Insights Calculated Field Patterns
Overview
This article outlines 11 common patterns for deriving Calculated Fields in Insights. These patterns have proven generally effective in illuminating actionable insights from subscriber data and creating useful customer segmentation.
Terminology
- Calculated Fields: Any field that Insights calculates using the patterns outlined in this article is called a Calculated Field. Calculated Fields can be either metrics or attributes. For example, you may feed an event into Insights every time one of your subscribers views a video on a webpage. You can use the Count metric pattern (described below) on those events to create a metric called "Videos Viewed per Day".
- Primary Fields: Any Account or User data that you send directly into Insights from your other systems that you want to use as an Account or User field in Insights are referred to as Primary Fields. For example, your product may already count the number of videos each subscriber views each day. You can send that number into Insights every day as a daily primary metric called "Videos Viewed per Day". The field patterns described in this article do not apply to Primary Fields.
Metric Patterns
Metrics are fields in Insights that quantify an Account or User's behavior at a repeating time interval -- either daily, weekly, or monthly. Metrics are always numeric. The following metric patterns are common in Insights.
| Pattern | Description | Examples |
| Counts | A calculated metric that counts either event, user, or session records stored in Insights. |
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| Averages | A calculated metric that averages a primary metric or primary attribute over a period of time. |
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| Percentiles | A calculated metric that indicates the percentile rank of an Account or User against all Accounts or Users for a particular primary attribute or metric. |
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| Percent Changes | Indicates the percentage a metric has change in a recent amount of time. |
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| Ratios | Compares the value of one metric with another. |
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| Sums | Sums primary metrics for Accounts or Users stored in Insights. |
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| Trends | Indicates if a metric is trending up, down, or flat. |
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Attribute Patterns
Attributes are fields in Insights that tracks a characteristic of an Account or User. Attribute can be numeric or text and differ from metrics in that they do not update on a predetermined frequency; in fact, many attributes update quite infrequently (or not at all). The following metric patterns are common in Insights.
| Pattern | Description | Examples |
| Coalesce | A calculated attribute that takes two or more attributes from different data sources that represent the same value and prioritizes which one to use. |
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| Highest Value | A calculated attribute that indicates the highest value for a particular Account or User field. |
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| Most Frequent Value | A calculated attribute that indicates the most popular event attribute value for an Account or User over a particular time period. |
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| Most Recent Value | A calculated attribute that indicates the most recent event attribute value for an Account or User. |
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