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Is there a way to see all of Google traffic as one row, regardless of the country domain

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Level 2

I have a website with lots of international website and when I look at referring sites, I have to swift through hundreds of Google domains (google.com, google.ca,  google.co.uk) instead of just seeing it as in Google Analytics, as one referrer? 

Thank you,

C.

1 Accepted Solution

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Correct answer by
Level 7

It's pretty annoying I agree there, I've never been able to work out a way of rolling it all up in to one source. I disagree with hacking s-code or other types of mods to try and get round it given the amount that companies pay to use this product. I'd raise it on http://ideas.omniture.com/ and see if it gets any traction on there.

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20 Replies

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Level 1

Could you just create a segment and then apply it to the report you're trying to analyze?

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Level 2

Hi Jessica,

I could but that would remove it or isolate from my report. Instead I would like to see organic traffic in context. I find it hard to believe that this is not a default setting, or an easy option.

One shouldn't have to do so much work to see global traffic from search engines. Do the mods here escalate tickets to Adobe?

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Correct answer by
Level 7

It's pretty annoying I agree there, I've never been able to work out a way of rolling it all up in to one source. I disagree with hacking s-code or other types of mods to try and get round it given the amount that companies pay to use this product. I'd raise it on http://ideas.omniture.com/ and see if it gets any traction on there.

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Level 2

Thank you very much, @arob87. I figured I wasn't alone on this but I thought it was me missing a feature/setting, not the product since it is so basic. here is hoping. 

C.

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Level 6

Not the prettiest solution but you can create a processing rule to copy the referring domain into an evar (or prop) and then classify that evar/prop so all the referring domain sub-domains are grouped together.

I can put up images if you want but assuming you can do processing rules and know how to use saint it is very straight forward.

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Level 2

That's a clever idea. Yes, if you have some images, I would love to see your Processing Rules set-up? Thank you! 

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Level 6

Ok, first you setup the eVar [referring domain eVar definition.jpg] you could make the expiration longer or shorter (but referring domain now works for the visit so this should also)

Then you setup the processing rule [processing rule - referring domain.jpg] so data starts moving into the newly defined eVar as soon as possible [remember processing rules can't go back in time so capture the data before trying to setup the classification so you loose less in the interim. All the rule does is if there is a value in Referring Domain it moves it into your eVar [If you want to get fancy you can create an event to count Referring Domains and set that to custom value 1. BTW I also set events for every processing rule I do that are just counters of the processing rule firing, It tells you your rule is working] You can beef up the condition for the processing rule to fire by changing 'is set' to 'contains' and put google bing and yahoo on separate lines and then you just get those search engines if you want cleaner data. You weren't completely specific in everything you wanted rolled up this way.

Then you can classify the new eVar [referring domain classifications.jpg] here I did a separate roll-up for Google, Bing and Yahoo but you could just do a 'Roll-up Name' if you want and do it in a single variable (or do both)

Then you can go into the classification rule builder to build the classification rule [warning it might take some time for your newly classified variable to show up in the rule builder. I've been seeing several HOURS latency the last couple of these I've done. In fact I was working on this at 4PM yesterday and waited overnight for the entry to appear in the rule builder select report suite/variable screen. And we don't have a huge number of report suites and I only defined this in one suite] YMMV [classification rule.jpg]

Then test your rule by running a domains report and exporting to csv and grabbing the values and pasting them into the sample keys in the rule test (I also selected search engines since I was just doing the 3 of them) [rule test.jpg]

So now you have a working model for your implementation.

I would still go to ideas.omniture.com and request that referring domain be classifiable (or adobe create a 'top level referring domains' report that does this roll-up for all domains) since there is precedent  for this (operating system/operating system type, browser/browser type, etc)

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Level 6

Ok, first you setup the eVar [referring domain eVar definition.jpg] you could make the expiration longer or shorter (but referring domain now works for the visit so this should also)

Then you setup the processing rule [processing rule - referring domain.jpg] so data starts moving into the newly defined eVar as soon as possible [remember processing rules can't go back in time so capture the data before trying to setup the classification so you loose less in the interim. All the rule does is if there is a value in Referring Domain it moves it into your eVar [If you want to get fancy you can create an event to count Referring Domains and set that to custom value 1. BTW I also set events for every processing rule I do that are just counters of the processing rule firing, It tells you your rule is working] You can beef up the condition for the processing rule to fire by changing 'is set' to 'contains' and put google bing and yahoo on separate lines and then you just get those search engines if you want cleaner data. You weren't completely specific in everything you wanted rolled up this way.

Then you can classify the new eVar [referring domain classifications.jpg] here I did a separate roll-up for Google, Bing and Yahoo but you could just do a 'Roll-up Name' if you want and do it in a single variable (or do both)

Then you can go into the classification rule builder to build the classification rule [warning it might take some time for your newly classified variable to show up in the rule builder. I've been seeing several HOURS latency the last couple of these I've done. In fact I was working on this at 4PM yesterday and waited overnight for the entry to appear in the rule builder select report suite/variable screen. And we don't have a huge number of report suites and I only defined this in one suite] YMMV [classification rule.jpg]

Then test your rule by running a domains report and exporting to csv and grabbing the values and pasting them into the sample keys in the rule test (I also selected search engines since I was just doing the 3 of them) [rule test.jpg]

So now you have a working model for your implementation.

I would still go to ideas.omniture.com and request that referring domain be classifiable (or adobe create a 'top level referring domains' report that does this roll-up for all domains) since there is precedent  for this (operating system/operating system type, browser/browser type, etc)

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Level 2

You are right, I like this solution but it is a big workaround for something that should be default from Site Catalyst. 

Thank you very much, @warrenSander

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Level 2

You are right, I like this solution but it is a big workaround for something that should be default from Site Catalyst. 

Thank you very much, @warrenSander

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Employee Advisor

I have this exact same issue on sites that I manage internally. I have a bit of give/take going on, but to me it's worth it.

In DTM, I have created a page load rule where if the referrer is from any google search engine domain, I override the referrer value to https://google.com.

  • The plus side is that I have all google values in one line item, which makes things so much easier for all my traffic sources reports, marketing channels, etc. I don't have to use any custom variables or segments either.
  • The downside is that I effectively lose the ability to see which google domains people are coming from. Keyword data supposedly would be overwritten too, but since google strips keyword data already, that's not that big of an issue.

Since I personally care a lot more which overall search engines people come from (more than I care about which google domains they're using), I have opted to consolidate them using the referrer override. Google is google to me, no matter which regional search engine visitors opt to use.

Avatar

Employee Advisor

I have this exact same issue on sites that I manage internally. I have a bit of give/take going on, but to me it's worth it.

In DTM, I have created a page load rule where if the referrer is from any google search engine domain, I override the referrer value to https://google.com.

  • The plus side is that I have all google values in one line item, which makes things so much easier for all my traffic sources reports, marketing channels, etc. I don't have to use any custom variables or segments either.
  • The downside is that I effectively lose the ability to see which google domains people are coming from. Keyword data supposedly would be overwritten too, but since google strips keyword data already, that's not that big of an issue.

Since I personally care a lot more which overall search engines people come from (more than I care about which google domains they're using), I have opted to consolidate them using the referrer override. Google is google to me, no matter which regional search engine visitors opt to use.

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Level 6

Then you can always do my processing rule the opposite way.

continue to overwrite the referrer value but save the original value in a prop or evar called 'original referrer value' and then you have that (evar is probably better so you can breakdown the google.com by that evar to find the google country sites) (or any other rollups you use.

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Level 6

Then you can always do my processing rule the opposite way.

continue to overwrite the referrer value but save the original value in a prop or evar called 'original referrer value' and then you have that (evar is probably better so you can breakdown the google.com by that evar to find the google country sites) (or any other rollups you use.

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Level 2

@Gigazelle That's exactly how I feel, Google is just google. If I really care to segment it regionally I can overlay Location. I'm always afraid of overriding data, but in this case, it may be something I won't miss... and at the end, I will have better intel.

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Level 2

@Gigazelle That's exactly how I feel, Google is just google. If I really care to segment it regionally I can overlay Location. I'm always afraid of overriding data, but in this case, it may be something I won't miss... and at the end, I will have better intel.

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Level 1

Hi Gigazelle,

I was wondering how are you setting up through DTM as I which condition or element you are selecting and applying the criteria.

Thanks,

S

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Employee Advisor

Certainly!

Data element: referrer, JS object. Defined as window.document.referrer.

Page load rule condition: If the data element referrer contains google (regex enabled)

Custom page action (in editor):

s.referrer="https://google.com"