Web Property Basics
What are web property groups?
The content you create for your audience exists across many different sites, hosted on different web properties. It might be content on domains you own or even branded content on third-party sites. You can monitor content on these different sites by tracking each of the relevant web properties in Conductor.
When you add a web property to Conductor, you add it to a collection of web properties called a web property group. These groups contain one or more web properties that you want to track together—so you can report on their performance on search engine results pages for a single set of keywords, and see a more holistic view of that performance.
You might create a web property group for:
- A specific brand your organization owns.
- Different regions your organization operates in.
- Separate business units.
- Any number of other reasons that provide value when you track separate web properties together.
You can create web property groups in the Web Properties activity.
What do I need to know about web property groups?
There are also some details about how you create and maintain web properties and web property groups:
Display Names
- You cannot create a web property group or comparison web property group if it has no display name. All groups require display names.
- You cannot create a web property group or comparison web property group if it has a display name that already exists in your account. This includes archived groups. Consider renaming the group you want to create or renaming the existing group.
Maximum number of web properties in a single group
There is no limit to the number of web properties that can be added to a single web property group.
A given web property may belong to only one group
You cannot add a web property nor a comparison web property if that web property already belongs to an existing web property group or comparison web property group.
Web property groups with a single web property
Creating a web property group with a single web property counts against your total number of groups. You cannot create a new web property group if you have reached the total number of groups for your account.
Comparisons tracked against multiple web property–search engine combinations
Comparing a web property across multiple search engines or languages associated with a single tracked web property counts as multiple comparisons against your total number. You cannot create a comparison web property group if you have reached the total number of tracked comparison web property groups for your account. For example, comparing a comparison web property against example.com on Google US / English, Google Canada / English, and Google Canada / French would count as three comparison web properties.
Comparison web properties must be compared to tracked web property groups
You cannot create a comparison web property group nor add a comparison web property to a group without choosing a tracked web property group and search engine against which you want to compare it. Comparison groups do not appear in platform reports unless they are associated with a web property group and search engine.
You cannot compare overlapping web properties
Comparison web properties cannot be compared to a tracked web property group that includes overlapping pages. For example, you cannot compare comparison property "blog.example.com" to your tracked web property group "example.com".
Additionally, you cannot compare multiple comparison web properties to a single tracked web property group if those comparison web properties have overlapping pages. For example, you cannot compare both "blog.example.com" and "example.com" to a tracked web property group.
Archived comparison web properties must have comparisons to active web properties to be unarchived
You cannot unarchive a comparison web property or web property group that has no comparisons to an active tracked web property group.
What is "Content" in Conductor and what should I add?
Content in Conductor can refer to the web properties you tell the platform to track keyword data for. This can be content on your web properties or your configured comparison web properties.
You can add any of the following web properties to track:
- Root domains
- Subdomains
- Subfolders
- Individual pages
- Amazon stores
- YouTube channels
These might represent a number of types of online content such as blogs, shops, social profiles, earned media, press articles, or sponsored posts.
Your Web Properties
What content counts as yours? Consider any sites you report on to stakeholders and executives in your organization as indicators of your performance.
The most clear example are web properties your organization owns, such as the domains, subdomains, subfolders, and pages that make up your websites. But your digital presence likely exists in other places, too. Consider examples like:
- An e-commerce business that has a store page on Amazon.
- A CEO that publishes an article about their business on Business Insider.
- A epidemiologist that writes an op-ed on the New York Times' website on behalf of the University she is affiliated with.
Each of these examples reflect content that is part of those organizations' overall digital presence. Though it does not live on their websites, it still represents their brand—and has the potential to appear on search engine results pages for the keywords you care about. Like your owned content, you can track individual pages like these with Conductor.
Finally, your organization might maintain a YouTube channel or an Amazon brand. You can also add these in Conductor as web properties.
Your Comparison Web Properties
Comparison web properties represent the content you want to know more about but will not measure as your own. These might be your competitors, but may be any site or page that you want to see data for in relation to your own content.
Just like the examples listed above for your web properties, you can track comparison web properties, regardless of where it lives online. It might be:
- A domain belonging to your organization's biggest brick-and-mortar competitor.
- A competitor's YouTube channel.
- An SEO competitor that fights for rankings in Google, but is not an actual business competitor.
Identifying these web properties as comparison content lets you see more data and do more investigation into how and why they rank for the keywords you care about.
What counts as a single web property in Conductor?
Both with your web properties and your comparison web properties, each combination of domain, search engine, and language counts against the total you can track in Conductor as determined by your contract.
For example, the following each would count against your total:
- example.com tracked on Google US in English
- example.com tracked on Google US in Spanish
- example.com tracked on Google Canada in English
Comparison Web Properties
What are comparison web properties?
Comparison web properties represent traditional business competitors, industry competitors, online competitors, or other web properties for which you want to gather data to compare with your tracked web properties. Account owners determine which comparison web properties Conductor collects data for in the Web Properties activity.
After you configure comparison web properties, Conductor tracks it similarly to how it tracks your web properties, identifying where it ranks in the top 100 positions for the keywords tracked in your account.
By naming competitors, you get more data to help provide a fuller picture of your performance relative to theirs.
What is the difference between a Top Ranker and Competitor?
Conductor provides information about Top Rankers and competitors. Both are important, but it's important to understand the difference.
Top Rankers
Top Rankers represent those pages (outside of your own) that are ranking in certain positions on a search engine results page (SERP). Top Rankers include:
- For tracked Google searches, any result on the first page of results.
- For tracked other searches, any result in the first ten positions of a SERP.
Competitors
Comparison web properties—which you can compare against your web properties tracked in Conductor—represents the web properties belonging to your competitors. Designating web properties for comparison tells Conductor to collect keyword data for that content from the top 100 positions on search engine results pages.
Why should I care about Top Rankers if I already know who my competitors are?
Top Rankers are important because they represent your online competition, even if they aren't traditional business competitors. Top Rankers are the ones who could be knocking you out of the top positions in Google, making you less visible in the online space. Top Rankers might not be (and often aren't) the same web properties you've added as Competitors in Conductor.
Keep an eye on Top Rankers: are particular domains showing up in the top Google SERP positions? Consider adding them as comparison web properties so you will have more data available to help give you the competitive advantage.
Where in Conductor can I see data for Top Rankers and Comparison Web Properties?
The reports listed below represent those that include data for either comparison web properties, top rankers, or both.
Reports | Comparison Web Property? | Top Rankers? |
Rank Comparisons | Yes | Yes |
Daily Keyword Tracking | Yes | No |
Explorer | Enter any site | |
Market Share | Yes | Yes |
Paid and Organic Optimizer | Yes | No |
Keywords | Yes | Yes |
Managing Web Properties
How should I organize and optimize web property groups?
The way you configure your web property groups should reflect how you want to report on and understand your data in Conductor. Depending on what kinds of properties your organization tracks, you might find there are a number of different configurations that make sense. Refer to the examples below for some sample scenarios that may guidance
Examples for Your Web Properties
Report on Your Brand's Holistic Digital Presence
Configure a web property group that includes your primary web property (for example, the domain you track with your web analytics platform) and any other web properties that represent your brand, such as Amazon stores, YouTube Channels, social accounts, microsites, or other pages on third-party sites.
By tracking all this content in a single web property group, you'll be able to see a more complete picture of your brand's performance across Conductor's various search visibility reports.
Aggregate Your eCommerce Reporting Across Multiple Brands
If you have multiple Amazon stores, create a web property group that includes all of them. Seeing your eCommerce performance aggregated can provide you with a better understanding of your market share for keywords our Amazon stores rank for in reports like Keyword Details: Visibility.
Aggregate Your Social Reporting Across Multiple Social Networks
Curious to know how your social channels perform for your tracked keywords? Aggregate all your channels in one web property group. Then review the Keywords report to see how your profiles perform in search.
Aggregate Your Brand Reporting Across Multiple Locations
Have separate domains, subdomains, or subfolders for the different geographic regions you operate in? Aggregate all of these web properties into a single web property group. Then, you can use roll-up reporting across your location-specific keywords in reports like Keywords and Locations to see your performance in aggregate.
Examples for Comparison Web Properties
Report on a Competitor's Holistic Digital Presence
Configure a comparison web property group that includes all the web properties that represent a specific competitor's brand, including Amazon stores, YouTube Channels, social accounts, microsites, or other pages on third-party sites.
By tracking all this content in a single comparison web property group, you'll be able to see a more complete picture of this competitor's performance across Conductor's various search visibility reports.
Aggregate a Competitor's Web Properties Across Multiple Brands
If you have a competitor that operates multiple brands that compete with your brand, you can aggregate those competitor's brands into a single comparison web property group. Then, use reports like Market Share to compare this group to your own domain to better understand that competitor's full effect on your rankings.
Aggregate Reporting on a Competitor's Brand Across Multiple Locations
Does a competitor of yours have separate domains, subdomains, or subfolders for the different geographic regions they operate in? Aggregate all of these web properties into a single comparison web property group. Then, you can use roll-up reporting across your tracked location-specific keywords in reports like Keywords to drill down and see where these comparison web properties appear in search for the keywords you track.
Track Web Properties Independently
There are times when grouping different web properties into groups might not make sense for the way you want to report on your data. When this is the case, you can always create a web property group consisting of a single web property.
Why don't I see data for one of my web properties?
Data appears for individual web properties only once both of the following conditions are true:
- You have at least one keyword configured for the content. Remember also that to track a location- or device-specific keyword, you must track at least one keyword at the country and desktop level. If you have tracked only location- or device-specific keywords for a web property, Conductor cannot publish data.
- Conductor has not had enough time to publish data for those configured keywords. To avoid waiting an extra week for data to be published, add keywords early in the week to give Conductor enough time to collect data.
How can I find what web properties belong to a web property group?
Beyond reviewing a web property group in the Web Properties activity in your Conductor accounts Settings section, you can find the constituent web properties for a group by hovering over the question mark icon in the web property menu:
Adding Web Properties
How do I track new web properties with Conductor?
You can track new content in the Web Properties activity (Settings > Web Properties). Your account determines how many web properties you can track in Conductor.
If you want to track more than your current limit, you can purchase more as an add-on. Contact support@conductor.com to learn more.
What characters and symbols can I use in the domains, subdomains, subfolders, and pages I track?
Only letters (a-z), digits (0-9), dashes (-), and dots (.) are valid in the domains, subdomains, subfolders, and pages you add to track with Conductor.
What content does Conductor track after I enter a root domain as a web property?
Conductor collects all the content from a root domain you track as a web property, including all subdomains or subfolders.
By entering only the root domain (e.g., example.com), Conductor gathers data for all pages, subfolders, and subdomains. However, if you specifically track a subdomain—such as www.example.com or store.example.com—Conductor collects only the data from that subdomain.
Should I track a subfolder?
Thinking about tracking a subfolder among your content or comparison content in Conductor? Here are some things to consider:
Analytics Support
When you track a subfolder within your site, Conductor does not automatically filter your sites integrated web analytics data to show only data related to that subfolder. This means that you'll need to create a segment in your analytics platform that you can then integrate with the related tracked subfolder in Conductor.
Allowable Subfolder Entries
Only subfolders defined with a forward slash can be tracked (For example: abc.com/example). No fragments (abc.com#example) or query parameters (abc.com?example) may be entered.
Likewise, Conductor cannot support a subfolder path that includes anything besides a simple text string.
Best Practices for Tracking Subfolders
In some cases, configuring a tracked subfolder may not be your best option, because it limits the scope of your keyword rank data. When determining whether your content should be configured as a root domain, a subdomain, a subfolder, or even just a page, consider these questions:
- Are the primary Conductor users at your organization responsible for overseeing the performance of all pages belonging to the domain or just the content found in the subfolder?
- Who is the intended audience for the subfolder content? Is it a different audience that would consume other non-subfolder tracked content configured in the account?
- Is it important to isolate the data into distinct subfolders? For example, should you use subfolders to keep your data isolated if your company has different regional SEO teams responsible for each market, and each team cares only about the data relevant to their market when they use Conductor?
- If your subfolders are structured along regional markets, might having different keywords tracked in the different search engine–language contexts be sufficient?
- Does your organization have analytics segments that mirror the desired subfolder content configuration(s) already?
- Instead of configuring subfolders, is the more desired experience to be able to filter keyword performance by URL groupings?
These questions can help guide your decision on whether to track a subfolder rather than tracking a broader scope with a root domain, top-level domain, or subdomain. However, if you have a question or need guidance, contact Conductor Customer Success.
If I track a root domain as a web property, does it track data from that domain's constituent subdomains as well?
Yes. For most reports, Conductor includes data for subdomains with the data it collects for root domains. However, in most reports, this data is not differentiated from root domain data or other data from other subdomains.
Why doesn't Conductor recognize the YouTube channel I'm trying to track?
For Conductor to recognize a YouTube channel you want to track—whether as one of your web properties or as a comparison property—the format you enter should be:
youtube.com/channel/[Your YouTube ID]
To find this URL, you can access any channel by going to a video in the channel and clicking the channel name below the video. Note: be sure to click the Channel name and not the User icon that appears next to it:
You can then use the URL that appears in your browser: