Defining a universal “engagement metric” (sounds like what Nielsen/NetRatings trying to do?) is like finding the holy grail. So while we all are trying to crack the code on how to best measure engagement, Compete created an important sister metric a few months back called “Attention” (freely available on Compete.com).

The Attention metric considers total time we collectively spend online and determines what percentage of that total time was spent on a given site. For example: If MySpace has Attention of 12%, it translates to: Of all time spent online by all U.S. internet users, 12% was spent on MySpace. You can also interpret the 12% as “the average internet user in the U.S. spends 12% of their online time on MySpace”.

Since “Attention” is based on time, logically the more time we spend on a site, the more attention we give it. Think of Attention as finite - a pie-chart - so the sites that are increasing in Attention over time are performing well along this metric.

I believe true engagement on the other hand is more of a spectrum that requires attitudinal inputs, and that the idea of a “universal” engagement is nice, but in practice it should generally be specific to a firm or product. What constitutes engagement for one product may be very different to even its competitors, let alone firms in other industries.

Why care about “Attention”?

Marketers need universal measures in order to put their own performance into context - relative to rivals, peers, or anyone else they want to compare themselves to. While Compete doesn’t present Attention as the king of all metrics, and certainly not as a one-size-fits-all metrics, it is an important additional piece of the puzzle of online measurement and engagement, and a step in the right direction.

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On the 27th, Compete.com won the award for “Best Content Search Engine” at Searchnomics. We were up against the good folks at Wikipedia, Feedburner and Technorati.

The winners of the Searchnomics Inaugural Search Engine Website Awards honoring leadership, outstanding achievement, and innovation in the search engine industry were as follows:

• Best Media Search Engine: YouTube
• Best Emerging Search Discovery Engine: StumbleUpon
• Best Social Search Engine: LinkedIn
• Best Overall Search Engine: Google
• Best Content Search Engine: Compete.com

Marissa Mayer with Google’s award:

David with Compete’s award!:

(via David)

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Search Analytics will be available on Compete.com ~5pm EST on Monday the 25th.

This product is going to be available to a small private beta group until it is ready for a wider release. Email me (jmeattle at compete dot com) if you’re interested in participating.

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The first time I wrote about YouTube, it had just crossed 20 million visitors in the U.S. Just 4 days after my post, YouTube was scooped up by Google for $1.65B in Google stock. At today’s stock price, the deal is worth over $2B.

There is certainly something magical about reaching 20 million. Web 2.0 darlings, also prime acquisition targets – Digg and Facebook both crossed this milestone last month.

To size up the quality of these visitors, let’s go beyond unique visitors. Let’s look at some key site engagement metrics:

Now take a look at the chart below. After a relatively slow start, Digg is now outpacing everyone else. Facebook is beginning to look up again after spending most of 2006 in flat territory. Both Digg’s and Facebook’s growth and expansion strategies seem to be paying off in a big way.

Let’s see how things look in six months. My Facebook invites are up 2x over the last month. Something big is indeed happening. Microsoft and Yahoo should take a long deep look at this as well.

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