I am so envious of everyone dining on turkey and stuffing and various pies today! Thanksgiving is such a big deal in the US! We have had our Thanskgiving so I can’t complain - as I had turkey and all the fixings last month…

So instead of whining, I’d like to wish our American clients and colleagues a Happy Thanksgiving!

Talk to you all on Monday when you are back at work!

Darlene

This is a webinar being put on by Yahoo! which will cover consumer’s search and shopping trends during the Holiday season including online / offline purchase behaviors, search volume trends, the combined impact of search and display on consumer engagement and spend. The webinar will conclude with search best practices for the Holiday season.

Start Time: 11/15/2007 12:00 PM
(GMT-08:00) Pacific Time (US and Canada); Tijuana
Duration: 01:00:00

Register for this one hour webinar.

Google Analytics is in the process of adding some fantastic new features to their web analytics software! So far I have had the opportunity to explore their new Site Search feature which provides details on the search terms people have used WITHIN your website - what are people searching for once they are already on your website?

This new report can be found under the content section of the Google Analytics dashboard once it has been configured in your profile. Some of the interesting reports that are emerging include:

• Percentage of your website visits that involved using your search function vs. visits that did not use it - the first site I have looked at has a 5% usage rate - seems good considering the search function is not located on every page of the website!
• Search Terms - For each of these search terms, you can see a number of relevant statistics that provide insight into how visitors respond to your internal search engine. For example, by checking the Total Unique Searches, you can determine which search terms visitors use most on your site. You’ll also be able to answer questions like, “Which search terms cause my visitors to search again?” by checking % Search Refinements.
• Start Pages - is your search box on every page of your website? Find out which page drives more searches
• Destination Page: Where do visitors who search on a specific term go after searching? If the answer is a press release you may want to rethink your internal search tool and the data it presents!

If you would like some assistance in setting up site search on your website or within Google Analytics, please contact us.

World Usability Day 2007 is being hosted by the Ottawa Usability Consortium (OUC), an organization of usability professionals and academics who promote usability through a range of activities throughout the year.

World Usability Day is for everyone who’s ever asked questions such as “Why doesn’t this work right?” and “What am I supposed to do with this now?” World Usability Day aims to raise awareness and visibility of usability engineering and user-centered design. This year’s theme is Healthcare.

Join us on November 8th at the RA Center and enter to win a pair of Ottawa Senators tickets just for dropping by our booth!

Details on the program are available at OUC.

I went to access the Google Analytics URL builder today only to be confronted with “We’re sorry, but the information you’ve requested cannot be found. Please try searching or browsing the Help Center.” *argh* This is not the first time Google has moved the tool and not performed a 301 redirect. What gives?

I have found the new location of the Google Analytics URL Builder for those who may be looking for it.

Shame on Google for not using redirects when they move pages around!