I was talking to a reporter from the Boston Globe recently on how Search Data might be used for Financial Gain. Immediately I thought back to the situation with HitWise, when I saw instances of people searching on terms like "HitWise Sold" more than a year in advance on when it happened, earlier this year, to Experian.
You could say…that when I traced back those referrals to my site, it often went to a financial institution … meaning that, in some sense, my search query log could be used as a possible barometer of what might be.
I guess anyone's search query log could be used that way - if you had enough searches on your site. A large newspaper site, like the New York Times, would be the perfect type of site to datamine for acquisition data….. I'm not telling anyone to do this … just that it could be done - and how well depends on …well.. how good you are at searching.
Here's an example - HitWise - an obvious example
| Keyword | Visits | Pages/Visit | Avg. Time on Site | % New Visits | Bounce Rate | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1. | 76 | 1.55 | 00:02:37 | 78.95% | 69.74% | |
| 2. | 76 | 1.66 | 00:01:43 | 64.47% | 65.79% | |
| 3. | 27 | 1.33 | 00:00:54 | 92.59% | 77.78% | |
| 4. | 21 | 1.05 | 00:00:09 | 80.95% | 95.24% | |
| 5. | 18 | 1.67 | 00:02:44 | 88.89% | 83.33% | |
| 6. | 8 | 1.12 | 00:00:09 | 75.00% | 87.50% | |
| 7. | 8 | 1.00 | 00:00:00 | 87.50% | 100.00% | |
| 8. | 5 | 1.20 | 00:00:07 | 0.00% | 80.00% | |
| 9. | 5 | 1.40 | 00:03:17 | 0.00% | 60.00% | |
| 10. | 5 | 1.40 | 00:01:02 | 100.00% |
80.00% |
|
The data is being shown is from February 2006 till today - September 20th, 2007. The first spike was on August 20th, 2006.
| Landing Page | Visits | Pages/Visit | Avg. Time on Site | % New Visits | Bounce Rate | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1. |
/2007/01/was_hitwise_sold_yet.html
|
10 ±70% | 1.11 | 00:00:04 | 100.00% | 88.89% |
| 2. |
/2007/04/hitwise_sold_to_experian_for_2.html
|
10 ±70% | 1.56 | 00:02:01 | 100.00% | 66.67% |
And look at who is visiting (asking if "Hitwise is sold"):
| Network Location | Visits | Pages/Visit | Avg. Time on Site | % New Visits | Bounce Rate | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1. |
SBC Internet Services
|
3 * | 2.00 | 00:02:48 | 66.67% | 33.33% |
| 2. |
Telstra Internet
|
3 * | 1.67 | 00:01:41 | 100.00% | 66.67% |
| 3. |
Verizon Internet Services
|
2 * | 2.00 | 00:01:45 | 100.00% | 50.00% |
| 4. |
AC-Net Asennus Oy / NetSonic
|
1 * | 2.00 | 00:06:50 | 100.00% | 0.00% |
| 5. |
Allens Arthur Robinson Operations Pty Ltd
|
1 * | 1.00 | 00:00:00 | 100.00% | 100.00% |
| 6. |
British Telecommunications
|
1 * | 2.00 | 00:00:38 | 100.00% | 0.00% |
| 7. |
Comcast Cable
|
1 * | 1.00 | 00:00:00 | 0.00% | 100.00% |
| 8. |
Financial News
|
1 * | 1.00 | 00:00:00 | 100.00% | 100.00% |
| 9. |
Google
|
1 * | 1.00 | 00:00:00 | 100.00% | 100.00% |
| 10. |
Lehman Brothers
|
1 * | 1.00 | 00:00:00 | 100.00% | 100.00% |
Unfortunately, Google Analytics just can't hone in deeper by the actual visit (ie: I'd have to set my range to August 20th, 2006 to get details of the first visit for "Hitwise sold" but you can be it was probably one of the three "network locations" listed above.
So what do we have here….. someone from a financial institution … Lehman Brothers…..is wondering about HitWise being sold, way before anything is formally announced about HitWise being for sale.
Of course, I knew, because I was watching the data coming in …. but I bet, you could go a lot further than I just did.
Just a thought on the last day of September, 2007.
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