Comments on: A brief introduction to the importance of internal search: don’t lose visitors or business by turning their search of your site into a galaxy quest http://marianina.com/blog/2007/06/24/a-brief-introduction-to-the-importance-of-internal-search-don%e2%80%99t-lose-visitors-or-business-by-turning-their-search-of-your-site-into-a-galaxy-quest/ How web analytics can transform your marketing effectiveness and business decisions Thu, 14 Aug 2008 12:05:09 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.8.4 hourly 1 By: Marianina Chaplin http://marianina.com/blog/2007/06/24/a-brief-introduction-to-the-importance-of-internal-search-don%e2%80%99t-lose-visitors-or-business-by-turning-their-search-of-your-site-into-a-galaxy-quest/comment-page-1/#comment-13 Marianina Chaplin Thu, 05 Jul 2007 13:50:19 +0000 http://marianina.com/blog/2007/07/02/a-brief-introduction-to-the-importance-of-internal-search-don%e2%80%99t-lose-visitors-or-business-by-turning-their-search-of-your-site-into-a-galaxy-quest/#comment-13 <strong>Ian,</strong> Thanks for your comment. I believe you mean't to comment on social networking post. You make a valid point - the hard thing with SNA is to find a way to filter out spammy messages/profiles so that one's analysis of influence of comment flow etc is not skewed. <strong>Anil,</strong> Thanks for your comment and am glad that you found this post interesting. Segment, segment and then segment a bit more is my motto!! <strong>Tim,</strong> Thanks so much for an extremely useful addition to the blog post - this has really added value as I had no idea that it was possible to extract internal search keywords using google analytics. Using the custom filters to extract them should be done with care, so it would be worth setting up a test profile in google analytics to test out the advanced custom filters until they are working absolutely right. :) Ian,
Thanks for your comment. I believe you mean’t to comment on social networking post. You make a valid point – the hard thing with SNA is to find a way to filter out spammy messages/profiles so that one’s analysis of influence of comment flow etc is not skewed.

Anil,
Thanks for your comment and am glad that you found this post interesting. Segment, segment and then segment a bit more is my motto!!

Tim,
Thanks so much for an extremely useful addition to the blog post – this has really added value as I had no idea that it was possible to extract internal search keywords using google analytics. Using the custom filters to extract them should be done with care, so it would be worth setting up a test profile in google analytics to test out the advanced custom filters until they are working absolutely right. :)

]]> By: Tim Leighton-Boyce http://marianina.com/blog/2007/06/24/a-brief-introduction-to-the-importance-of-internal-search-don%e2%80%99t-lose-visitors-or-business-by-turning-their-search-of-your-site-into-a-galaxy-quest/comment-page-1/#comment-12 Tim Leighton-Boyce Wed, 04 Jul 2007 13:58:00 +0000 http://marianina.com/blog/2007/07/02/a-brief-introduction-to-the-importance-of-internal-search-don%e2%80%99t-lose-visitors-or-business-by-turning-their-search-of-your-site-into-a-galaxy-quest/#comment-12 Internal search is indeed a goldmine: it's one of those rare opportunities to hear the voice of the visitor in their own words. For any frustrated Google Analytics users who are prepared to set up a filter it may yet be possible to get at this data. If your web site passes the query string as a parameter like ?query= or ?txtsearch then you can use an advanced filter to extract this from the request URI and store it in the 'user defined' field. You can then segment by 'user defined' in many reports and see the search term. Only one per session, though, I believe. Jim Newsome was my original source for this. There's a thread about this on one of the Google groups: http://groups.google.com/group/analytics-help-tracking/browse_thread/thread/6dfe9f5ea95f751f/6cf10d6d3761e915 Tim Internal search is indeed a goldmine: it’s one of those rare opportunities to hear the voice of the visitor in their own words.
For any frustrated Google Analytics users who are prepared to set up a filter it may yet be possible to get at this data. If your web site passes the query string as a parameter like ?query= or ?txtsearch then you can use an advanced filter to extract this from the request URI and store it in the ‘user defined’ field. You can then segment by ‘user defined’ in many reports and see the search term. Only one per session, though, I believe. Jim Newsome was my original source for this.
There’s a thread about this on one of the Google groups:

http://groups.google.com/group/analytics-help-tracking/browse_thread/thread/6dfe9f5ea95f751f/6cf10d6d3761e915

Tim

]]> By: Anil http://marianina.com/blog/2007/06/24/a-brief-introduction-to-the-importance-of-internal-search-don%e2%80%99t-lose-visitors-or-business-by-turning-their-search-of-your-site-into-a-galaxy-quest/comment-page-1/#comment-10 Anil Wed, 04 Jul 2007 10:25:19 +0000 http://marianina.com/blog/2007/07/02/a-brief-introduction-to-the-importance-of-internal-search-don%e2%80%99t-lose-visitors-or-business-by-turning-their-search-of-your-site-into-a-galaxy-quest/#comment-10 That's a great insight! I believe "Segmentation" is the key in the entire analysis process. thanks anil That’s a great insight! I believe “Segmentation” is the key in the entire analysis process.

thanks
anil

]]> By: IanBrooks http://marianina.com/blog/2007/06/24/a-brief-introduction-to-the-importance-of-internal-search-don%e2%80%99t-lose-visitors-or-business-by-turning-their-search-of-your-site-into-a-galaxy-quest/comment-page-1/#comment-2 IanBrooks Mon, 02 Jul 2007 08:35:55 +0000 http://marianina.com/blog/2007/07/02/a-brief-introduction-to-the-importance-of-internal-search-don%e2%80%99t-lose-visitors-or-business-by-turning-their-search-of-your-site-into-a-galaxy-quest/#comment-2 I attending a conference on social networking last week. There are 6.8m myspace users in the UK and 2.7m on facebook, but they are convinced that facebooks will overtake myspace by the end of the year. Someone however questioned the quality of sites like myspace - he claimed to have registered as a "sheep", and by the end of the week had 50 new friends! I attending a conference on social networking last week. There are 6.8m myspace users in the UK and 2.7m on facebook, but they are convinced that facebooks will overtake myspace by the end of the year. Someone however questioned the quality of sites like myspace – he claimed to have registered as a “sheep”, and by the end of the week had 50 new friends!

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