But what if this was used against you?  What if I stuff my comments with keywords that mislead search engines in some way.  What if your post is about baseball bats and I intelligently word my comment to appear that I am talking about baseball bats, but I slip in some references to bats, as in the animal.  You think I’m having a relevant conversation with you and being a little witty.  However, with a little help from other parties, other responders make reference to my comment.  Now the stage has turned and the search engine spider sees two topics equally represented and this drives the relevance of each slightly down.

How far down does it have to drive the relevance to matter?  I guess that depends.  We all know that being in the first search position can mean much more traffic and revenue than the second search position, but how much does that really amount to when you’re talking about blog posts?  Would you take offense to someone using SEO sabotage through blog comments on you?  Would it really move the needle enough for you to spend your energy to combat it?

The thought never crossed my mind.  I just took job classifications at face value.  They either want someone short term or they don’t.  After realizing this, it is apparent that many web analysts are getting cheated.  Cheated out of health coverage, retirement, etc.

Believe it or not, the IRS makes it clear what defines a contractor vs. and employee.  The one point that I think is really the issue in our industry is the location of work performed.  I’ve taken so many calls for short-term web analytics contracts that required the analyst to be on site when there clearly was no technical reason he or she couldn’t perform the lion’s share of the work at home.  Face it, I am an employee of one of the largest brands in the world (IBM) and yet I perform all of my work from home.  I also did so when employed by Sun Microsystems.  If these massive companies can manage to make it technically possible for me to perform my obligations from home as an employee, then so can these much small, trying-to-cut-costs companies.

Honestly, I’m not asking for all these contracts to be reclassified as employed positions.  I like the contracts.  Let’s just get real.  You don’t need a web analyst in the short cube next to you.  There’s lots of talk about how amazing technology is these days.  So let’s use it!  Get on Skype!  If the analyst needs to present data, then I’m sure she won’t mind visiting on site for a couple hours.  You like the flexibility of contractors and contractors like the flexibility of being one.  Being able to control their location is part of what defines their role and allows them to be more successful.

A final added bonus to letting contractors be contractors is that your candidate pool just grew exponentially!  Your welcome.

Here are some takeaways that I gathered (and tweeted):

• Yuchun Lee made an excellent mathematical observation that showed that you really can’t spend enough money to overtake what he referred to as “earned media”.  I don’t remember the numbers off-hand.  Earned media is loosely defined as what people are saying on social networks.  It’s not something you pay for, but rather freely provided by loyal or unhappy customers.
• Yuchun Lee provided a very good reason for the competition to look out.  He said he’s not about winning the money, but rather, winning the market.  I think he’s got the right prize in mind!
• We were almost overtaken by Craig Hayman’s response as to the importance of Unica’s innovation.  He started by saying that IBM didn’t support it…instead, IBM is reliant upon it!
• Elana Anderson was the first I’ve heard to make the comparison of IBM’s fusion of Coremetrics and NetInsight as IBM’s arranged marriage.  I found this to be an amusing comparison.  So does that make me a groomsman, a ringbearer, or an usher perhaps?
• The most innovative conference swag award from me goes to Covalent Marketing – a stain remover pen.
• One presentation showed that companies are quite out of touch with the intended use of social channels.  Customers are really checking out social channels for discounts and to make purchases.  One airline has even made it possible to book a flight right on their Facebook page.
• The most amusing story I heard was about the CMO of Air France who had boarded his flight and then received a text message from Air France that his flight had been canceled.  He bewilderingly approached the pilot about this who confirmed that the flight was still scheduled to depart.  Moments later, the pilot came back to the CMO and relayed the news that he had just received – the flight was canceled!  They were both surprised how quickly the company was able to provide up to the minute flight information.
• ING was able to use Unica’s tools to drastically improve one conversion.  It required visitors to print, sign and mail a form to complete their process.  They discovered that visitors were dropping at the print step.  So they setup a campaign that automatically provided the visitor’s phone number to the call center who then called and offered to mail the form.  50% improvement!  Amazingly, customers saw this as a service, not marketing!  This is a concept that got a lot of attention.  If you do your marketing right, the end result is that it is perceived as a service and not marketing.
• Another point that I think is vital to a social marketer’s success – participate!  If you don’t have a facebook, twitter, LinkedIn, etc. account, then how can you really understand how to leverage those channels?
• Rockwell introduced a new term to me – web anthropology.  Pretty cool!  I like being a web anthropologist!
• Another great point is that we’re ALL in sales.  If you don’t like it, nobody cares.  You are in the business of selling.

I thoroughly enjoyed my week at the Unica, an IBM Company Marketing Innovation Summit (MIS2011).  I highly recommend it.  Mark Jeffries was an incredible host.  He had so many great ideas to take in.  I’m already looking forward to MIS2012!  You can take a look at all the #MIS2011 tweets on Twitter search.

http://webanalyticsconsultant.net?unique

That’s it!

This is great for use with various web analytics tool implementation such as Unica NetInsight in which regular expressions are used to define parameters in many cases.

Make this…

<script language="JavaScript">var i=0,s="",k=0;function foo()
{for(j=0;j<10;j++){for(i=0;i<10;i++){s="string1";
k=Math.floor(Math.random()*10);
for(i=20;i>9;i--){s="string2";k=i;}}}</script>

Look like this…

<script language="JavaScript">
var i = 0, s = "", k = 0;
function foo()
{
    for(j = 0; j < 10; j++)
    {
        for(i = 0; i < 10; i++)
        {
            s = "string1";
            k = Math.floor( Math.random()*10 );
        }
        for(i = 20; i > 9; i--)
        {
            s = "string2";
            k = i;
        }
    }
}
</script>

I liken this to renting out rooms in a house versus renting out the whole house. If you rent out the rooms, then it’s much easier to make ends meet if you lose one renter. If you rent the entire house, then it can be frightening if you lose your one renter.

Full-Time Contracts

Onesies are for those who appreciate some security, focus and a deeper level recognition.

• One consultant responded that he usually knows when his contract will end so preparing an exit strategy is easier.  Of course, finding the next gig may not happen in a timely manner, so have three to six months of cash reserves if it takes you a little longer than expected to find your next contract.
• Some people like the idea of working for themselves, but still want to or can only focus on one thing at a time.  Full-time contracts provide focus on one project for an extended period of time.  Usually just long enough to captivate the consultant until they are ready to move on.
• Having large projects under your belt does wonders for landing your next full-time contract.  Enough said.
• A full-time, extended contract usually means that your involvement is more mission critical and you will be spoken of highly by those who speak highly.  A glowing review does wonders when asked for references.
• Lastly, a full-time contract provides much stability and security.  Your payment schedule is steady and there are no other projects crowding you.  Your client is reliant upon your success and is not likely to bail.

Part-Time Contracts

Given cushion, part-time contracts afford the variety and engagement that the on-the-move, trend-catching consultant needs.

• As mentioned, variety is a mainstay of part-time gigs.  You may be involved in search engine optimization for one client, social analytics for another and web analytics implementation for a third.  You will never be bored.
• The ability to network is richer as you are likely to meet many more movers in various industries.  It is easy to please your clients quickly and land new gigs with those in their network.  It is also easy to upset them and have opportunities dry up around you.
• Projects are usually easier.  You may also end up with ongoing maintenance which can afford some stability.
• Developing strong time-management skills is a great part of part-time contracts.  Being able to manage multiple clients successfully will speak volumes to prospective clients.

Whatever your fancy, either method of consulting provides great flexibility and independence.  Most companies won’t appreciate you working in your pajamas or working on Saturday so you can take Wednesday off.  You are the ruler of your destiny!

Thinking about consulting?  Got consulting bruises to share?  Add your thoughts below!

Online sales conversion rates are generally accepted to be between 2% and 5%.  I really like to using the FireClick Index to keep an eye on this.  They are currently reporting the top line conversion rate at 5.00%.

So let’s assume that 5% of your traffic from Twitter makes a purchase on your site.  That’s nice, 5 out of 100 visitors from Twitter bought your products/services.

Now the hard question.  How much effort does it take on your part to get 100 of your Twitter followers to click through to your website?

Taking the general marketing conversion rate to be between 2% and 5%, we’ll optimistically say that 5% of your followers will click through.  Applying Bayes’ Theorem, that means that 0.25% of your Twitter followers will make a purchase on your website.  To make one sale, you need about 400 followers.

Now let’s look at Dell to see if this math is credible.  DellOutlet has about 1.5 million Twitter followers.  The report stated that Dell made $6.5 million.  Assuming 0.25% of their followers made a purchase makes the average purchase price at roughly $1,750.  I suppose that could be realistic considering that there are some enterprise level items available through the Dell Outlet.  [To someone in the know at Dell Outlet, I'd loooove to know how close I am to the average purchase price for Twitter visitors.]

I’m no expert at Twitter strategy, but my guess is that you need to dedicate some serious resources to get enough relevant followers to merit it as a marketing channel.  I would say it will be easier to do so if your products/services appeal to a large, diverse audience.  But if you are in a small niche, Twitter might not be the best solution.

Bottom line – Twitter is another marketing channel and requires effort too, this isn’t an easy way to profit.  It’s new, but it appears that there has been some valid success.  In the end, you really have to test out new marketing channels and compare them to how those you already use are performing.  So I wouldn’t write it off, I’d test it!

“Come on, Dustin, what is the missing factor of bounce rate?”  Ok, ok…it’s the total number of visits to that particular page.  Without that context, you run the risk of providing an empty insight.

YOU:  ”The bounce rate on the FAQ page is 90%.  We better fix that!”

SOME OTHER PERSON WHO ALWAYS PICKS AT YOUR ANALYSIS:  ”Hey, our FAQ page only gets ten visits a month!  You should have had a V-8! [sound of your head being smacked]”

So don’t forget context and breakfast when considering bounce rate and other metrics.