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I was looking to add Google analytics event tracking in some of my videos, but this plugin does not support this built-in Flowplayer feature. Has anyone found a workaround or some method to easily utilize the tracking for select videos?
Any help would be greatly appreciated.
Thanks!
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Hi Schneeb,
Google analytics support is baked right into FV Flowplayer 5.
default FV Flowplayer 5 optionshttp://foliovision.com/images/2013/05/400/default-FV-Flowplayer-5-options.png
Flowplayer tracks following information when user leaves a page:
- Seconds played. If video was repeated this is more than the duration of the video
- Flash or HTML5 / video format
- Video title or file name
These views can be found under Google Analytics > Content > Events > Top Events > Video / Seconds played.Play around with the ‘Secondary dimension’ dropdown. For a better visual view select the pie chart. If your site already uses or is planning to use Google Analytics it’s good to view those statistics in the same place.
Why on page leave?
The best place to track video data is when user leaves the page. You know
exactly the total amount of seconds viewed. Sending data during playback gives
you messy results; pausing, fullscreen, seeking are not important.Flowplayer sends event data on jQuery’s unload event. The handling of the unload event varies on different browsers. For example, some versions of Firefox trigger the event when a link is followed, but not when the window is closed. However around 90% of events are tracked giving you good overall statistics but 100% reliability is not guaranteed.
For FV Flowplayer v1 (Flowplayer v3) this suggestion might help.
Hi Alec,
I also want to track visitor usage of my videos. I put my Google Analytic ID in the Flowplayer Options box. Do I need to alter the tracking code itself? If so do I put the following code between the <script> tags?<div class=”flowplayer” data-analytics=”UA-27182341-1″ title=”Video title”>
<video>
<source type=”video/mp4″ src=”/my/video.mp4″>
</video>
</div>Thanks
Jake
Hello Jake,
just put your Google Analytics ID into plugin settings and that’s it. No need to alter the tracking code itself.
By the way – this works even if Google Analytics script tag is not inserted at all – FV Flowplayer recognizes this and loads Google Analytics on its own, with the tracking ID from its settings.
Thanks,
Martin
Hi. Look here. I have -today- set a plugin to open your player in a modal window. The reason for this is that I have posts where there are multiple podcasts and I need to track all the data I can per podcast, through Google Analytics?
Can this be done with your plugin? Will it recognize the close of the modal as page leave? If not, is there other way you recommend?
Sorry. Here is the link.
http://exodusinteractiveforum.com/questions-about-salvation/Hit the Test Link.
Thanks for all the help.
Hello Chris,
I think that it won’t recognize closing of the modal box as user leaving the page, but it should not matter as the user will leave the page anyway.
However you are using Ajax to load the box content, so I’m not so sure about that.
What’s worse is that you are using the audio player. That one unfortunately doesn’t come with Google Analytics support, it only works with video. So we will add support for Google Analytics in audio player too.
If this is important for your work, you can buy our pro support and we will accelerate development of this feature.
Thanks,
Martin
Hi Martin. Thanks for this.
Actually I use the video player but simply placed the mp3 link there instead of a video one.Now let me see if I got this right before I decide on if I need to go to pro support. Some questions follow:
1. Is there a solution now for the audios? I mean I have lots of mp3’s only.
2. In this page (and others) I have multiple mp3’s. A user will click on each one of them and listen to them (they will open in a modal, or shouldn’t they?). So, is what you are saying means that info on listening time will be somehow stored anyway and passed to GA when a visitor leaves the WP post anyway? For all podcasts listened there separately?
3. If I won’t open each mp3 in a modal but place each different podcast shortcode next to each title and thus present i.e. 6 podcast players will the information be somehow stored and passed to GA when a user leaves the post/page? Will it work right in that way with a modal but inline?I need to understand exactly how this will work through your plugin.
Thank you.
Hello Chris,
I understand that you are using the same player, but since Flowplayer doesn’t support audio, we have to internally switch to another player.
We can add the Google Analytics tracking for audio. However it would only track following events – play, pause, stop. Tracking playtime would be much more work.
There is no need to place these players into a modal window, unless you have some specific reason. You can put up as many players as you want into a single page.
Thanks,
Martin
