Docalytics is one of Contently's best and most unique features. Using Docalytics, you can host your PDF documents with Contently, embed lead forms from tools such as Marketo and Pardot, and most importantly track analytics data such as heat maps and engagement scores. 

In this article we will review the following:

1. Log into Contently and from the create menu, select "Upload story."

2. Fill in your story details, upload a PDF, and click "Save."

3. Review your document.  You can use the tools on the right to add tags and comments to your document.  Click the "View" button on the top right to see what your document will look like.  When your document is complete, click the "Publish" button to publish your document.

4. Your document is now available online. Look for the "Published at" URL at the top of the page.

Notes: To share your document, use the 'Published at' URL for the document.  

Your new document will now appear in your list of stories.  Analytics for your document will become available after the first person has viewed your document.

The power of Docalytics lies in the metrics you can track about each PDF document. To view analytics for your Docalytics documents, navigate to the Stories page in the analytics section. 

Note: To view all of your Docalytics documents at once, filter the page by 'Hosted Documents'.

When you expand the details for a Docalytics document, you will see the following metrics:

Engagement score by page: The first chart shows you what percentage of people engaged with each page during a specific date range. You can use this chart to understand whether people are actively scrolling through your entire document of if they're losing interest after a few pages. Hover over each page for more information.

Views by page: The second chart shows you how many people have viewed each page during a specific date range. The blue line shows you total views and the orange line – which is typically lower – shows you the number of unique people who viewed each page. If the blue line is significantly higher, that means many people returned to view this page more than once. Hover over each node for more information about the page.

Heat maps: The heat maps at the bottom help you understand which areas of each page people are engaging with the most. You will be able to see if certain charts and graphs are grabbing people's attention throughout the document. Many people use this information to figure out which pieces of a document to use in tweets or shorter form articles.

Above these charts you can see how many times people downloaded and printed your document. You can also see the total number of people who viewed the document and the average amount of time they spent viewing it.

If you use a Marketing Automation Platform like Marketo, Pardot, Eloqua, or Hubspot, you can connect your Docalytics PDFs to your marketing automation tools. Docalytics offers a variety of plugins to give you the flexibility that you need. You can use Docalytics plugins to embed a web page in your document, add additional analytics tracking codes to your document, or embed a lead form in your document. Here is an overview of the Docalytics plugins that we offer:

Page Snippet:  You can trigger a web page that you created in your Marketing Automation Platform like Marketo, Pardot, Eloqua, or Hubspot to appear when a reader reaches a certain page in your Docalytics PDF. You can also trigger other javascript or HTML using a <script></script> tag. Use this feature to embed a lead form, advertisement for an upcoming webinar, partner content, survey, or another piece of content from the web directly in your document – exactly where you want it. Page snippets can be dynamically embedded using javascript or HTML.

Document Snippet: You can embed an analytics tracking code in your document from Marketo, Eloqua, Google Analytics, or another analytics tool to track additional analytics for your Docalytics PDF. Use this feature to send data about your Docalytics PDF to your other marketing systems. Data will be sent to your analytics tool after the first person has viewed your document.

iFrame Lead Form: You can embed a lead form from your Marketing Automation Platform into an iframe in your Docalytics PDF. This lead form will appear when a reader reaches a specific page in your document. iFrame Lead Forms are similar to Page Snippets but we will automatically embed your form into an iFrame for you. When you create an iFrame lead form, you can choose to prevent readers from continuing past this form until they complete the form. Leads will be sent to your Marketing Automation Platform when the reader completes the form.

As a note, if adding an iFrame Lead form, your Docalytics story view mode must be set to document mode and not slideshow mode.

You can change your Docalytics story presentation once it's been published by selecting "Edit" on the page.

Note: To use any of these plugins, you must first upload and publish your PDF. Once published, you will be able to manage your plugins from the right-hand menu on your document page.

Once you upload and publish a Docalytics PDF, follow these steps to add a plugin to your Docalytics document:

1. To add a plugin to your document, navigate to the Plugins tab in the right hand menu next to your document.

2. On the Plugins tab, click "Add" and choose which plugin type you'd like to add to your document.

Note: You can add more than one plugin to your document if you'd like.

3. Customize the settings for your plugin and click "Save."  Each plugin has different settings for you to customize.

Settings for Page Snippets

Settings for Document Snippets

Settings for iFrame Lead Forms

Note: Using a plugin will not interrupt the analytics for your document. You can still log into Contently to view the analytics for your Docalytics document.

When you publish a PDF, your document will be available at a unique URL.  You can either point your traffic to the URL where your document lives or you can embed the document directly on your website.

This page explains how to customize certain parameters and embed the Docalytics viewer on your website. 

PREPARATION:  To embed your document on your website, you first have to upload the document to Contently and publish the document.

1. Once you publish your PDF, the "Published at" URL will appear above your document.  This is the unique URL where your document lives.  To embed the document on your website, click the 'Embed' button next to the URL.

2. To customize the Docalytics viewer, enter the width and height you want the viewer to be once you embed it on your website. 

3. To embed the Docalytics viewer on your website, click the blue copy button to copy the embed code to your clipboard. Paste the code into the HTML on your website where you want the document to appear.  

Note 1: The embedded viewer has built in support for both web and mobile viewing. Users will still be able to download your document if it is embedded on your website.

Note 2: You can still log into Contently to view the analytics for your Docalytics documents.

If you’d like more brand control over the URL where your documents live, you can set up a custom domain for your Docalytics documents.  When you host your documents on a custom domain, your documents will also contribute to your site’s SEO rankings.  

Custom domains allow you to serve your Docalytics documents from a subdomain that your company owns, such as “docs.mycompany.com”.  This is typically a complex process for your IT team to manage but we have built a fast and easy solution to help manage this process for you.  

Once you set up a custom domain for Docalytics, you will be able to point your traffic to “docs.mycompany.com” instead of “mycompany.docs.contently.com”.  With a custom domain set up, Contently will serve all of your traffic over a fully qualified SSL encrypted connection on the subdomain that you choose. You can still log into Contently to manage your documents and view the analytics for your Docalytics documents.

PREPARATION: To set up a custom domain, you need to make a change to your domain’s DNS records.  In most companies, DNS is managed by your IT Team.  You will need to check with them first to make sure you can set up the DNS record as outlined in Step 2 below.

1. Choose which subdomain you want to use for your Docalytics documents. Make sure this subdomain is not already being used for something else in your company.  Think carefully about which domain you want to use. Subdomains like “docs.mycompany.com” and “content.mycompany.com” are popular options. 

2. Have your IT Team make an update to your DNS records to point your new subdomain to the Docalytics custom domain servers. They need to add the record below. Please note that once this record is added, it can take a few hours for changes to propagate across the web and you may not see it work immediately. Your new domain should become available within 24 hours.

NEW RECORD TO ADD:
Type: CNAME
Host: Your new subdomain that you chose in Step 1 (ex: docs.mycompany.com)
Points To:  custom-domain.docs.contently.com (note: please do not edit this URL)

3. Once your IT Team updates your DNS records, contact your CS lead and let them know you want to use a custom domain for your Docalytics documents.  Please include the new subdomain you want to use and which publication(s) this custom domain should be assigned to so that we can configure your new custom domain. This configuration is usually pretty quick.

4. Once your IT team completes Step 2 and your CS lead tells you that your configuration is complete on Contently’s side, you can go ahead and test your new custom domain.  Upload a test document to your publication and push "Publish."  Verify that the “published at” URL for the story points to your new custom domain and that the link loads correctly.

Note: The very first time you visit a document on your new URL it may take a few extra seconds to load while we provision the needed security/SSL certificate for your domain.  All subsequent requests will be much faster.

USING YOUR NEW DOMAIN:  Your new custom domain will now appear in the “published at” URL on the story page for all new documents that you publish to Docalytics.  You can also use your new custom domain for your existing Docalytics documents.  The “published at” URL will not change when you view your existing documents on Contently but the documents will be available at your new custom domain.  Feel free to update the links that you point your visitors to.  Make sure not to change the title of the document at the end of your existing URLs.

ANALYTICS:  You can still log into Contently to view the analytics for your Docalytics documents.

TROUBLESHOOTING: When you upload a document to Contently and click "Publish," if your “Published at” URL is not correct, please contact your Customer Success lead. If your “Published at” URL is correct but your page does not load correctly, please make sure your IT team completed Step 2 above.

MULTIPLE CONTENTLY PUBLICATIONS: If you have more than one Contently publication, you can share your custom domain across your publications. However, please know that each publication can only have one custom domain assigned to it.

SSL CERTIFICATES: Please know that when you set up a custom domain, Contently uses LetsEncrypt to automatically provision an SSL certificate for your custom domain.

If you have any questions on this, don't hesitate to reach out to support@contently.com.