One of the most important elements of Feathr campaigns are Goals. In this article, we'll learn what a Goal is, how it interacts with your data, and how to optimize campaign Goals to track success.
A Goal is any individual action you'd like your campaign to influence and report back to you as a conversion.
You may have an overall goal for your campaign to "get x number of registrations" or "get x donation dollars," but when setting up campaigns in Feathr, the goal would be a registration or a donation.
Goals are optional in Feathr, but they are the most meaningful way of tracking the ROI of your campaigns and the overall value of Feathr to your organization.
Goals = Conversion Tracking
When launching a campaign, you almost certainly have a desired end result in mind. If your goal is quantitative, such as a donation amount or number of membership registrations, it's useful to be able to translate it into visible data. With a properly configured campaign goal, you will know exactly how many registrations your campaign influenced.
Registration, however, is just one common example. Any action can be tracked as a goal provided that your Feathr Super Pixel is present on the page where that action occurs.
When identifying a Goal in a Feathr campaign, you are telling Feathr two things:
- What action you'd like to define as a conversion for that campaign.
- What dollar amount one conversion is worth to you.
As long as you have a properly configured Goal, Feathr's campaign reporting tools will tell you:
- How many conversions the campaign earned.
- The total value of those conversions.
- A list of each unique conversion, providing insight into the digital "journey" of everyone who converted.
The Default Goal Types Explained
Every Feathr campaign offers the option to choose from five goal types that can apply different conversion tracking methods with just a few clicks.
The options below are available in the Goals step of the campaign wizard. Be sure to check the requirements for any goal type to function.
1. Visits URL
Track conversions when someone visits a specific page on your website.
This goal type is best for event registration pages, counting visits to donation landing pages, tracking visits to thank you or confirmation pages, and similar actions.
When you select Visits URL, you specify a URL, and Feathr tracks when people who saw or clicked your ads visit that page. You can match the exact URL or use "starts with" matching for dynamic URLs. Conversions will only be tracked when audience members have seen or clicked on the ads of the specific campaign that is using this goal.
The only requirement to use this goal type is having the Feathr Super Pixel on your website.
2. Submits Form
Track conversions when someone submits a specific Feathr Form.
This goal type is best for contact forms, registration forms, newsletter signups, information request forms, survey submissions, and other similar acts.
Select Submits Form, then choose from your published Feathr Forms, and conversions are recorded automatically when people submit that form.
This goal type does require using Feathr Forms. Learn more about Feathr Forms here.
3. Submits Donation Form
Track conversions when someone completes a donation through Feathr Fundraising.
When you select this goal, you will choose from your published donation forms, and conversions are recorded when donations are completed. The actual donation amount is automatically captured as the conversion value.
This goal type requires Feathr Fundraising to be set up and a donation form to be created and published. Check out this article for more information.
4. Conversion Pixel
Track custom conversion events using conversion pixels.
This goal type is best used for e-commerce purchases, complex multi-step processes, third-party form submissions, custom conversion events, shopping cart completions, and similar processes.
Select Conversion Pixel as your goal type, then select from your configured conversion pixels, which fire when specific events occur on your website. Conversion values are automatically captured if configured in the pixel.
This goal type requires conversion pixel setup in Feathr and published on the relevant pages. Learn more about advanced conversion tracking and Conversion Pixels here.
5. Enters Group
Track conversions when someone enters a specific audience Group.
The best uses for this goal type are any action that you can define using Groups in Feathr. These actions can be as simple as clicking a particular link on a page, or complex logic using multiple filters.
You select an existing Group, and conversions are recorded when people meet the Group's filter criteria. Keep in mind that conversion amounts will not be tracked automatically when using this goal type, though you may attach a goal amount by conversion manually.
What's NOT a Goal?
There is no need to configure a goal for any activity that your campaign already tracks by default. Stats such as ad clicks and page views are integral to any campaign regardless of its goal, and your Campaign Report will always provide those data.
A Goal should be an additional action beyond what is reported to you by default. Take a look at this article about Campaign Reports to learn about everything your report will tell you, even if you have not established a specific Goal.
Goals and Groups
In Feathr, goals can be in the form of a Group. If you're not familiar with Groups in Feathr, you can learn about them here.
Whatever your goal is, you might build a Group that matches the criteria of your goal. That gives Feathr two crucial pieces of information that allows conversion tracking:
- Who has met the goal criteria.
- Who among that group has seen or clicked on ads from your campaign.
If your campaign goal is to increase event registrations, first you will build a Group of confirmed attendees, then apply it as the goal Group in your campaign. That way Feathr can connect the two dots above and know that your campaign is reaching its goal.
Learn more about creating registration confirmation Groups here.
A Group defined as anyone who has landed on the registration vendor's confirmation page since reg opened.
Advanced Conversions
More complex activities might require a conversion pixel to accurately track conversions. Learn more about Advanced Conversions in this article.