Outbrain, the free service that lets site publishers and bloggers offer ratings and recommendation options to their site visitors and readers, has just released a Reporting Dashboard for its clients. Though Outbrain only had its public launch a few weeks ago, the Outbrain service has been around for well over a year, working closely with test partners in order to tweak and improve its service.
The new reporting dashboard features rating analysis, data on page views, and information on new traffic being directed to your site. The updates touch on some of the qualms Adam O. had with Outbrain, mentioned in his previous coverage of the service. Given the necessity of a well-rounded perspective on a site's content for the purpose of user feedback and re-purposed recommendations, these concerns are quite valid.
Outbrain is addressing some of these concerns with its rating analysis, which will offer information on the data for a given piece of content, in hopes of revealing insight to the audience's feelings. Further filter options sort by popularity, which consists of all the factors Outbrain looks at, such as ratings, the weight of the ratings, and the age of the ratings in order to provide an ever-updating look at what's popular on a publisher's site. Page views are also important, as are new traffic stats, especially if you're using Outbrain as a cross-network service that can in fact return some love your way.