[AT Community Q&A Coffee Break] 6/24: Ram Parthasarathy, Principal Product Manager Adobe Experience Cloud

[Amelia_Waliany]

Join us for our next Adobe Target Community Q&A Coffee Break, 

taking place Wednesday, June 24th @ 10am PDT

--> REGISTER NOW <-- 

We'll be joined by Ram Parthasarathy aka @ram_adobe, Principal Product Manager for Adobe Experience Cloud, who will be signed in here to the Adobe Target Community to chat directly with you on this thread about your Adobe Target questions pertaining to his areas of expertise:

• General Adobe Target topics
• Next Best Offer
• Offer Decisioning

Want us to send you a calendar invitation so you don’t forget? Register now to receive a reminder!

REQUIREMENTS TO PARTICIPATE 

• Must be signed in to the Community during the 1-hour period
• Must post a Question about Adobe Target
• THAT'S IT!

*(think of this as the Adobe Target Community equivalent of an AMA, (“Ask Me Anything”), and bring your best speed-typing game)

INSTRUCTIONS 

• Click the blue “Reply” button at the bottom right corner of this post
• Begin your Question with @ram_adobe 
• When exchanging messages with Ram about your specific question, be sure to use the editor’s "QUOTE" button, which will indicate which post you're replying to, and will help contain your conversation with Ram

Ram is a Principal Product Manager for Adobe Experience Cloud, based in San Francisco, California. He focuses on next best experience engines and cross-channel decisioning.

Curious about what an Adobe Target Community Q&A Coffee Break looks like? Check out the thread from our last break with David Son, Adobe Target Product Manager

[ram_adobe]

Hi everyone! Welcome to the Community Q&A coffee break. I’m looking forward to sharing insights and answers to your questions. 

[MihneaD]

@ram_adobe ,

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@ram_adobe wrote:

Hi everyone! Welcome to the Community Q&A coffee break. I’m looking forward to sharing insights and answers to your questions. 

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What is an upcoming product feature you are most excited about?

[ram_adobe]

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@MihneaD wrote:

@ram_adobe ,

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@ram_adobe wrote:

Hi everyone! Welcome to the Community Q&A coffee break. I’m looking forward to sharing insights and answers to your questions. 

---

What is an upcoming product feature you are most excited about?

---

I know you asked one feature but I'm going to call out three things!

1. AEP Web SDK - I'm really excited about the new AEP Web SDK that consolidates Analytics, Target, Audience Manager, Visitor ID and AEP into a single, modular JS tag. It has been a massive collaborative effort between different teams at Adobe to execute on our shared vision of providing a faster and more integrated web experience. 

2. Local Decisioning - Performance is continuing to have a very significant impact on experimentation and personalization. Local decisioning enables certain types of decisions to be made without making a round trip and I'm excited to see the new ways our customers will use this feature. 

3. Target and AEP - Adobe Experience Platform is being built to be a foundational system for all Adobe systems and I'm excited to see our integrations with the Unified Profile and Data Science Workspace for enabling custom ML models in Target

[Damon_Hall]

Hello, a question that I had was whether or not the "Redirect" issue with Target experience data in Adobe Analytics will be addressed in the near future.  Specifically I'm referring to when you use a redirect in an experience in an a/b activity, you received inflated Unique Visitor data (sometimes up to 2 times the amount you see for the control).  

Also, in the New Target Panel that was recently released, is this displaying Target Reporting data? Or AA reporting Data? Will you still see the redirect discrepancy in this new panel?   https://docs.adobe.com/content/help/en/analytics/analyze/analysis-workspace/panels/a4t-panel.html

[ram_adobe]

---

@Damon_Hall wrote:

Hello, a question that I had was whether or not the "Redirect" issue with Target experience data in Adobe Analytics will be addressed in the near future.  Specifically I'm referring to when you use a redirect in an experience in an a/b activity, you received inflated Unique Visitor data (sometimes up to 2 times the amount you see for the control).  

Also, in the New Target Panel that was recently released, is this displaying Target Reporting data? Or AA reporting Data? Will you still see the redirect discrepancy in this new panel?   https://docs.adobe.com/content/help/en/analytics/analyze/analysis-workspace/panels/a4t-panel.html

---

Hello Damon, 

The "redirect" issue is generally related to the sequence in which the data is recorded and our teams are evaluating potential solutions. Unlike regular tests where we have good control over the sequencing of the hits to make sure the data is accurate, redirect tests are a little tricky!

We have addressed this issue completely in our brand new Experience Platform Web SDK. The new web SDK unifies Analytics, Target, Visitor ID into a single js tag and eliminates this problem. 

https://docs.adobe.com/content/help/en/experience-platform/edge/home.html

For the current set up with appmeasurement and at.js, here is a proposal. In order for Analytics to keep all of the data coming in from Target, the following calls have to all fire and they have to fire in this specific order on both URL1 and URL2. Additionally they have to be on the specified minimum versions:

visitorID visitorAPI.js v2.3.0 (demdex)
Target at.js 1.6.3 (mboxHost)
Analytics appMeasurement.js v2.1 (/ss)

We should ensure that the calls from above are firing on both URL1 and URL2 and are firing in the order specified above and are on the minimum versions specified above. There is a possibility that even after you do all of that there will still be an issue with traffic distribution when using redirect in an activity which is A4T enabled but this sequencing should minimize it.

For your part two of the question on the A4T panel, it shows AA data. For A4T tests, Target uses Analytics hits as the source of data collection and this applies to the new A4T panel in workspace as well. Unfortunately, you will still see the redirect discrepancies in the workspace panel until the underlying implementation issue is resolved. 

Thanks to @MihneaD  for the insights on the sequence of tags firing.

[ram_adobe]

---

@Damon_Hall wrote:

Hello, a question that I had was whether or not the "Redirect" issue with Target experience data in Adobe Analytics will be addressed in the near future.  Specifically I'm referring to when you use a redirect in an experience in an a/b activity, you received inflated Unique Visitor data (sometimes up to 2 times the amount you see for the control).  

Also, in the New Target Panel that was recently released, is this displaying Target Reporting data? Or AA reporting Data? Will you still see the redirect discrepancy in this new panel?   https://docs.adobe.com/content/help/en/analytics/analyze/analysis-workspace/panels/a4t-panel.html

---

Hello Damon, The “redirect” issue is generally related to the sequence in which the data is recorded and our teams are evaluating potential solutions. Unlike regular tests where we have good control over the sequencing of the hits to make sure the data is accurate, redirect tests are a little tricky!

We have addressed this issue completely in our brand new Experience Platform Web SDK. The new web SDK unifies Analytics, Target, Visitor ID into a single js tag and eliminates this problem.
https://docs.adobe.com/content/help/en/experience-platform/edge/home.html

For the current set up with appmeasurement and at.js, here is a proposal. In order for Analytics to keep all of the data coming in from Target, the following calls have to all fire and they have to fire in this specific order on both URL1 and URL2. Additionally they have to be on the specified minimum versions:

visitorID visitorAPI.js v2.3.0 (demdex)
Target at.js 1.6.3 (mboxHost)
Analytics appMeasurement.js v2.1 (/ss)

We should ensure that the calls from above are firing on both URL1 and URL2 and are firing in the order specified above and are on the minimum versions specified above. There is a possibility that even after you do all of that there will still be an issue with traffic distribution when using redirect in an activity which is A4T enabled but this sequencing should minimize it.

For your part two of the question on the A4T panel, it shows AA data. For A4T tests, Target uses Analytics hits as the source of data collection and this applies to the new A4T panel in workspace as well. Unfortunately, you will still see the redirect discrepancies in the workspace panel until the underlying implementation issue is resolved.

Thanks to @MihneaD for the insights on the sequence of tags firing.

[christammm]

Hi @ram_adobe, 

Are HTML offers meant for strictly content/asset changes to existing sections on the page? What would you say is the best practice for storing offers that create or add new sections on the page with JavaScript, given that you can only replace existing elements with Offers on the VEC?

[ram_adobe]

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@christammm wrote:

Hi @ram_adobe, 

Are HTML offers meant for strictly content/asset changes to existing sections on the page? What would you say is the best practice for storing offers that create or add new sections on the page with JavaScript, given that you can only replace existing elements with Offers on the VEC?

---

HTML Offers are not restricted to changes. You can store new content and then use the form composer with some custom js on the page or through other ways to insert the content on the page. We have also seen some customers use JSON offers to store structured content that has to inserted in the page and then using custom code to parse the JSON and insert it on the page. This works well if you are creating headless content on other platform and then picking it in Target

Here is a useful doc that has information on using HTML offer insert After and insert Before

https://docs.adobe.com/help/en/target/using/experiences/vec/viztarget-options.html#insert-after

[shanitco]

@ram_adobe Hi, what are your thoughts on adjusting the significance level for pages that are testing different stages in the conversion funnel (e.g. .05 vs .01)?

[drewb6915421]

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@shanitco wrote:

@ram_adobe Hi, what are your thoughts on adjusting the significance level for pages that are testing different stages in the conversion funnel (e.g. .05 vs .01)?

---

Hi shanitco!

95% usually constitutes a reasonable trade-off between the risk of a false positive and the opportunity costs of running the test for a longer time to have greater confidence in the results. However, two situations warrant paying close attention to the significance level and its implications for test results: post-test segmentation and testing multiple offers.  You can certainly adjust to 99%, but know that this will require higher levels of traffic to achieve statistically significant results.

[drewb6915421]

---

@drewb6915421 wrote:

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@shanitco wrote:

@ram_adobe Hi, what are your thoughts on adjusting the significance level for pages that are testing different stages in the conversion funnel (e.g. .05 vs .01)?

---

Hi shanitco!

95% usually constitutes a reasonable trade-off between the risk of a false positive and the opportunity costs of running the test for a longer time to have greater confidence in the results. However, two situations warrant paying close attention to the significance level and its implications for test results: post-test segmentation and testing multiple offers.  You can certainly adjust to 99%, but know that this will require higher levels of traffic to achieve statistically significant results.

---

Here is a good source document for how Target treats statistical confidence and other factors to consider in analysis of results: https://docs.adobe.com/content/help/en/target/using/activities/abtest/common-ab-testing-pitfalls.htm... 

[shanitco]

Hi Drew, thanks for your reply, I'm familiar with the above situations. I was hoping to get more insight on @ram_adobe POV on decreasing the significance level (e.g. .05 vs .01) for pages deeper in the conversion funnel for risk management purposes. Some experts have recommended to decrease the significance level for example in checkout pages to reduce the business risk since it's so close to the purchase completion/customer journey. Thank you.

[ram_adobe]

---

@shanitco wrote:

Hi Drew, thanks for your reply, I'm familiar with the above situations. I was hoping to get more insight on @ram_adobe POV on decreasing the significance level (e.g. .05 vs .01) for pages deeper in the conversion funnel for risk management purposes. Some experts have recommended to decrease the significance level for example in checkout pages to reduce the business risk since it's so close to the purchase completion/customer journey. Thank you.

---

Hi @shanitco 

I think that recommendation is a good strategy for risk mitigation. My point of view on this topic is to stay consistent and ensure that you will have enough traffic to reach significance for your tests set to p99. 

[MihneaD]

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@shanitco wrote:

@ram_adobe Hi, what are your thoughts on adjusting the significance level for pages that are testing different stages in the conversion funnel (e.g. .05 vs .01)?

---

In addition here is a great KB that talks about this a bit more: https://docs.adobe.com/help/en/target/using/reports/conversion-rate.html
"If the confidence level is over 90% or 95%, then the result can be considered statistically significant..."

[abdulr94569029]

Hi @ram_adobe ,

What are the recommended ways to integrate Salesforce data with Target for personalization?

[ram_adobe]

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@abdulr94569029 wrote:

Hi @ram_adobe ,

What are the recommended ways to integrate Salesforce data with Target for personalization?

---

Hi Abdul, 

It depends on the type of salesforce data that you want to use for personalization. 

If data is for enriching profiles, you can use customer attributes to onboard this data and this will be available to both Analytics and Target. You also have an option to directly upload it to the profile using Target's profile API but the customer attributes is the preferred approach. 

If the data is available on-page or if it is something along the lines of Krux/DMP, one easy way is to use the dataproviders option in at.js. This link has detailed instructions on how to onboard different types of data - https://docs.adobe.com/content/help/en/target/using/implement-target/before-implement/methods/method...

Also, this is a blog post that I authored where I talk about the different use cases and methods.

https://theblog.adobe.com/transfusing-adobe-target-personalization-lifeblood-data/

[ram_adobe]

---

@abdulr94569029 wrote:

Hi @ram_adobe ,

What are the recommended ways to integrate Salesforce data with Target for personalization?

---

Hi Abdul, 

It depends on the type of Salesforce data that you want to integrate with Target. 

If it is data to enrich the profiles, you can use the customer attributes feature to onboard it to the Target Profile. You can also use the profile API but the customer attributes approach is preferred.

If it is DMP/Krux like data that will be available on-page, you can use the databrokers feature in at.js. This link has all the methods that you can use to onboard data to use in Target for personalization - https://docs.adobe.com/content/help/en/target/using/activities/automated-personalization/uploading-d...

This blog post that I authored is also very relevant to your question and talks about the different types of data and methods for using it in Target - https://theblog.adobe.com/transfusing-adobe-target-personalization-lifeblood-data/

[Amelia_Waliany]

Hi @ram_adobe! This question was posted by Target Community member @ambikaTewari_ATCI : @ram_adobe Good Morning,  wanted to ask if Adobe Target integration is in future roadmap with SFMC crm ?

[ram_adobe]

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@Amelia_Waliany wrote:

Hi @ram_adobe! This question was posted by Target Community member @ambikaTewari_ATCI : @ram_adobe Good Morning,  wanted to ask if Adobe Target integration is in future roadmap with SFMC crm ?

---

Hi @ambikaTewari_ATCI 

We don't have any roadmap plans to integrate Target directly with SFMC crm. Our long term plan is to centralize all data integrations on Adobe Experience Platform. AEP uses a source and destination methodology and some data sources from Salesforce can already be added as a source and Target will soon be available as a destination.

For now, the methods that I described in this thread can be used to onboard SFMC data

https://experienceleaguecommunities.adobe.com/t5/adobe-target-discussions/at-community-q-amp-a-coffe...