Last Friday we deployed an update to the analytics dashboard allowing customers to download an ‘executive summary’ in PDF format.  Long-time customers will recognize this feature from before however it has been updated to include our new reports.

Analytics Summary Report was posted at Blogging PRWeb. | http://www.bloggingprweb.com

This Friday we are going to be rolling out several additional updates to our analytics dashboard including the following:

• Hovers for ‘impressions breakdown’ - We will be adding hover menus with help text over the various fields in the breakdown table for impressions to better explain what those different values mean.
• Table with exact counts for impressions, reads and interactions - We will be adding a table into the impressions, reads and interactions reports showing the actual count for each of these statistics by day.
• Premium impressions – Premium impressions was an idea we had during development that was rolled out as part of our beta release.  Unfortunately, we weren’t able to acquire the proper data and will be putting that feature on hold for the time being (until we can get the proper data to filter through).

You may also see some changes to our category taxonomy.  We’ve made these changes for a number of reasons.  First, we’ve added a lot of categories over time based on customer request and it was simply time to take a step back and evaluate the overall quality of the taxonomy scheme.  Second, we wanted to start imposing more of a hierarchical logic on the overall scheme that better organizes more specific categories (i.e. chemistry) into broader categories (i.e. science).

Finally, I wanted to mention that we are in the midst of making some significant changes to the layout of the PRWeb news release itself that are going to be a big step forward in terms of search-friendliness and overall look-and-feel.  There are also going to be some goodies thrown in.  We’ll be talking more about some of these upcoming changes in the next several weeks so stay tuned!

More Updates to Analytics, Category Updates and More was posted at Blogging PRWeb. | http://www.bloggingprweb.com

On January 8, we rolled out a batch of fixes to the release editing tool and analytics dashboard, including the following:

Release editing tool

• Increased the lag on pop-up help menus – Although many users (particularly those newer to the release creation process) liked the pop-up help menus, the velocity with which they appeared was fast so we have introduced a 2.5 second delay on the pop-up.
• Keyword character limitation on URL customization field – We’ve introduced a field-based 25-character limitation to each of the URL customization fields.  The limitation was already there however it was being represented as a validation error instead of being field-based.
• Tickers for quotables and headlines - There are now tickers available for both quotables and headlines so you can see how much runway you have for these pieces of content.

Analytics updates

• Inclusion of export functionality – ‘Export’ functionality was absent in the beta launch of analytics and has been added back in (in PDF, CSV and XML).
• Introducing ‘legend’ into impressions, reads and interactions - Graphs for impressions, reads and interactions show both cumulative and counts by day.  We’ve added a legend back in to help people distinguish the difference between these two.

In addition, there were several additional updates to both the release editing tool and analytics dashboard probably not worth noting at this point in time.

This Friday we are going to be introducing some additional fixes to the analytics dashboard that I’ll be adding to a subsequent blog posting.

Updates to Analytics and the Release Editor was posted at Blogging PRWeb. | http://www.bloggingprweb.com

This is notification that we will be updating the PRWeb customer analytics dashboard in the next several weeks.  The new dashboard will contain the same reports that are currently available in PRWeb however the user interface has been refined and several new reports have been added.  We are all eagerly anticipating the launch and we will be providing more detailed information on the updates as we get closer to the launch date.

Analytics Updates was posted at Blogging PRWeb. | http://www.bloggingprweb.com

Some of our users may notice that we have made some updates to the e-mails we send after the news release has gone live.  Formerly we distributed an e-mail after the news release had been live for 14 days, notifying customers of how many reads and impressions they have received.  Based on numerous customer requests for additional notification of their traction, we have added an additional e-mail that will go out 7 days after the release has gone live.

Second, we have added a link to each of these follow-up e-mails that will run a search query for the title of the customer’s news release.  This query will provide you with a good estimation for the online pickup of your news release.

For example, take a news release we issued July 7, Go Green and Save with Top Amtrak Rail Routes.

Running a query for the title of the release (in quotes) in Google provides us with the following:

Click thumbnail to view full size image

Since the title of the news release is basically a unique identifier, the results displayed will all be pertinent to the news release.  In this example there were 780 results according to Google, which means that the news release showed up on 780 different Web pages. 

So our follow-up e-mails will all contain queries for your news release so you are able to track your online pickup. 

Tracking Online Pickup with Google was posted at Blogging PRWeb. | http://www.bloggingprweb.com

Starting in November, we will be sending out analytics updates via e-mail, two weeks after their release is published through PRWeb.  These e-mails will simply recap. the total number of impressions and reads that the release has received up to that point in time, with a link to your news management console so you can log-in and get access to the full range of your press release analytics.

E-mail with your Top-line Analytics was posted at Blogging PRWeb. | http://www.bloggingprweb.com

PRWeb’s distribution reporting received a complete overhaul to enable more detailed reporting of your press release distribution. You now have the ability to compare your press release statistics with other press release statistics in your account and against the average distribution of press releases for the industry targets you selected. These new statistics will be enabled for press releases launched on and after March 26, 2007.

Furthermore, you will be able to create distribution reports for your clients and managers, to create highly-customizable, professionally-designed PDF files detailing distribution of your choice of press releases, and to view a world map detailing the areas where your press release readers came from. These features are enabled with the Media Visibility package.

New Distribution Reporting was posted at Blogging PRWeb. | http://www.bloggingprweb.com