SiteBrand and First Time Visitors

This month Web Analytics Wednesday was sponsored by Sitebrand. Senior Analyst Jim Cain presented a very interesting summary of his white paper "First Time Visitor: A Marketer-Oriented Approach to Optimizing Online Conversions" (get it for free!)

First time visitors are "special"

The topic raised interesting questions and everyone could readily see how important it is to address the specific needs of first time visitors. Why is it what we take for granted in real life seems to be so hard to apply in the online world? Why do so many sites welcome everyone in the same way, regardless of their interest, location or level of engagement with us?

Ask the obvious

Jim explained some of the most important questions to ask about first time visitors:

• What percentage of your traffic is 1st time visitor?
• Where do they come from?
• What are there entry and exit points?

Some might argue that cookie deletion, or geotargetting errors could make the approach difficult to apply. But what about the more than 80% if not 90% or 98% of the time where it works? Why put everyone in the same "unknown" basket when you can at least try to better serve them. Seems obvious to me!

Sitebrand's solution

And that's where Sitebrand comes in: their service makes it easy to create targeting rules based on various criteria. In my experience, even basic behavioural targetting is hard to get done by internal IT teams, so why not outsource this function to Sitebrand. The nice thing is the solution will cooperate with your web analytics solution of choice (actually the behavioral data is collected by Sitebrand, but in the future it will be integrated directly with your existing web analytics solution). Lots of companies are a bit afraid of behavioral targeting costs and complexity, but what I've seen with Sitebrand makes it very easy and affordable.

Sitebrand and WASP

WASP already detects Sitebrand, but with the help of Sitebrand's team, the upcoming release of WASP will highlight the targeting area directly in the page. Click on the thumbnail bellow for a larger view, basically, the behavioral targetting areas are automatically highlighted when the WASP sidebar is open.

WaW: Montreal, Oct. 15th, a free seminar worth a lot!

I've been organizing local Web Analytics Wednesdays in Montreal for over two years now. People have frequently expressed interest to have monthly topics and learn more about what is being done and what is possible.

This month Web Analytics Wednesday, shouldn't be missed!

Come & learn, for free!

Sitebrand, a leader in online marketing solutions, is sponsoring our next Web Analytics Montreal.

Speaking at Web Analytics in Montreal, QC, on October 15, 2008 is Jim Cain, a Senior Analyst at Sitebrand who also serves on the Standards Committee of the Web Analytics Association. As author of a newly released whitepaper titled First Time Visitor: A Marketer-Oriented Approach to Optimizing Online Conversions, Cain sees increasing demand for more insight on the topic of web personalization. "The recent surge in website testing practices shows digital marketers have evolved past traffic generation and into site optimization," says Cain. "I’m really excited to be part of this event so I can explain how any marketer can create a profitable dialog with their most underperforming and under-serviced traffic segment, aka the first time visitor."

As part of the session, which will focus on web personalization and visitor persuasion, Cain will reveal how first time visitors to a website are a unique traffic segment that can – when properly understood and messaged to – have a profound effect on site outcomes. Based on research and proven client successes, Cain will also be speaking about the uniqueness of this visitor type, along with best practices for analyzing and optimizing over time.

Event Details

Date: Wednesday, October 15, 2008
Time: 5:30 pm - 9:00 pm
Place: Le Local
Address: 700 William, Montréal, H3C 1P1, 514-397-7737

Sponsor: Sitebrand

About Sitebrand

Sitebrand.com Inc. (TSX-V: SIB) Sitebrand Inc. (TSX-V: SIB) provides online marketing solutions and related services to major retailers across North America and Europe. Based on its proprietary software, Sitebrand’s Segment&Serve™ personalization platform delivers personalized online marketing campaigns for websites, email, search engine marketing, blogs, banners, point of sale, or any other web medium. Using Sitebrand, online retailers are able to develop customized marketing campaigns that leverage anonymous web analytics and visitor behavior, providing each visitor with a personalized experience to that particular visitor in real-time—generating more customers, more profit per customer, more customer loyalty, and more conversions. Sitebrand was founded in 2000 and is headquartered in Gatineau, Quebec..