Is this for stat function real or a scam?

[MeanSEO]

I feel as though my customer and I are being missrepresented by a vendor and I am looking for other expert opinions here.

One of my customers is advertising with a portal site that has about 20 businesses listed on the same page. The sales person for the portal is trying hard to move my client from a $10,000 a year subscription to a $30,000 a year package.

The sales person for the portal showed me our client’s stats and it showed that this month my clients listing on the portal is receiving 50% of the impressions he did in the month of February. The CTR percentage rate also dropped in half!

When confronted by the fact that the impressions dropped 50% he claimed that their software counts impressions and can tell if the surfer looked at any particular listing even though all are on the same page and all are bellow the fold on a very large monitor. In other words they can count impressions on each section of a page even though all sections are on the same page. The page is static and always shows the same exact content every time someone views it.

Besides the fact that the sales person didn’t even know what below the fold is, I find it very unlikely that they are able to count impression based upon where a customer is scrolling on a page and not performing any other interaction with the page.

Is this sales person lying about this tracking feature and the portals traffic is dropping...or...is he telling the truth? He claims since he is selling more expensive ads which get placed above us we are losing impressions THAT THEY CAN COUNT. I don't see how they can do that.

My server logs and java scripting stats show we get far less page views per visitor and length of stay than from other traffic sources coming to the same site.

I do not wish to post the portal URL unless this is the only way to clear this up.

(mods please feel free to move this to another forum if this is the wrong area)

[wige]

Sounds like a scam to me. It is I think possible to determine how far down on a page a user scrolls through Javascript, but any statistics based on these numbers are unlikely to be reliable because different browsers report screen and 'viewport' information differently. Many of the sites I have talked with about advertising on have shown me that they do charge significantly more for ads shown above the fold, and they charge per impression, but I have always been told that the "per impression" rate is determined by how many times the page was displayed, not how many of the users scrolled to the location of the ad.

[chrisJumbo]

I would be dubious as well other than if there are studies that show #1 gets x%, #2 gets y%, #10 gets z%, etc.

And you would want those to be independent since the portal has a vested interest in you purchasing the more expensive ads.

Have sales dropped? If you are happy with the sales from the portal why triple your ad cost? Is tripling your ad cost going to triple your sales from that site?

cd :O)

[incrediblehelp]

$30,000 a year package link/banner package, wow show me the money.

[freelancedesigners.com]

Sounds fishy - normal web logging and stats packages certainly don't record that kind of information. I can't think of any way to do it offhand and I have been doing this since 95

[craigmn3]

There is one born , every minute....sometimes two, and if you can get a few suckers to bite, you have it made

[chocochef]

Sounds like a load of salesman garbage. Ask him to have a technical contact from his company explain in exact and specific detail how the software works to capture that data. Don't settle for the "we have a package that counts..." vague BS. If he can't explain it, and isn't willing to put a technical guy on the line, then it's complete BS.

Even the concept of "below the fold" is going to vary depending on monitor resolution, browser window size and browser chrome/toolbars. There's no technical way that I'm aware of to accurately measure what he's claiming.

If I were you, I'd get pissed off at him for trying to intimidate you with BS and threaten to take the entire 10K account away. Put the blame on their site for not bringing in qualified traffic and ask what they're doing to fix it.

[deepsand]

Once a page has been downloaded, from the server to the user's machine, there is no further communications with the server unless & until the user takes an action that explicitly sends another request to the server.

The rendering and display of the page all occur locally, in total isolation from the server.

In technical terms, the 'net is stateless; hence the need for devices such as cookies to preserve a session's state.

Knowingly or otherwise, said saleman is engaged in an attempt to deceive.

[Peter (IMC)]

That the CTR dropped seems to make sense. The sales person says that other companies are now listed above your client's listing. Generally the higher position in the page, the higher the CTR of a link.

About the less impressions... as far as I know there would have to be a javascript on the page that detects if a link is actually showing up in the visual part of the screen. (simply said: It detects the scrolling though that´s not exactly what I meant.)

If they have something like that it is possible they can detect the impressions.

The fact that the sales person doesn't understand the technical stuff is nothing to worry about. That´s pretty normal,.

$10,000 per month, That´s got to be a great portal. I don't know what your client sells of course. If the costs per sale from clients refered by that portal are low enough, then it's worth it. Going up to $30,000 will increase the CTR, but may also increase the costs per sale. What's really needed is statistics on costs per sale per refering source. That's the only way to determine if it is worth it to advertise on that portal.

Ofcourse that sales person could be deceiving you, but it's a risky assumption if you base it just on the fact that he wants to put your client on a more expensive package. You really need to understand what´s going on.

If I were you I would ask the sales person for the contact of a technical person in that company that can explain how they determine impressions.

[rcourtney]

Deepsand is exactly correct and that, therefore, rules out all server scripting languages normally used for these apps including asp, php and net. Clicks, sure. Impressions, no way. It is an interesting marketing strategy though.

[alienpest]

Sounds like time to hide your wallet!

[cppgenius]

If your ads are below the fold, you are going to have a lower CTR, whether they can count visual impressions or not, so IMHO, his approach is deceptive.

The only way of counting visual impressions may be possible via scripting. But like deepsand already stated, there is interaction necessary from the user's side to do this kind of tracking. Thus, if the salesman is talking the truth, then they're probably using spyware to track the behaviour of users, otherwise I don't know how they are doing it.

[jrb@w3f.com]

Originally Posted by incrediblehelp

$30,000 a year package link/banner package, wow show me the money.

You got that right.

We are in the wrong business.


Anyone that has been around the block at least once knows that banners
above the fold are worth more so they cost more, and show a better CTR.

I would really like to see how a tracker can tell if someone scrolled,
and don't tell me mouse position, because you can scroll without
changing the mouse x and y mouse values.

Where is the smiley of someone laughing their ass off?

Put up an independant tracker and see for yourself.
Page views is important, but CTR, and ROI are the kings.

Impressions come from page views, meaning pages loaded,
not where the person looked, or even if they saw the ad. If
the ad is above the fold, then you can be pretty sure that
the visitor saw it, but there is no guarantee of any thing.

[incrediblehelp]

Obviously would need to know a lot more about this situation, but it just sounds fishy from the outside looking in.

[hostBrain]

I think missrepresented is the understatement of the day.

Definitely does not sound ethical to me.

Maybe the pageviews are down because of the time of year.. summer. - Were they down last year?

[MeanSEO]

Thanks for all of the replies. I felt just like deepsand does. If I knew of such a script for sure I would use it.

It also seems as though at least 95% of their traffic is from PPC bidding against us. When I asked to see 5 natural SE rankings the written response they sent to me was:

"We’re capturing traffic on over 155,000 keyword searches on the search engines with our own unique marketing mix that we unfortunately cannot share. Please take your time with the research, but remember that these listings are in the process of being closed daily. I cannot guarantee any currently available placements will remain available."

We have dropped the vendor and will not renew.

[langsor]

Just for the record, deepsand is wrong about not being to send data back to the server after the page has loaded.

In short, if the client (visitor) has javascript enabled in their browser and a relatively recent version of their browser...then javascript can be used to do the following things.

* detect the visible height of the browser window
* detect the percent or pixels that the visitor have scrolled down the page
(here you have the impressions of where the visitor is on the page in relation to the ad)
* create a recurring timer that fires at any desired time interval
* and send this information back to a server script via XMLHttpRequest object (aka AJAX) on that timed interval

the server can then...
* create a permanent file or database entry for that specific page or impression and
* can even talk back to the javascript if that is desired,
* which (the javascript) can even change the content of the page or the page itself, based on this e-conversation with the server...

I personally could write this script in a day or two...depending on desired features...

However if this package is worth $30K is not in my realm of knowledge

Good luck

[Peter (IMC)]

Originally Posted by deepsand

Once a page has been downloaded, from the server to the user's machine, there is no further communications with the server unless & until the user takes an action that explicitly sends another request to the server.

The rendering and display of the page all occur locally, in total isolation from the server.

In technical terms, the 'net is stateless; hence the need for devices such as cookies to preserve a session's state.

Knowingly or otherwise, said saleman is engaged in an attempt to deceive.

Based on what langsor said, the above is thus not true.

suesheboy,

I'd like to know what portal that is. I'm sure I will learn a couple of things from that site. (either things I shouldn't do, or things I could do, either way, its good to research) If you hesitate to share it publically, please send me in a private message.

Thanks

[MarcGrobman]

Who knows.... It is possible that they have some very fancy scripting involved, especially if it is such a high end, high profile, expensive site. The worst thing is that it sounds like this guy is playing you off the other guy, and that is annoying.

But what it really comes down to is this -- does this site pay off for you? If it is making big sales for you, it sounds like it would be worth making more. And, yes, appearing higher on the page will get you a lot more clicks. If you are not able to track that sort of thing, it might be time for you to better track your conversions. There is also a strategy, with listings, of not being first, but being second or third. People will shop the others then settle on you. It really all depends on the kind of site and the kind of ad you are running.

[wbmcl]

Originally Posted by chocochef

Even the concept of "below the fold" is going to vary depending on monitor resolution, browser window size and browser chrome/toolbars. There's no technical way that I'm aware of to accurately measure what he's claiming.

Additionally, a number of monitors rotate to a portrait mode (my Dell 20" does) and in doing so, provide a much greater "below the fold". There can be no accounting for that capability on the server side.

Bill M.

[MeanSEO]

Originally Posted by Peter (IMC)

Based on what langsor said, the above is thus not true.

suesheboy,

I'd like to know what portal that is. I'm sure I will learn a couple of things from that site. (either things I shouldn't do, or things I could do, either way, its good to research) If you hesitate to share it publically, please send me in a private message.

Thanks

I do see some heavy JS.

The site is:

r e s o r t s a n d l o d g e s.com

(remove the spaces)

I don't want them to get SE traffic nor get click throughs from this board.

[MeanSEO]

Originally Posted by langsor

Just for the record, deepsand is wrong about not being to send data back to the server after the page has loaded.

In short, if the client (visitor) has javascript enabled in their browser and a relatively recent version of their browser...then javascript can be used to do the following things.

* detect the visible height of the browser window
* detect the percent or pixels that the visitor have scrolled down the page
(here you have the impressions of where the visitor is on the page in relation to the ad)
* create a recurring timer that fires at any desired time interval
* and send this information back to a server script via XMLHttpRequest object (aka AJAX) on that timed interval

the server can then...
* create a permanent file or database entry for that specific page or impression and
* can even talk back to the javascript if that is desired,
* which (the javascript) can even change the content of the page or the page itself, based on this e-conversation with the server...

Last 100 people on our site:

77.00% MSIE 6.0
14.00% MSIE 7.0
8.00% Firefox 2.0.0
1.00% Mozilla 5.0

New enough browsers for this to work or be accurate?

If you can do what you are saying and and not effect SE rankings or show as "spyware" I may have work for you in the near future.

[TrafficProducer]

Check out Eye Tracking Study, Heat Maps etc :-

The Fold, Screen Real Estate

Scanning

The sales person for the portal is trying hard to move my client from a $10,000 a year subscription to a $30,000 a year package

The More persure the worse it is... If it's that good they wouldn't need to even advertise... They would have too many customers already.

[twist]

This is the tracking script they seem to be using,

*ttp://www.*esortsand*odges.*om/includes/omniture/s_code.js

Here is the analytics website, Web Analytics | Online Business Optimization by Omniture

I don't see any direct way through the javascript that they are able to track impressions on any segment of the screen. No xml data being transferred that I can find.

One possible way they could (sort of) track impressions would be to use Flash content that needs to be called externally, for example the Photo/Video flash next to the hotel names. A person clicks on that flash and it calls an external file. They count how often that file is called which would give them an idea of how often that section of the page is viewed. This wouldn't be much different than link tracking though, which could also be how their configuring their impressions. You said the guy didn't sound very tech savvy, so I would go with the simplest answer, they consider link tracking to be a pseudo way of figuring impressions on page segments.

[langsor]

Originally Posted by suesheboy

Last 100 people on our site:

77.00% MSIE 6.0
14.00% MSIE 7.0
8.00% Firefox 2.0.0
1.00% Mozilla 5.0

New enough browsers for this to work or be accurate?

If you can do what you are saying and and not effect SE rankings or show as "spyware" I may have work for you in the near future.

All of these browsers can do what I'm talking about, and it would be very unobtrusive so I feel confident that it would not effect your rankings or be seen as spyware.

I would be happy to work with you to produce this (or other) functionality, or discuss the possibilities.

Send me a private message on this site or email me directly at: kdouglas(at)satarah(dot)com

Thanks,

Kevin

[DaveSawers]

It certainly is easy enough to do using AJAX.

Unfortunately, it's just this kind of spyware that encourages users to turn Javascript off and limit the functionality of so many great websites, more and more of which are now using AJAX.

[wige]

Actually, Google Analytics does half of this already, showing a technical report that gives the monitor resolutions of every visitor to your site. Replace one variable, add two equations, and you will be able to know the lowest pixel the user viewed. Add a few extra functions and you could probably get an array of (or code containing) all the elements displayed above that limit. Yes, the mental gears have been grinding since I first read this post. It would probably be similar to what some sites use to show "floating" information that stays in the same position as you scroll on the page. Viewport I think. You wouldn't even need to use AJAX, just store the viewport and lowest point viewed in a cookie, and it will be submitted the next time a page is requested.

[toroandbruin]

If they do not use sophisticated spyware to detect scrolling below the fold, perhaps they are basing the viewer's actions on the length of time spent on that page, figuring it takes a while to get to the bottom. I haven't looked at the Website in question but I believe from my own browsing habits that sometimes the best way to get an ad seen by a SERIOUS prospect is to be dead LAST in the list of links. If a page has the info. I want I'll read to the bottom and only then look at the ads. But those people are right who pointed out that you need a way to track sales conversions. Once you have the ability in place, negotiate with the salesman for an inexpensive test run of the above-the-fold placement.

[langsor]

Originally Posted by DaveSawers

It certainly is easy enough to do using AJAX.

Unfortunately, it's just this kind of spyware that encourages users to turn Javascript off and limit the functionality of so many great websites, more and more of which are now using AJAX.

Dave,

It's true that people are sensitive to this type of thing to varying degrees. People don't necessarily want 'anyone' to know 'anything' about their browsing behavior...but that's naive in today's world.

At least this script concept gathers no personal data (most of which can already be gathered at the server level without javascript: IP address, referring page, etc), stores no tracking cookie on their machine (which can also be done at the server level without javascript), and only tests to see if they've scrolled down the page far enough to have been given the impression of an ad or article...so someone can get paid for that impression. I have a hard time classifying this in the realm of spyware.

Also, now with most browsers you can turn off pop-ups and cookies on a fine-grained level and leave more useful scripted features alone, such as menus, etc.

Another thought is that Flash can also communicate directly with the server using an XML socket, and similar approaches. However Flash can not gather the details of the browser and screen real estate with out talking to a javascript function on the same page as it (which it can do).

I just find it interesting that many people are nervous about javascript, but javascript has a fairly small sandbox that it's allowed to play in because of security concerns.

Take care...

[wige]

It is truly amazing the amount of information you can gather about site visitors. On an extremely secured computer that is directly connecting to my site I could determine the visitor's town to a good degree of certainty, as well as their ISP and type of internet connection. On a moderately secured PC I could also identify many "Internet aware" applications, do a vulnerability scan remotely, find the operating system and browser information, determine what scripting software is installed, and more. On most computers, I can also find out (if I had any desire to) the monitor size, resolution, screen size, number of installed plugins/toolbars, how long the person spends on each page of my site, yes how far they scroll, and probably more. All this is done with various scripts and the information that browsers normally share.

[Martinscholes]

When people use tracking software on my work computer it tells them I am in a town 100 miles away. Which is where our ISP is based.

[wige]

Just wanted to add a follow-up... I am getting ready to do a major rewrite of the "user interface" of my company's web site, and one of the consultants that we have been talking to suggested we install a new analytics program that records how users interact with the site. Having just logged into the software today to view the first week's reports, I can confirm that what the company reports is definitely possible. The solution we have installed shows clicks, heatmaps and I think where the mouse hovers and even false clicks and missed clicks. It is possible to record how far users scroll (although the system we are using does not), and even, to an extent, if they have ads blocked.