Impressions vs Clicks vs Leads - HELP - CONFUSION

Status
Not open for further replies.
S

seethesun

New member
Mar 1, 2009
6
0
0
Before I start...I sent and instant message and email to my AM today, but thought I would see if I could get a faster answer on here.

Can someone explain to me the difference between impressions, clicks, and leads?

I thought it was pretty self-explanatory, but looking at some stats from an affiliate network (Clickbooth) I started running an offer last night, it has me completely confused.



This is the way I see it:
  • Impressions - when something gets shown...an advertisers ad, banner, etc
  • Clicks - when the visitor clicks on your affiliate link (banner, text link, etc) and goes through to the advertiser's site
  • Leads - when they complete whatever action necessary to convert
Now, according to stats with an offer I started running late last night I have 30 impressions, 198 clicks, and no leads. That gives me a 550% CTR.

This led me to think that the stats were just off somehow because impressions would be larger than clicks, right?

Then, I started thinking about it and first of all, my landing page has nothing directly linking to the advertiser (banner or ad). The link they click through on the landing page goes to another page on my site and redirects. So if they hit my landing page without clicking it shouldn't count as an impression, right?

In addition, the offer I am running is only for US traffic. I have evidently had some international traffic because my reports show an "International Redirect" offer for the UK and Canada. I think Clickbooth will redirect international traffic to a valid offer for them so you don't miss out.

That's great, but confusing. I am showing 6 total impressions and no clicks between those two international offers, which I am not directly linking to.

This confuses me because wouldn't they have to click on my link to be redirected to that UK or Canadian offer for it show up on my reports? In that case it should also show up as a click. If they don't click, then the offer shouldn't show up on my report because there would never be a reason to send them to that offer. Seems to make sense to me.

This almost makes me start thinking that overall, the impressions are actually clicks (which the stats would be totally off) and the clicks are actually completed leads. They just haven't been credited as leads so zero leads are showing.

Otherwise, where the hell are these impressions from the UK/Canada coming from if they aren't clicking on my link?

How am I coming up with impressions in the first place for any of the offers if I am not using a banner ad or something else?

I hope that wasn't too confusing. Need any clarification let me know.

Thanks for any assistance.
 


God damn your post is long, needless to say I didn't read half of it because it started to sound like your rambling.

  • Impressions - when something gets shown...an advertisers ad, banner, etc
  • Clicks - when the visitor clicks on your affiliate link (banner, text link, etc) and goes through to the advertiser's site
  • Leads - when they complete whatever action necessary to convert
Click to expand...
Your got the definitions right, but you should never be using your networks tracking for some of this.

How does your network know how many times your landing page is shown? It doesn't. The best you can do is make a deduction between clicks from your LP to the offer vs leads. Even then, how does the network count clicks? Do they count every click or do they count unique clicks?

You should be using your own tracking (like Prosper202) to track your stats.
 
Ignore the impression part, unless you use the image script from the network(please don't do that)

Click vs leads is what important when using DT tracking.
 
Rage9 said:
God damn your post is long, needless to say I didn't read half of it because it started to sound like your rambling.

Your got the definitions right, but you should never be using your networks tracking for some of this.

How does your network know how many times your landing page is shown? It doesn't. The best you can do is make a deduction between clicks from your LP to the offer vs leads. Even then, how does the network count clicks? Do they count every click or do they count unique clicks?

You should be using your own tracking (like Prosper202) to track your stats.
Click to expand...


Thanks for sort of reading it. I realize it's not two lines...but it's not exactly a novel either.

Doesn't really help, but at least you wrote something?

I wasn't asking for the network to track the impressions of my LP.

I do use Prosper202, so I know how many times my LP was shown. I just started with Clickbooth and started my first campaign last night. So I do not currently have a tracking pixel or postback url to see conversions. Under normal circumstances I would have waited, but it was a time sensitive issue.

Waiting on the AM so I can have it posted.

Thanks.
 
redmonkey said:
Ignore the impression part, unless you use the image script from the network(please don't do that)

Click vs leads is what important when using DT tracking.
Click to expand...

Thanks. I don't use the image script so we are good there. I will ignore the impressions. Thanks for the heads up.
 
gopher said:
Your clicks are the networks impressions. Also, make sure to use the correct link.
Click to expand...

No, That's not quiet correct. Clicks are clicks, although it's not really match up with your p202 tracking, it's still pretty accurate. I could only believe that's it's one of the DT's bug that counts impressions even thought you don't use it's creative's link.
 
redmonkey said:
No, That's not quiet correct. Clicks are clicks, although it's not really match up with your p202 tracking, it's still pretty accurate. I could only believe that's it's one of the DT's bug that counts impressions even thought you don't use it's creative's link.
Click to expand...


Well, that still ends up with an issue of are the clicks really being accounted for.

Those 6 impressions I had for "international redirects"...those people would have had to click through to get redirected. It shows 6 impressions, but no clicks. So I guess the question is if those clicks aren't showing...hwow many other clicks aren't showing.

More importantly if those stats are screwed up...what about the leads?

By the way I use Prosper, but I just started with CLickbooth and didn't have my pixel or postback URL up to follow conversions
 
Hi seethesun,

If you would send me a PM with your CD account number and i'll pull your Clickbooth account up. I'd be glad to explain to you were the impressions and clicks are coming from.
 
Hey.

Here is the deal....and this is what confuses newer affiliates:

All links from a network are not created equal.

Also, all pixels record activity differently.

As crazy as it may sound I have seen campaigns where someone promoted a PPV offer with a PPC link. PPV is when you pay for impressions. Every view is recorded as an impression. However, with the quirks that exist in DirectTrack if you grab the wrong link it will count every impression as a click.

Also, not two tracking pixels are alike. Affiliates get hung up on this because they expect everything to line up with Google. The reality is that Direct Track will not be identical with Google nor with Yahoo. You will see discrepancies with regards to impressions, clicks and conversions.

Don't get hung up on it.

Conversions are usually pretty close between different tracking systems but don't expect them to match up perfectly.
 
On DT networks, offers which are US only that have international traffic on it will always redirect to another offer. These "international redirects" , will always show up as impressions rather than clicks on DT.
 
Thanks to everyone for providing some insight.

Evidently I had a legit beef. I didn't have one conversion from all the clickthroughs I ended up with. My AM went through both offers I was promoting and her clicks came up, but neither one converted when she did it either. So they are checking into what the issue is.
 
If you're afraid that you might lost leads because of just fews clicks/impressions errors, then stop promoting it...

There ain't nothing perfect. Few clicks error is nothing comparable to %50+ scrub rates.

Solved.
 
redmonkey said:
If you're afraid that you might lost leads because of just fews clicks/impressions errors, then stop promoting it...

There ain't nothing perfect. Few clicks error is nothing comparable to %50+ scrub rates.

Solved.
Click to expand...

I did stop promoting it. The day after I started.

My concern wasn't just a few clicks missing. My point was if some of it is off...then a lot of could potentially be off. Turns out conversions weren't being tracked at all. At the moment 50% sounds a hell of a lot better than 100%, but I get what you are saying.

My Prosper tracking showed over 300 click throughs (thats a 100+ difference). Unfortunately, I started it on a Saturday night so I didn't have a pixel placed to track conversions.

There may not have been any conversions that came from those, but this was targeted traffic so I have to think there would have been at least one, probably more, if their tracking was working.

They fixed the tracking problem today, but they can't (or won't) go back and determine if there were any conversions that I missed out on.

I am in no way saying they are screwing me because my AM was helpful in solving the issue. But just saying "unfortunately, nothing we can do to find out if anyone converted" leaves a bad taste in your mouth.

In the end, I will definitely look at other networks first before I run offers with them in the future.

Thanks again for everyone's input.
 
Status
Not open for further replies.
Top Bottom