other companies that would have been a good fit for sponsorship.

Recently I attended a Lighted Pumpkin Trick or Treat Trail even put on by the township parks. There were many sponsors and groups that participated. Some of the ones that caught my eye were the local credit unions. There were three different credit unions involved, one of which I currently use. The acknowledgement that they were participating made me feel better about the company knowing that they were being an active member of the community. 

One company that was missing was any of the large grocery stores. Meijer, Walmart, and Kroger were all absent. I would think that any one of these stores could have made a great impression with minimal commitment to show more community involvement. By a simple donation of some candy, decorations, or similar they could have made a large impact on the event.

Landing Page Testing

In reviewing a sample Troy-Bilt landing page for snow blowers, we are supposed to evaluate items that can be tested for improvement. We are then tasked to recommendations, actions for testing recommendations, and why.

The first item is to identify what could be tested for improvement. The first thing that would look at is layout, putting items that are across the bottom above other things. You could also look to make the snow blower selector, feature video, etc in a column instead of a row. Other things that could be tested are the wording of "Find your ideal snow blower" and the reminder text below it.

The specific items I would recommend for change are to remove or change the layout of the text in the middle of the page. It feels like too much reading to figure out what I am trying to click on.

To test the changes I would replace the wording with a highly recognizable picture with reminder text below it for each item. Placing the items in a single row could make them more consistent with the rest of the site. Once this is done a multivariate test could be conducted to place the different items in different areas on the page. This would show what items are getting favorable responses.

I would expect results of the test to show an increase of clicks on the snow blower selector or feature video, depending on which version of the elements is shown (picture vs text only).

Website Usability

For this section we are reviewing website usability and what things are difficult on a particular website.

We are supposed to be reviewing a companies web site, and since Facebook is not publicly traded they seem to be fair game.

Facebook is one of the websites that I have the most difficult time working with. If all I am doing is posting a comment or being voyeuristic and reading others posts everything is fine, it is when I try to do something out of the ordinary that things get messy. One of the biggest issue with Facebook is that they are constantly moving functionality around, or are changing what you can/can't do.

It used to be easy to upload groups of pictures, it would default to selecting a folder and choosing what you want to upload. They then changed it a while back so that you had to go to a special screen to do that. This was quite confusing for many people (in my family) and I had to walk them through it.

Another change that they made was on how you created events for business pages that you might manage. It used to be that you could quite easily open your page, click event, add people, etc. and click publish. Everything was done. With the changes they made it took me a while to figure out how to do it, but they have reduced functionality. Now you have to create an event but you can't invite people that "like" your company. It no longer shows on your timeline, so now you have to "share" your event on you timeline to produce reminders. To invite people I have to join the event personally, then invite those that I am friends with.

Finding all of the intricacies of Facebook can be quite daunting especially with the features on each security setting. I don't argue that some of these items weren't needed changes, but finding where things have moved to or how it is supposed to work is not very straight forward.

Due to the issues at hand with Facebook and not trusting them with much security, due to how obscure some of the settings are, I prefer to not post. I don't use the service much other than for specific coordination and for advertising for my company.

Website Usability

Reviewing the General Motors web sit for usability is our next assignment. During this review we look to see how usable the web site is by using a checklist for items found in our text. The checklist consists of 25 items that are categorized into 4 items (Accessibility, Identity, Navigation, Content).

For the most part GM did well on the scale, but there were a couple items of concern. The biggest issue was the use of flash/animations. When you first reach the site a background video plays. You are able to stop the video but it was confusing why it was running. The intro is over a minute long and plays a video with background music. After the video completes the web site rearranges and moves items from the bottom of the page to the middle. To compound the issue, when you click on each brand a different video will play.

The other issue that I had with the page may be a marketing decision, the logo or name is very subdued in the top corner of the page. The words "General Motors" blended in and the traditional blue box was nowhere on the page.

Social Media Content Analysis

The process that is being reviewed in this assignment is the creation of a social media content analysis. In analyzing the content being published about GM on social media outlets we have to review in 8 parts.

In part 1 we have to identify all of the content that is on the web making mention of General Motors. By researching the mentions on Google Alerts, Social Mention, and Twazzup I was able to make a list of top items.

Part 2 requires reviewing the content to see the type of conversation that GM was mentioned it. The majority of the content on twitter and some on news/discussion forums were focused on the automotive bailout. Other news highlighted new technology being introduced, jobs creation, and updated models at the Paris auto show.

These items would be categorized into Distributing Media, Expressing criticism, Making a joke, or Offering an opinion.

Part 3 requires a determination of visibility of the brand within the message. For the majority of the posts that GM was mentioned the were either Exclusive or Dominant. This means that GM was the only company that was mentioned in the articles or the primary focus. The prominence of the mentions were also in the top 20 percent, or in the headline. A few articles included photos of GM products.

Part 4 has us look for any quoting in the articles. Of the ones that I reviewed, there was little quoting of GM employees. This would be difficult to determine otherwise since I am not familiar with any of the actual employees of GM.

Part 5 looks at the tone of the mentions. The mentions of GM in the Twitter articles that focused on the bailout looked negative or neutral. These mentions were using GM as an example to be critical of President Obama. The other mentions in news articles were positive.

Part 6 rates the messages that were conveyed. Most of the mentions didn't include any message.

Part 7 determines the positioning on key issues or battles. The news articles were focused alternative energy and job growth.

Part 8 tries to determine the authority of the author. This was quite difficult and most of the twitter posts were  of smaller individuals that didn't have many followers. The major news organizations that picked up on mentions had a high authority.

For GM, I believe that they may need to increase their social presence. The difficulty for GM is that very few of their products are actually marketed as part of the parent company, instead they are one of the sub-brands.

Social Media for Marketing

For this assignment we are highlighting a company that has successfully used social media. I have chosen to look at Southwest Airlines again and assess their efforts.

Southwest Airlines has fully embraced social media. The outlet that social media gives is very much in line with the philosophy of the company. They try to make the customers feel like a part of the company and create a friendship between them. The success that they have had can be seen in comparing the followers of Southwest Airlines (1,300,000) compared to that of Delta Airlines (360,000).

Even when things go wrong with social media Southwest has been able to create a success out of it. Back in August Southwest provided a special code for reduced fares for those that followed them on social media. The deluge of people trying to use the code brought the Southwest web servers to a crawl.

The web server issues created a bunch of frustration for the users and many had grown angry. Some users were never able to get on, while others had multiple charges for their flights. After all of the dust settled, Southwest did provide vouchers for those that had issues and cleared all of the duplicate credit card charges.

This was an example on how both successfully use social media as well as how to have a failure. Southwest Airlines continues to have a high social media presence. I believe in the future they will need to make sure they are prepared for the repercussions that will occur when you are target marketing to over 1 million people.

http://smartblogs.com/social-media/2012/08/10/how-southwest-airlines-bounced-back-social-media-snag/
http://rebeccamurtagh.com/southwest-50-facebook-promo-luv3like-fail/

Economic Value

Economic Value

In trying to determine the value of web applications they will compare the amount of exposure that the web application provides compared to that of its offline counterpart. In the example of the Ford Mustang Customizer Facebook application you would be able to calculate the worth by comparing it to the cost of mailing a physical pamphlet to the customer.

To compare the costs, a pamphlet would cost 10-20 cents depending on the size, quality, and volume produced (PSPrint.com). Add to that the mailing costs of postage and an envelope, this could cost Ford nearly $1 per pamphlet mailed.

Each download and use of the Ford Mustang app is equated at $1 which could add up to several thousands of dollars, or more.

Critical Few Metrics

Critical Few Metrics

For this assignment we are to analyse our previous companies web site to identify three major specific items. We are to identify the critical few metrics are and explain why these were identified. Also we are to list what the companies macro conversions and micro conversions are.

The critical few metrics for GM

The macro conversions for the GM site would be a customer requesting a dealer quote or building a customized car from the web applications. By engaging in these activities GM is accomplishing a major goal and getting the customer highly engaged in a sales possibility.

There are many other micro conversions that can be had as well. A customer that subscribes to the web blog, has shown interest in the company. Another micro conversion would be having the customer browsing the discounts that may be available to them, or downloading a brochure on a particular car. These activities show that the users are engaged, even if at a lower level.

SEO Review

For this assignment we are to use the information & techniques from the lectures and reading, analyze your blog for search engine optimization improvements.

• What data did you look at?
• What techniques did you use?
• What are your findings?
• How would you improve the SEO of your blog?  Use the data & techniques to prove your recommendations..

The first set of data that I reviewed was the traffic received from search results in Google Analytics. The results here were all zeros. At this point my site has not been clicked from any search results (not surprising since the assignments are direct links to posts).

Since those numbers were empty I then did some more looking in the Google Webmaster tools. This showed the rates of crawls and indexing of the site to make sure that was functioning. I also ended up linking the webmaster tools into Analytics to generate additional reports.

Since all of  my data was empty the real challenge would be to get content on my site that is relevant and have keywords that are effective in generating search hits.

Landing Page Improvements

When analyzing the landing page of the purple boots page at Amazon there are a couple items that would be of particular interest.

• First would be to identify those items that are selling the most and putting those as top results.
• Next would be to identify the other items that are purchased by customers that have landed on this page. This can create  a cross selling opportunity by highlighting items such as purses or jackets that were bought at the same time. 
• I would also review the links that were getting from here to see which links were getting the most clicks. This could identify other areas that are being neglected, or that should be defaulted in the search area when creating the landing site.

Root Cause Diagnosis

This is a root cause diagnosis of the Mustang page on Ford.com and identifying issues why visitors are not using the "Request a Local Quote" button. Through analysis I was able to isolate the issues with clicks of the button to the following items:

• Prominence / location of the button on the screen
• By increasing the size of the button it could gain notice
• Moving the button on the screen to an area where it might be seen better
• Promoting the button (letting users know that it exists)
• In advertisement, make sure users know that the button exists
• Social media traffic
• Correlate Facebook/Twitter traffic by referral to identify those that may be clicking the button
• Online Advertisement traffic
• Correlate Ad traffic by referral to identify those that may be clicking the button
• Intra-site traffic
• Identify areas of the Ford.com web site where the traffic comes from that ends up requesting a quote
• Quote click form
• Identify if users are completing the form after they first click it.

Custom Report

As an exercise to evaluate traffic that I have been receiving I created a report in Google Analytics using a comparison of unique visitors and bounce rate. By comparing these values I can see how often I get a user hitting my site and then the percentage of time that they are leaving without reading any of my other entries.

Below you can see that earlier in the semester much of the traffic was only a couple of users and they were only viewing a single page at a time. Later in the semester the bounce rate has fallen some, but there is still a high rate.

Choosing a Vendor

Choosing a Vendor - 10 Questions to ask when interviewing a prospective vendor.

As an exercise I will compare Webtrends with Google.

1. What is the difference between your tool/solution and free tools from Yahoo! and Google?
 The data collection methods differ in that Webtrends can be based on logs vs the Javascript passed tracking in Google. By using log views you can get a truer version of who is connecting to your site. Those clients that cannot run Javascript would not be gathered from Google. The associated infrmation on IP and referral link is also covered by our product that isn't covered in Google.

2. Are you 100 percent ASP, or do you offer a software version? Are you planning a software version? We offer both SaaS as well as local copies of our software. This makes us more flexible and more capable to meet your needs.

3. What data capture mechanisms do you use?
Using a 1st party cookie data is logged across sites. 

4. Can you calculate the total cost of ownership for your tool?
We offer a full tool to calculate the TCO of Webtrends. http://webtrends.com/products/analytics/total-cost-of-ownership-calculator-app/

5. What kind of support do you offer? What do you include for free, and what costs more? Is it free 24/7? There are several different levels of support. We offer a web site knowledge base as well as forums. Normal support by phone is offered during normal business hours. Our premium support offerings has 24/7 phone support.

6. What features in your tool allow me to segment the data? We offer the Webtrends Segments as an additional product. This will offer full segmenting features.

7. What options do I have for exporting data from your system into our company's system? We offer the ability to export data to Excel.

8. What fetures do you provide for me to integrate data from other sources into your tool? We natively integrate directly into SharePoint, SalesForce, and Email systems. We also have integrations into SAP for custom functionality.

9. Can you name two features/tools/acquisitions your company is cooking up to stay ahead of your competition for the next three years? While I am unable to disclose our upcoming features, we do have an open forum where we solicit feature requests. Those items that are highly rated will be more likely to be integrated in the future.

10. Why did the last two clients you lost cancel their contracts? Who are they using now? May we call one of these former clients? This is not able to be answered.

Guidelines for Measuring Relationships in PR

Good company to audience relations

One company that has a great relationship with its audience is Southwest Airlines. They have prided themselves on focusing on the customer while maintaining low prices.

In the airline business Southwest has targeted the low fare business but maintained a large national fleet. To maintain the relationship that they have Southwest heavily markets the low fares, including free baggage. This is marketed such that the audience feels that Southwest is doing them a favor because they are "friends". By getting and maintaining a friendly association a person is generally more forgiving of any issues that may occur and they have a better attitude about flying.

Those that advertise a low fare but add on additional fees bring on a level of distrust from the customer. The customer is then more apt to complain of little issues and less agreeable when things don't go as planned.

By maintaining these relations Southwest has happier customers and ultimately happier employees. For many of the employees that have to deal with customers (flight attendants, gate personnel, ticket agents) they would gladly work with those in a better mood than those that are angry about every little thing.

A goal of the company would be to maintain the highest customer satisfaction rating in the industry. The outcome of the relationship would be in increased ticket sales and greater market share in the industry.

Content Analysis - GM

Analyzing GM's Marketing

The overall perception of GM has went up in the last two years. According to the New York Times in 2009 the company was at a low of 59% of Americans having a negative view of the company. As of last summer this sentiment had turned around to 42 % approving and only 32 % disapproving. This turn around is just the first step in recovery and the changing of image.

The recent decision to discontinue Facebook ads has created a bunch of press coverage and some are chastising GM for not utilizing the tool correctly. As an example Jan Rezab wrote an open letter to GM that was posted on the Forbes web site. In the letter he is critical of GM not seemingly taking the Facebook presence seriously and not dedicating a resource to answer questions. He also points out that they were posting updates at times when most of their audience was not actively on Facebook or in a position to look at the pages.

What is a bit misleading is that GM was specifically withdrawing the Facebook ads and not their Facebook pages. The delivery of the ads may be not creating the traffic that they would like and it appears that they are just refocusing their efforts elsewhere. This is exactly what we are covering in class where have to review the data and take action on the results. This alone tells me that they are not satisfied that their message is getting out to the target audience and that they are going to try a different approach.



http://economix.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/03/13/auto-bailout-is-looking-better-to-the-public/
http://www.forbes.com/sites/ciocentral/2012/05/16/an-open-letter-to-gm-why-you-shouldnt-abandon-facebook/

Sodexo Case Study

Sodexo and Social Media

After reviewing the social presence of Sodexo it is easy to see why they have been so successful in their recruiting endeavors. Each of their sites is relatable to the younger generation that they are targeting. The content is more robust than just simple job postings and engages the prospects. This additional content and eye appealing format brings in repeat visitors as well as keeps the users eyes on the pages longer. 

In order to show the effectiveness of each of the social sites they can make unique links/forms for each that could be tracked individually allowing them to see where the prospect is coming from. They can also do comparisons to traditional methods to get a baseline. 

ROI - Measurement

According to Measure What Matters there are 7 steps to perfect measurement. I will correlate these steps with how GM could use these steps and how they would measure ROI.

Step 1 - Define your goals an objectives: Why are you launching this plan or pursuing this strategy? What is the "R" in the ROI that you are seeking to measure?
For GM the goals that would be targeted by this campaign would be to become thought of as the leader in the alternate energy transportation within 2 years. The return would be to surpass Toyota and Nissan in the marketplace in both reputation and market share.

Step 2 - Define your Environment, your audiences, and your role in influencing them.
The defined environment would be most social media such as Twitter, Facebook, and YouTube. The target audiences would be those that have shown interest in prior GM products and are actively looking for a new car. By targeting this group you are trying to maintain your loyal base customers and by using social media you can reach associated people as well that would be influenced by the purchaser.

Step 3 - Define your investment: What will it cost? What is the "I" in ROI?
This is a bit unknown in actual dollars since I am not actually a part of GM. It is however suggested that 5-7% of the budget should go to measuring the program.

Step 4 - Determine your benchmarks
There should be a benchmark created compared to the current market share of the competitors as well as the opinion rating of each. These can be compared to later data for evaluating growth.

Step 5 - Define your key performance indicators: What are the metrics you will report with?
The metrics that will be defined would be the growth of the market share as well as the overall growth of market. Also would be the approval ranking of the company in the segment compared to competitors.

Step 6 - Select the right measurement tool and vendors and collect data
The specific tool used for evaluation would depend on the exact medium and the data needed by management. This is inconclusive since I am not a part of the company.

Step 7 - Turn data into action: Analyze data, draw actionable conclusions, and make recommendations.
This step would be evaluated at a periodic time frame that would allow for comparisons of the growth and effectiveness of the campaign.

Social Media Trends

In the past year there have been several major developments in social media. First was the introduction of Google+ this was a direct competitor to Facebook. The other major change is the IPO of Facebook.

The release of Google+ has not been much of a success so far, but it will be a key service for Google to leverage for data mining and for their mobile services. This service is still in it's infancy and the marketing possibilities are still at a minimum.

The Facebook offering may have more important consequences. By going public Facebook has to be more transparent with their revenue stream and thus the marketing effectiveness will be questioned.

As stated in a previous post GM has identified the ineffectiveness of Facebook advertising and as  result pulled their marketing. Other companies are also questioning the effectiveness and the accuracy of the statistics provided for the number of viewers/clicks that the adds are receiving.  This trend will continue and is already effecting the stock prices for Facebook.

PR Measurement Guidelines

• What are their current PR activities?
  Shortly after the chapter 11 bankruptcy GM blanketed the social media sites, Facebook, Twitter, and blogs. This was all to engage the consumer and answer questions on the restructuring and to alleviate uncertainty.

http://www.prsa.org/SearchResults/view/8548/105/What_drives_GM_s_social_media_strategy

• What are the possible outputs, outtakes & outcomes?
  By addressing the issues head on and keeping a positive spin on the media they can make consumers more comfortable with the company and more willing to purchase from them.

• What might their PR objectives and business objectives be?
  When the initial PR push was enacted there was damage control being done. Currently the PR goals are still to continue dispel any myths about the bankruptcy and the bailout, but also to try to gain back market share that was lost. They have recently also embarked on a television marketing campaign to show how they have been repaying the federal loans.

• How might they measure each?
  The monitoring of negative comments vs. positive ones can give a metric that could show if the perceived issues are being addressed. The total traffic can be monitored to see how much market penetration they are making.

• Do they seem to be accomplishing their objectives?
  I think that the view of GM has been positive over the last year or so.

Understanding Business Objectives & Audience - Blog Post Assignment

Understanding Business Objectives & Audience

In this assignment I will be re-using the company of GM from the first assignment.

Question 1: What are your Objectives? Increase sales of Electric/Hybrid vehicles.

Question 2: Who are your Program's Target Audience(s)? Individuals with higher income that are looking for new cars.

Question 3: What is Important to Your Audiences? Fuel efficiency, Styling, Reliability, Status

Question 4: What Motivates Them to Buy Your Products? Wanting a fuel efficient car, buying an American vehicle.

Question 5: What are your Key Messages? The hip and progressiveness of GM and how favorable GM is compared to other car companies.

Question 6: Who Influences Your Audience(s)? Major influencers are peers, traditional media, and websites

Question 7: How Do you Distribute Your Product or Service? The main channel would be through new car dealers.

Question 8: What Are You Going to Do with the Information You Get from Your Research? Assist marketing to determine which parts of social media are effective in reaching those looking at electric/hybrid models.

Question 9: What Other Departments or Areas Will Be Affected?  PR / Communications would be able to use the data to possibly use the same channels to bring additional messages to the market.

Question 10: What Other Measurement Programs Are Currently Underway? Unknown

You Make The Case : Blog Assignment 1

You Make The Case : Blog Assignment

In the first Make The Case I will be a web analyst for General Motors. The presented issue is that I need to convince my boss that we need a measurement strategy.

In an attempt to persuade them to invest in a measurement strategy I will point out the failed attempt that they had with utilizing social media. Recently GM decided to remove their presence on Facebook due to lack of perceived returns. With a  measurement strategy they would be able to measure the impact the both joining Facebook would have as well as what the loss would be in removing it.

Another argument would be that they need to identify other electronic avenues and monitor what impact they have. By measuring this, they can link the impact that they are having on targeted markets to those that are actually purchasing the cars. They can also then identify the loyalty and brand interest in those markets.

Student Introduction

This is the introduction post for my Web Analytics class. As part of the class we are asked to create a blog, post in the blog and monitor the analytics of the blog.

About Me:

My name is Richard Garnaat, but I go by Rick. My personal life consists of hanging out with my wife and kids, playing games of all kinds, and tinkering with gadgets of all sorts.

I have worked for a Fortune 500 insurance firm for over 13 years. My positions within the company have involved working in desktop support all the way up to database administration, software development, and management. My interest in computers has been around for over 25 years, and was introduced to the internet in 1994.

As a student I completed an associate degree from LCC in 2011 and have continued my study at Lawrence Technological University. I am planning on completing my Bachelors degree in Information Technology in December of 2012.