Happy Easter/ Good Friday!
I read a Google Analytics paper (click here) recently about digital attribution and how most advertisers are unhappy about last-click attribution but yet 54% continue to use last-click attribution.
For the uninitiated, attribution is the process of assigning credit for a favorable outcome (e.g., a sale, click on a request for more information, registration to a mailing list, etc) on a website to the various sources that led the visitor to the website. The complication arises because a visitor may click on a search ad on her first visit, a banner on her second visit, and eventually buy during a visit initiated by an organic search. How would you attribute the sale to these different sources? Last-click attribution is a technique where the last source leading to the favorable outcome gets all the credit. Most people agree that's a dumb way of looking at the digital/multi-channel/ multi-device world (but are doing precious little about it).
Attribution is important because it allows the advertiser to correctly price the value of a keyword (on a particular search engine) or the value of TRPs on a network TV ad or the value of a banner on a particular social media website or the value of an affiliate lead. The accuracy of the value computation will become a source of significant competitive advantage in the emerging digital and multi-channel era.
Some smart folks have moved beyond last-click attribution to give weightage to sources contributing to visits leading up to the favorable outcome. My question is : How do you know that your attribution technique is working?
My suggestion is that the advertiser should test various attribution techniques to understand the pricing of various keyword-engine, banner-publisher, TV TRP-creative combinations using data over recent time periods using these alternative techniques. the technique that yields a statistically stable estimate of pricing should be chosen.
The other thing that an advertiser should do is analyze the contribution (to a favorable outcome) of a first visit, the last visit, a visit in the last n days, etc by type of source (Search Engine, Publisher, Social media website, affiliate, etc) using a decision tree. This will help understand typical patterns of visits leading up to the 'successful' visit.
Friday, April 6, 2012
Thursday, February 9, 2012
Amazon launches as Junglee.com in India! Is it a big deal?
Amazon launched as Junglee in India earlier this week. It is a price comparison site for various merchants to list their products and provide prices. Already quite a few significant Indian vendors (homeshop18, indiaplaza, healthkart, uRead, bookadda, etc) have listed their products on the website.
So, with the brand name of Amazon, one would think this will be a major development in the Indian online market. Right?
Well I don't think so.
Amazon has launched this price comparison site (and not an ecommerce website) only because Indian law prohibits 100% foreign direct investment (FDI) in multi-brand retail. Foreign investors who want to own Indian retail operations (e.g., international private equity firms, foreign internet retailers) have typically invested in the 'supply chain back-end' operations of retailers or in 'wholesale cash-and-carry' operations. Amazon apparently is not interested in playing such games.However let's be clear that Amazon will launch its own store-front in India the very day that Indian government allows FDI in multi-brand retail.
Given that scenario, it is likely that Junglee is only an attempt by Amazon to learn about the Indian ecommerce market and understand the price sensitivities of the Indian consumer. They are also getting pricing information freely from their competitors !! I assume many of the sellers listed would only be too happy to be acquired by Amazon when the time is right.
However some of the bigger players in the Indian market (flipkart, snapdeal, dealsandyou, fashionandyou, yebhi, myntra, etc) seem to be staying away from Junglee. They seem to understand the threat of giving structured pricing data to their future competitor.That is why, Junglee is unlikely to be a great force in the Indian e-commerce landscape.
Current Alexa rankings for India:
snapdeal 26
flipkart 30
homeshop18 124
Myntra 153
koovs 186
infibeam 208
indiaplaza 284
Junglee 533
While these rankings are based on 3 month averages and Junglee is likely to rise in rankings over the next 3 months, there is also a honeymoon effect which is likely to wane (also as buyers see lot of items with only 1-2 sellers).
My bet is that Junglee will make it to top 200 within the next 3 months, but will not generate as much traffic as the leading Indian e-commerce sites.
So, with the brand name of Amazon, one would think this will be a major development in the Indian online market. Right?
Well I don't think so.
Amazon has launched this price comparison site (and not an ecommerce website) only because Indian law prohibits 100% foreign direct investment (FDI) in multi-brand retail. Foreign investors who want to own Indian retail operations (e.g., international private equity firms, foreign internet retailers) have typically invested in the 'supply chain back-end' operations of retailers or in 'wholesale cash-and-carry' operations. Amazon apparently is not interested in playing such games.However let's be clear that Amazon will launch its own store-front in India the very day that Indian government allows FDI in multi-brand retail.
Given that scenario, it is likely that Junglee is only an attempt by Amazon to learn about the Indian ecommerce market and understand the price sensitivities of the Indian consumer. They are also getting pricing information freely from their competitors !! I assume many of the sellers listed would only be too happy to be acquired by Amazon when the time is right.
However some of the bigger players in the Indian market (flipkart, snapdeal, dealsandyou, fashionandyou, yebhi, myntra, etc) seem to be staying away from Junglee. They seem to understand the threat of giving structured pricing data to their future competitor.That is why, Junglee is unlikely to be a great force in the Indian e-commerce landscape.
Current Alexa rankings for India:
snapdeal 26
flipkart 30
homeshop18 124
Myntra 153
koovs 186
infibeam 208
indiaplaza 284
Junglee 533
While these rankings are based on 3 month averages and Junglee is likely to rise in rankings over the next 3 months, there is also a honeymoon effect which is likely to wane (also as buyers see lot of items with only 1-2 sellers).
My bet is that Junglee will make it to top 200 within the next 3 months, but will not generate as much traffic as the leading Indian e-commerce sites.
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