Learn about what the Podsights pixel is, how it may be used, and how to install it.
Applies to: Brands, Agencies
Overview
Podsights is a reporting and attribution platform for podcast advertising. To effectively measure the performance of an advertising campaign, Podsights integrates with both the podcast and the advertiser's website. Podcast integration is achieved via an Analytics Prefix (appended within the RSS feed of the podcast) or your hosting provider's Tracking URL. Advertiser integration is achieved via our JavaScript SDK which is installed on the brand's website.
What does that actually mean? To activate Podsights attribution measurement, an advertiser pixels their website (or app) to fit the other half of the attribution puzzle piece.
There are two pixel categories you should understand:
- Visits: when a user downloads a podcast with your ad and consequentially visits your website, a visit is registered. The sum of your visitors makes up your conversion rate, so your goal should be to capture visits from all webpages a podcast listener lands on. Place the Page View pixel on your website's homepage, landing page(s), and across the entire website, especially places where one may be directed from search or social. The page view pixel will collect page views and unique household visits within the attribution window.
- Conversions: depending on your campaign KPIs, you may want to install additional pixels to understand not just how many households are visiting, but what actions they are taking. Common conversion events include:
- Leads, purchases, add to cart, etc... Podsights pre-categorizes conversion events for you in the dashboard.
How to install a Podsights pixel
A Podsights pixel should be installed at least two weeks before the start of a campaign. It is imperative that this is placed prior to the start of the campaign, as Podsights cannot collect pixel data retroactively. While it's not a technical requirement, this timeline allows for enough runway to troubleshoot or alter the pixel as needed. If your pixel is not installed or is installed incorrectly, your campaign's performance data will be inaccurate or incomplete. There's no way to retroactively receive your website data, which is why installation is so critical.
First time using Podsights?
- Configure Brand: When you log in for the first time, you will have to associate your organization with a brand.
- Search your brand in the Brand Name field to see if it already exists. If it does not, you will see Create brand next to the name you have entered. Select your brand.
- After entering your brand name, select your Brand Industry.
- Note: Brand Industry may automatically populate if your brand already exists. If the wrong industry populates, you can use the drop down menu to select the correct industry for your brand.
- Once you're ready, click Create brand to start.
2. Create a Pixel: Now you will automatically be prompted to generate your Page View pixel.
-
- Start by selecting all installation methods you will be using by clicking the Methods drop-down menu. JavaScript is the default, but we offer integrations with AppsFlyer, Branch, Adjust and Kochava. Learn more about each here.
- Next, you will need to input your website domain in the Pixel Domain field.
- Optional: Toggle on Alias Events if you wish to match conversions back to your internal systems.
- Advanced users can optionally pass us an internal user ID along with each event, which we can pass back to you when reporting on conversions. You can then match back the conversions we attribute with your internal systems.
- Before clicking Create Pixel, you must select who will handle the pixel installation. That can either be you or another member of your organization.
3. Add Events: Next, you will be prompted to Add Events. From here, you can choose to Add 1 Suggested Event (Page View), or create additional events. Your Page View pixel will collect page views for web and mobile installs for mobile. Depending on which type of installation method you choose in the previous step, that is what will show by default. To add another event:- Type your event into the Event Name field to search the most commonly used events. If you do not find an event you need, you can also create a Custom event.
- Chose descriptive & accurate event names so your colleagues know what's what! The event names you create will show up in the dashboard and in reporting exactly as you have entered them here.
- Note: Don't worry if you missed a few things here, you'll have the opportunity to edit and add to this list later.
- Start by selecting all installation methods you will be using by clicking the Methods drop-down menu. JavaScript is the default, but we offer integrations with AppsFlyer, Branch, Adjust and Kochava. Learn more about each here.
- Generate additional event pixels: This part is easy! Our tools will generate the code for you based on your inputs - no need to edit the code.
- Navigate to Manage > Your Pixels and click onto the alpha-numeric Pixel ID.
- From here, you will see the pixel(s) you have already setup and you will see the option to Add New Event.
- Note: To edit any events you have already setup, click the pencil icon.
- Note: To edit any events you have already setup, click the pencil icon.
- After editing or adding, the code will automatically be generated for you to use based on your installation method. Directly copy and paste this code.
- Navigate to Manage > Your Pixels and click onto the alpha-numeric Pixel ID.
-
- While we support third-party installation, we cannot troubleshoot any third-party installations.
- Need help? If you or your developer need help, let us know. Our Platform Success Engineers can assist those installing the pixel. Keep in mind that we will be able to speak to our code, not necessarily how to explicitly install it on your website.
6. Verify the pixel is collecting the data you need.
Our tools will show you if data is being collected, but we cannot verify if it's collecting the right information. *Keep in mind that the verification tools show all activity on your website, not just attributed activity* Verify your pixel installation in these two ways:
-
- Event log graph shows activity at the expected volume. Compare the daily activity to your internal data. Example: if your website typically receives 20,000 visits per day, but your graph shows 10,000 per day, then the pixel was likely not installed across the full site. If the graph shows 100 events per day, it's likely that the pixel was installed only on one page. In this case, you would resend the pixel script to your developer with instructions to install and check activity.
- Verified event table shows activity as expected. Now we need to ensure that the data we need is being sent. For example, if we are tracking a purchase event on a check out page, we want to ensure that we are not only registering the event, but also that we are being passed relevant data like product name or value of purchase.
Best Practices
Place your Podsights Page View pixel to collect views and visits. You will need to install the Page View Pixel on at least 3 pages, however, we recommend that you place the main pixel on every page of your website (site-wide). The more website data, the more attribution data!