Comments on: Ad tracking for Yahoo! Store

By: Michael Whitaker

Michael Whitaker — Mon, 05 Oct 2009 23:49:28 +0000

Thanks for the suggestion Luke. I have updated the post and have added instructions on how to see the transaction value in Adwords reporting.

By: Luke

Luke — Mon, 05 Oct 2009 23:26:09 +0000

Michael,
In order to view this data in adwords, I read in another post that you have to run a report and choose “Sales Conv. Value (many-per-click)”; is that correct?
Right now when I run a report with this value it just gives me numbers 1, 3, etc. – will these turn into dollar amounts now that I have the code?
Im sure others will find this info helpful too. Thanks!

By: Luke

Luke — Mon, 05 Oct 2009 23:10:24 +0000

Michael,
I just noticed my code didn’t post right there – but no problem, I understand what your saying now. I am not a JavaScript expert, so I thought the number should then parse there – and then I also found that php tagged one a manual was suggesting.
This is a snippet of what shows at the top of the Yahoo Store Order Confirmation page (should be good reference for everyone else reading):
var orderSubTotal = ’3.25′;
var orderTotal = ’7.24′;
So, I guess I will watch my stats now and hope it pulls it! Thanks for the great tutorial.

By: Michael Whitaker

Michael Whitaker — Mon, 05 Oct 2009 23:01:30 +0000

Sure, the source on the confirmation will still show var google_conversion_value = orderSubTotal; BUT on a live transaction, higher up on the page there is a Javascript array that has the actual value, e.g. orderSubTotal = 25; The Adwords code will then take the 25 value not the literal orderSubTotal.
Trust me – it works! Feel free to email me if you still have questions.
Michael

By: Luke

Luke — Mon, 05 Oct 2009 22:49:57 +0000

Andrew,
Thanks for answering my question. I do have a yahoo store and I am trying to use this on the adwords conversion code.
If all you put is “orderSubTotal” – then when I view source on my confirmation page, it still shows “orderSubTotal” RATHER than have the actual order subtotal there – a number should appear there to transfer to adwords data.
I have also tried the sample which adwords suggests in a PDF manual I found:
if () {
google_conversion_value = ;
}
but it just turns out as jibberish on the confirmation page – example:
if (? echo $SubTotal ?) {
google_conversion_value = ? echo $SubTotal ?;
}
My understanding is that when you view source on the confirmation page, we should see the subtotal as a Number at that point, where we have typed “subtotal” in the code.
By the way, I just spoke with Yahoo and they said doing this is not possible…

By: Michael Whitaker

Michael Whitaker — Mon, 05 Oct 2009 22:33:07 +0000

Hi Luke,
Many thanks for your comment. The example in this post were for a Yahoo! Store so maybe your platform is different and you can use PHP directly to display the SubTotal value. The Adwords script is JavaScript and using the JavaScript variable in the Yahoo! Store works very well.

By: Luke

Luke — Mon, 05 Oct 2009 21:20:59 +0000

the adwords snippet doesn’t work like that – when I view source on my confirmation page it should replace that snipped with the subtotal, but it doesnt.
I think you need the php tags around it like adwords suggests…

By: Michael Whitaker

Michael Whitaker — Fri, 14 Aug 2009 16:33:47 +0000

Hi Andrew,
Conversion tracking scripts from Adwords, YSM and AdCenter write first party cookies that are then read as third party cookies on your conversion page. What this means is that it doesn’t matter that your checkout is on a different domain. The reporting in Adwords should give you conversion data as well as revenue data if you follow the tips in this post.

By: Andrew

Andrew — Thu, 13 Aug 2009 20:41:51 +0000

Hey Micheal, I have a question, to setup conversion tracking, do i need to modify the add-to-cart button code on a yahoo! store?
It basically uses a form action code to submit details to the shopping cart and when the visitor is moved to the shopping cart, all campaign data is lost as it moves to a different domain (order.store.yahoo.net)
So basically i am unable to record the actual ROI for this. Please help!
Thanks!

By: Mr Smith

Mr Smith — Wed, 12 Aug 2009 14:33:17 +0000

Thank you, this simple example was most helpful. Keep up the great work!