Leveraging Analytics #

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Collecting analytics data is only valuable if you use it to make better decisions. This guide shows how to interpret PetMatchPro event data and use it to increase adoptions.

Understanding Search Behavior #

What Are Visitors Looking For? #

Impression data tells you which animals visitors see most often. Combined with filter usage, you can learn:

• Popular species – Are visitors primarily searching for dogs, cats, or other animals?
• Popular breeds – Which breeds attract the most searches?
• Filter usage – Which filters are visitors using most? This tells you what matters to them.
• Search position – Animals higher in search results get more views. Consider adjusting your sort order to feature animals that need homes most.

Interpreting Position Impact #

The “Position Impact” insight in the analytics dashboard answers a specific question: does an animal’s position in the search results affect how often visitors click into it? This section explains how position is recorded, how the 8.7.0 dwell-gated impression model changes the data, and what you can do with the signal.

How Position Is Recorded #

When an impression or detail-view event fires, PetMatchPro captures the card’s position within the visible (post-filter) result set, 1-based:

• Position 1 is the first card the visitor sees after any active filters or sort.
• If the visitor applies a species filter that hides 80% of the cards, position 1 is the first remaining card.
• If the visitor uses pagination, position resets within each page (position 1 on page 2 is the first card on page 2).

This means “position 3” always means “third in the deck the visitor was looking at”, not “third overall in the database”.

What Changed in 8.7.0 #

Before 8.7.0, every animal card rendered to the page counted as an impression – including positions 200, 300, and 362 on a long results page where the visitor never scrolled past position 8.

After 8.7.0:

• Only cards the visitor actually saw (with at least 50% in the viewport for at least 500ms) count as impressions.
• On a 362-card “all available dogs” page, a typical session generates 8-20 impressions instead of 362.
• Position-impact data becomes much more meaningful: a high impression count at position 5 now means “5 visitors actually scrolled to position 5”, not “5 visitors loaded the page that happened to have a card there”.

Reading the Data #

The Insights accordion shows position impact in two ways:

Position-by-position impression counts #

How many times each position was viewed. Expected pattern: a steep drop-off after the first row or two. Most visitors do not scroll past the fold.

Click-through rate by position #

For each position, the percentage of impressions that converted into a detail view. This is the more actionable metric: a high CTR at position 1 is unsurprising, but if position 6 has a higher CTR than position 3, the cards at position 6 are doing something right (better photo, more compelling name, etc.) and worth studying.

Comparing Pre-8.7.0 and Post-8.7.0 Data #

Direct numeric comparisons across the upgrade boundary are misleading. A few rules of thumb:

• Total impression counts will drop dramatically after the upgrade. This is correct – you are now measuring real visibility instead of page renders. Use percentages and ratios, not raw totals, when comparing periods that span the upgrade.
• Search CTR will increase because the denominator (impressions) is now smaller and more accurate. Again, this is the truer signal.
• Position-impact data before 8.7.0 was always noisy at high positions. Treat pre-upgrade data for positions past about 20 as approximate at best.

If you have weekly or monthly reports that span the upgrade boundary, consider adding a footnote explaining the methodology change.

Actionable Uses for Position Data #

Position data is most useful for these decisions:

• Sort field tuning. If an animal you expect to perform well is consistently ranked at position 50+, your sort field is hiding it. Try a different default sort (e.g., date entered ascending instead of descending).
• Featured-animal placement. Animals you manually feature should appear in positions 1-6. If they do not, check your [pmp-search] shortcode parameters.
• Pagination cadence. If almost no impressions register past the first page, your “results per page” setting is too low – visitors are not paginating. Consider showing more cards per page.
• Card-design A/B testing. When you change card photo or name handling, watch the position-CTR curve. A change that lifts CTR at position 5 by more than at position 1 is interesting (the change made deeper-positioned cards more clickable).

Position Caveats #

• Position is captured at the moment the impression fires. If a visitor applies a filter and the same animal moves from position 12 to position 4, only the position at first sighting is recorded – re-entry does not re-fire.
• On carousel templates, “position” reflects DOM order, which usually matches the rendered card order but can diverge if a custom CSS order is applied.
• Detail views captured before the matching impression (rare, e.g., direct deep-link entries) do not contribute position data.

Understanding Detail Page Engagement #

Which Animals Get the Most Attention? #

Detail view events show which animals visitors click on to learn more. Compare this with impression data to calculate a click-through rate:

• High impressions, low clicks – The animal is seen but not interesting enough to click. Consider improving the photo or search card details.
• Low impressions, high clicks – The animal is appealing when seen. Consider moving it higher in sort order so more visitors see it.

How Are Visitors Arriving? #

The source field in detail view events tells you how visitors reached the detail page:

Understanding Action Engagement #

Action click events are the most important metric – they represent visitors taking steps toward adoption. PetMatchPro splits action types into two groups:

Conversion Actions #

These eight action types represent adoption-relevant intent and are what the Conversion Funnel, Conversions by Traffic Source, and Repeat Visitor Conversion widgets count:

Engagement Actions #

These four action types are useful signals of interest but are not conversions – they appear in the Action Breakdown widget but are excluded from conversion-rate metrics so the conversion narrative is not inflated:

Practical Optimization Ideas #

Improve Search Results #

• If a species is searched frequently but has low click-through, improve photos for that species
• Enable overlays and icons to give visitors more information at a glance
• Adjust the fields shown in search results to include the details visitors care about most

Improve Detail Pages #

• If visitors view details but rarely take action, add more compelling descriptions and better photos
• Enable the “similar animals” template to keep visitors engaged
• Make action buttons (adoption application, email, phone) prominent and easy to find

Boost Social Sharing #

• If share events are low, enable social sharing and make sure the social buttons are visible
• Track which platforms generate the most return traffic

Use Print Posters #

• If poster print events are significant, your facility staff or volunteers are actively promoting animals – keep the feature enabled

Next Steps #

• Understanding PMP Analytics – What events are tracked and what each metric means
• Queue Health and Tools – Operational diagnostics for the analytics pipeline
• Privacy and Data Retention – What is stored alongside position data
• GA4 Configuration – Set up analytics reporting