New in FeedBlitz 2: Part 2 - AdSense and Visitor Tracking

When you think about it, there are several pages in FeedBlitz that are really a part of your site, not ours. These are the subscription signup and landing pages. (By the way we've considerably reduced the amount of text and graphics on these pages, you'll be pleased to hear, making the whole signup process much, much simpler for users).

Now, if these are your pages, shouldn't you be able to track visitor activity like you do on the rest of your site? Yes, you should.

And if these are your pages, shouldn't you be able to add your ad network's ads to those pages, like the rest of your site? Yes, you should.

So, starting with FeedBlitz 2, you can serve your ads and analyze your metrics using your tools. It won't cost you a penny more - nor require you to share any revenues - either. Now you have the chance to monetize and analyze the landing pages we serve on your behalf.

Right now we're supporting:

• Google AdSense
• Google Analytics (aka Urchin)
• Site Meter
• AWStats

We'll be adding other services over time; if you want yours added please let us know! (Squeaky wheels will get oiled faster, if you see what I mean).

Google AdSense Integration

FeedBlitz can now add your Google AdSense ads (plus you keep ALL your revenues) to the landing pages. The ads are placed at the top of the relevant pages; you can see an example running now in the signup for this blog at http://www.feedblitz.com/f?Sub=84

To enable your AdSense content on your pages, you need to know your publisher ID. It's a text string that looks like "pub-1234567" where "1234567" is replaced by a long string that is your identifier.

To determine your identifier, go to https://www.google.com/AdSense/code#section=3 and copy your code. You may need to paste it into a text editor to get the code exactly (don't re-key - a typo will mean that someone else will get your revenues!). Just extract the "pub-...." text.

Then, go to www.feedblitz.com/f?lists and go to the Syndication Setup Advertising and Visitor Analysis menu for your content. Pick Google AdSense as your ad network, and paste your publisher id (no quotes!) into the box below and save it. Then go to your subscription page and you will see it in action.

Now, Google AdSense is a context sensitive program; it searches the text on the page to figure out what to show you. Since there isn't much context on these pages the results for the first few weeks may be iffy, but stick with it. We're using tags inside the page to guide the AdSense computers to the content that is specifically yours (your feed title and description), so after a while the ads shown will become more relevant to your readers.

[Update: At FeedBlitz 2's launch last week this was a premium-only service; we've enabled it for everyone now (well, I want you to find this so valuable you'll be able to fund an upgrade to one of our premium services...). So if you tried it and nothing happened, please try again...]

Visitor Tracking

Since we serve these pages on your behalf, how about adding them to your site metrics / log analysis solution? Right now we're supporting three different options (if your service isn't listed, write to us!). All these options are found on the same page as the ad network settings.

1. Google Analytics ("Urchin")

Select Google Analytics as your metrics solution and enter your ID (starting "UA-") in the field. If you don't know your ID, follow the instructions at https://www.google.com/support/analytics/bin/answer.py?answer=31845

2. SiteMeter

You'll need your SiteMeter codename - pick SiteMeter from the drop down and enter your code name into the form.

3. AWStats / Generic

If you are self-hosted or run your own log analysis not using a service, pick "AWStats" and specify a URL for FeedBlitz to fetch. You can see this file in your logs and use it to analyze visits from your FeedBlitz pages.