This document discusses how Sony Online Entertainment implemented Tealium tag management to improve their web analytics capabilities. Some key points: 1) Previously, SOE struggled with outdated tags, missing tags, and inconsistent analytics reporting across sites due to a lack of tag management. 2) Tealium helped SOE quickly implement new tags and pixels, allowing them to respond rapidly to marketing requests. It also saved an estimated 80% of development time compared to manually editing code. 3) With Tealium, SOE was able to gather 33% more analytics data, conduct A/B tests across properties, and gain insights from single-page web applications.

1. Preparing for the Unknown
with Tag Management
John Coyne, Clif Bate
Sony Online Entertainment

2. A Little Bit of Background
• An organization of passionate gamers dedicated to creating innovative and
connected gaming experiences for players worldwide
• A recognized worldwide leader in massively multiplayer online games
• Best known for blockbuster hits including EverQuest®, EverQuest® II, PlanetSide®,
PlanetSide®2, Free Realms®, Clone Wars Adventures™, and DC Universe Online™
• An industry leader that has pioneered the way for MMOs, distribution channels,
business models, free-to-play online worlds and games as a service
Our Mission Statement is Simple:
“We are gamers dedicated to creating the best
online worlds for players of all ages.”

3. When We Decided We
Needed Tag Management
• Web analytics had not been a consistent priority in the
organization. Making it core to all projects was painful.
– Out of date tags/code
– Missing tags/tags not firing
– Mismatched data across analytics reports – no standards
across sites
– Time intensive implementation of tags – tied to scheduled
deployment environments

4. When We Decided
We Need Tag Management
• Improved analytics reporting opened the door for
new challenges
– Increase in campaigns and remarketing requests
from Marketing
– More split test implementations
– Single page web applications
– Expansion of data being passed into analytics

5. Why We Chose Tealium
• Tested Tealium against another tag management system.
– Easy to use user interface
– Development and QA tag environments
– With advanced options was able to deal with complicated
page load timing issues.
– Custom tag and pixel containers
– Ability to edit tag templates
– Responsiveness of servers was fast!

6. A Typical Friday in
Tag Management
• 1:06PM – e-mail from our ad agency: …If we are trying to
get tags implemented today can you please let us know by
what time you will need all tags by?
• 2:06PM – e-mail with the tags that need to be
implemented arrives: 12 new pixels across 11 different
pages, 20 pixels that need to be verified are still active.
• 2:38PM – e-mail from me: …pixels are now in place and
have been pushed to live. Phase one pixels are still in place
and can be tested.
• 32 minutes to implement with Tealium.
• Estimated 2.5 hours to implement, QA, and publish if
having to edit actual web pages.

7. Implementation Time
• We have many development
environments
– Publishing our code base is multiplied
by a factor of four.
• Pulling our tags out of our code base
saved us an estimated 80% on
development time linked to tags.
– Tags should not be part of a code base
similar to how content should not.

8. How Many Pixels Does
Remarketing Take?
• We wanted to increase the complexity of our
remarketing campaigns.
– We wanted to include user actions into our
campaign data.
• A typical Remarketing campaign implementation
could be adding 25 pixels to 12 different pages.
– Using Tealium we can target multiple pages
with the same pixel.
• Removal and replacing remarketing campaigns
has become extremely easy.

9. The Benefits We Have Seen
• 5X increase in Ad/Campaign pixels placed
– Ability to add or remove at a moments notice
– No longer tied to deployment process
– Roll out with Ad partners that are ready, and add
others when they are setup on the partner’s side
• 33% increase in data gathered by web analytics
• Hundreds of pages following a consistent, easy to
implement tag process
• Minutes to publish vs tied to 2 week sprints

10. Split Testing
• We wanted a solution that would allow for a split test to be both server
and client side.
– Most of our split tests are run on the server side.
– Using Tealium to map split test variables into our analytics platform we
are able to have a in-house split test system that works across all our
properties.

11. What if We Only Have
One Page?
• We have been developing a single page web application so handling view
changes in a analytics system can be difficult.
• We were able to solve this issue with our Tealium implementation.
– Tealium handles the tags sending them off each time we issue that a
page view should happen.

12. Data, Data, and More Data
• We have become more of a
data driven organization and
continue to be evolving in this
direction.
• The more data we gather it
seems the more questions we
have that require gathering
more data.

13. Thank you
Clif Bate John Coyne
cbate@soe.sony.com jcoyne@soe.sony.com
soe.com
@SonyOnline