Content Dashboard displays content performance

The Content Dashboard shows an overview of the following:

• the number of Content items that Optimizely Content Recommendations processed
• the number of unique topics (generated by natural language processing (NLP))
• the average number of topics per content item

The graph shows when content was imported and ingested.

Click Compare to compare data to the previous period for which data was gathered. A dotted plot line is overlaid on the current data, and you can see whether there is an increase or decrease in activity.

Filtering lets you analyze your content repository in different ways so you can determine whether content is driving conversions and encouraging prospects further down the sales process. For filtering examples, see Filtering Content Recommendations.

The following scenarios describe several uses for the Content Dashboard.

• A content editor wants to know which other topics are mentioned along with a particular topic of interest.
• A content editor wants to reduce the amount of content being created and keep it more focused.
• A content editor wants to group content in a clear and concise way.
• A content creator wants to see which topics were extracted from a content item.
• A website owner wants to know what are the most talked about topics across all content.
• A website owner wants to know where the majority of their content is across multiple locations. A content creator wants to see what topics they covered in a content item they just created.

In each scenario, you want to know which topics are published more and how content volume against each topic changes over time.

You have the following view:

• Topics
• Sources
• Content List
• Sections
• Flows
• Properties

Topics

The Topics view shows how often a topic appears in the processed content. In the following example, Investment appears four times in the content.

Sources

The Sources view shows the sources (URL origins, such as baring.epi-us.net/) of content items. If a new source is added, its content is ingested and processed. You can filter and save Sources views for frequent use, and share a view with a linked URL. Saved filters are shown in the All Sources menu.

Adding an RSS feed

An RSS feed (such as http://www.optimizely.com/?feed=RSS) has an Active/Paused toggle button to activate the source.

• Title. Enter the name of the source from which you want to extract content.
• Approval. Enable to automatically approve content from the source.

  Unapproved content interactions are still tracked and contributes to profile optimization. However, they cannot appear as a recommendation to a user within a widget.

• Output Display. Select the type of output you want to extract from the source.
  • Make the full content available
  • Only include the abstract
  • Only include a link to the original content
• Override Existing Content. If a piece of content is ingested from another source, enable this option to override existing content with potentially new data from the new source. This saves space at the expense of losing access to older content.

When you click Save, the source is added to the list.

Content List

The Content List view shows each content item that is successfully processed for tracking. The content list also displays associated sections next to content items, which helps you create filters to refine sections.

You can filter and save Content views for frequent use. Saved filters are shown in the All Content menu. You also can reprocess the content.

Get more details by clicking content items in the view. Details let you determine whether content is being ingested as intended. The details include:

• Topics and their relevance (displayed by size)
• URL
• Source
• Publish and import date
• Text content
• Metadata associated with the content
• Images linked to the content

Reprocessing content

You can reprocess content in the following situations:

• You want to re-evaluate the topics that were picked up (because of NLP changes).
• You want to re-evaluate the content body after content scraping fixes (for example, remove non-unique content elements on a page, such as a disclaimer).
• The content has moved and you want Content Recommendations to update the URL.
• The content editor has changed the article.
• The content editor has added or changed metadata and you want to pick it up (want this to go into a section as a result, see case below).

To re-analyze content that is in the system, (that is, content that is already ingested), do the following:

1. To process content again, select All Content > Select All.

   

2. Select Actions > Reimport, then click Apply to All Content.

   

Sections

The Sections view shows groups of content based on flow rules. You can assign multiple flows to a section. A piece of content can be in more than one section provided the rules for creating it are not mutually exclusive.

For example you create one flow with published before X date, and another with published after X date.

You define sections when setting up Content Recommendations. You can filter and save Section views for frequent use, and share a view with a linked URL. Saved filters are shown in the All Sections menu.

Click a section name in the list to edit its attributes.

Deleting a section

To remove an associated flow from a section, click Bin (trash can icon). To restore a removed flow, click Restore (back arrow icon).

Click Move To Bin to delete the section.

Click View Content in the edit view to see the content that the section groups.

Flows

The Flows view lets you create and view rules for sections. Create rules based on titles, URLs, or metadata to group content.

Click Create Flow, then enter a flow name and rules. For example, the following example flow called International sports is defined as the Source is at least one of Episerver or century.epi-us.net, and Topic is at least one of 2020 Summer Olympics, 2014 Winter Olympics, 2014 FIFA World Cup, or 2003 Rugby World Cup. The flow rules found 2 content items that will be automatically given approval status. As other content items that satisfy these criteria are added, this flow will approve them.

• Approve. If the criteria match, approve the content item.
• Move to Bin. If the criteria match, move the content item to the Bin (denying content from being ingested).
• Feature. If the criteria match and this is enabled, the content is given priority recommendation, even if the visitor already interacted with the content.
• Add to Sections. Click the field to select from existing sections where the content should get associated. For example, you might have a content section and a documentation section about financial issues.

  You can create a new section by entering a new section name in the Add to Sections field.

• Options. Content Recommendations shows how many content items match the criteria. Click Preview to see the matching content. Upon viewing this, you may want to refine the flow rules. Enable the check box to apply the rules to existing content items when you click Save.

  Preview only shows ten items as an example; not the full list of items. (Image shows three.) To see the full list of content, mimic the flow within the Content Dashboard.

  

Making changes to an existing flow

A section is a group of content. A content item can exist in multiple sections.

You can set up a flow as follows:

1. Set up the original flow as follows:

   

2. Add another condition to make the flow more granular.

   

3. Filter the Content view by flipping the condition.

   

4. Modify the flow action for when the content does not match the flow.

   Move to Bin deletes content from the instance; it does not remove content from the flow.

   

5. Click Apply to X existing content items.

Troubleshooting flows

In the Options view, you can evaluate the existing content count to determine whether a flow is becoming less or more granular.

• If the flow is becoming less granular, the count goes up for content that matches the flow.
  • Edit the flow and select Apply to X existing content items, which performs the flow action rules against the historical content and any new content.
• If the flow is becoming more granular, the count goes down for content that matches the flow.
  • Use the content list filters to select content that previously matched this flow (essentially re-creating the flow rules) with the opposite of the more granular rule you were adding. Then use the actions in the content list to perform the opposite of the actions of the flow.

The following list shows common flow changes, some of which do not produce the results you might intend.

• A section has content it should not have, so you update the flow to be more granular and click Apply to X existing content items.
  • This only modifies a section moving forward, not retroactively. So Apply to X content items does nothing because the content is already in the section.
• A section has content that it should not have. So you update the flow to be more granular and reprocess the content.
  
  • Reprocessing the content does not re-evaluate flow rules. So the existing content stays in the section. Reprocessing achieves nothing but potentially eliminates manual updates to the content.
• You added metadata to content to identify the section where the content should belong. You create the flow and then reprocess the content to pick up that metadata in that section.
  
  • Reprocessing content does not re-evaluate flow rules. So although the new metadata is captured, you need to run the flow with Apply to X existing content items after it is reprocessed, or update the flow after the reprocessing.
• A section does not have all the content it needs, so you make the rule more broad and click Apply to X existing content items.
  
  • This is correct because historical content matching is added, and future content is evaluated against this when it is imported.
• You create a new section, produce a flow, and click Apply to X content items.
  
  • This is correct because historical content matching is added, and future content is evaluated against this when it is imported.

Properties

The Properties view lets you create unique tracking scripts for your site.

You can add a web property.

The Add Web Property view has the following fields.

• Title. Enter the name of the new property.
• Hostnames. Enter domains and sub-domains you want to whitelist for content ingestion. Only domains or sub-domains on this list are ingested. Place each name on its own line.
• Collections. Enter a new collection (that is, a theme or topic such as finance, or retirement), or select from existing collections from a drop-down.

When you click Save, the Tracking JavaScript view appears. This view has on-screen instructions to help you set up the property.

• User identification. Select the option that best describes the visitors of this property. In most cases, select the default option.
• Automatic Event Tracking. Enable only if your site loads content dynamically.
• PDF Tracking. Experimental. Enable to track PDF files.

• Caveats. Contact Optimizely for a custom solution.
• Canonical Tags. See Consolidate duplicate URLs.
• Published Dates. Add article meta tags to your webpage. See https://ogp.me/#type_article.
• Include code. Add the following JavaScript code in the <head> tags.

  You need this only if you are deploying with a manual installation. You do not need to deploy a tracking script again via manual installation if Content Recommendations was installed from a NuGet package, because tracking is included in that installation.

  

• Track Events. Optionally, add event calls (consume, like, dislike, share, comment, group, and exit) to the webpage to track other personalization events.
• Tracking Conversions. Optionally, add a convert event to the webpage to track conversions.

  Content Recommendations cannot ingest granular conversion-level data, such as Order ID, price, and so on.

  

Click Done at the top of the view.

To return to the Web Property view, click Tracking JavaScript in the right pane. Click Edit (the pencil icon) to update settings, such as for updating or removing hostnames.