Skip to main content

Glossary

The Frosmo glossary is a dictionary of the commonly used terms in the Frosmo Platform and in web UI development more broadly.

TermAbbreviationDefinitionAlternative terms

A

A/B testing

Most common way to test optimized or personalized content. In A/B testing, you split your visitors into two or more groups (A, B, and so on) and show different content variations to those groups. When the variations have been seen by enough visitors you can analyze their performance to see which content variation performed the best, for example, resulted in the highest conversion rate or average order value.

In the Frosmo Control Panel, you can create an A/B test modification with two or more variations and define the distribution between the variations.

See also: Variation distribution

Split testing

Above the fold

See Fold.

Activity

The Frosmo Platform maintains a user activity log for each site. Every time a user performs an action that changes a feature configuration for a site, such as creating a modification, editing a placement, or removing a template, the platform logs a single activity for the site.

You can view the activities in the Frosmo Control Panel.

See also: Feature configuration, User

Advanced tracking

Advanced tracking extends the basic tracking functionality of the Frosmo Platform with custom events, which allow you to track modifications beyond clicks, displays, and true displays. A custom event can be about anything that you can do with or change in a modification.

See also: Custom event

Affinity

Affinity measures a visitor's level of engagement with the items, such as retail products or online games, on a website. Affinity indicates what an individual visitor is interested in. The more a visitor interacts with specific items, and the more interest they therefore show in those items and the attributes they represent, the greater their affinity for the items and for similar items. You can use affinity to personalize the content that visitors interact with and the user journeys they experience based on their individual interests and preferences.

Affinity is measured along item attributes. A given affinity is always for a single attribute value, such as a specific category like "Mobile Phones" or "Roulette Games", rather than for a specific item. A visitor can have multiple affinities per item attribute. Each affinity has its own affinity score, which indicates the visitor's current level of affinity for that attribute value.

The Frosmo Platform automatically tracks affinities for each individual visitor in near real time. The totality of affinities tracked for a visitor make up the visitor's affinity profile.

See also: Affinity data, Affinity group, Affinity profile, Affinity score, item, item attribute

Visitor affinity

Affinity data

Any affinity-related data tracked or generated for a visitor and stored in the Frosmo back end. The data consists of the visitor's affinity profile and affinity group data.

See also: Affinity, Affinity group, Affinity group data, Affinity profile

Visitor affinity data

Affinity group

Group of visitors who share the same affinity.

The Frosmo Platform automatically creates and manages affinity groups for a site. You cannot create, edit, or remove affinity groups, but you can assign modifications to them and view statistics about them.

See also: Affinity, Affinity group data

Visitor affinity group

Affinity group data

Any affinity-group-related data tracked or generated for a visitor on a site and stored in the Frosmo back end. The data consists of a list of the affinity groups to which the visitor currently belongs.

The Frosmo Platform automatically keeps a record of the affinity groups to which an individual visitor belongs.

See also: Affinity, Affinity group

Visitor affinity group data

Affinity profile

Full record of a visitor's current affinities on a site. The profile lists all affinities (attribute name and value) and corresponding affinity scores tracked for the visitor in the past 60 days.

The Frosmo Platform automatically creates and maintains a dedicated affinity profile for each individual visitor.

See also: Affinity, Affinity data, Affinity score

Visitor affinity profile

Affinity score

Numerical measure of how interested a visitor is in the items represented by an affinity. Each affinity has a single affinity score. The score is always a positive integer, such as 17 or 328. The higher the score, the greater the interest.

A visitor's affinity scores are recorded in their affinity profile.

See also: Affinity, Affinity profile

Visitor affinity score

Annotation

Annotations are dated notes associated with a site and shown in timeline-based statistics views. You can add an annotation to a specific calendar date to easily detect whether there has been a change in your site statistics during or after that date.

For example, you can create an annotation for a day you launch a new feature on your site. Later, you can easily view how the launch has affected the traffic, visitor retention, conversions for your site, or the performance of a specific modification.

Approximate string matching

In computer science, approximate string matching is a technique for finding strings that match a pattern (another string) approximately rather than exactly. The closeness of the match between a string and the pattern is called the edit distance. The shorter the distance, the closer the match.

Frosmo Search uses approximate string matching to handle typographical errors in search terms, which allows for typo-tolerant searches. For example, if a visitor searches for "cot" (a typo), approximate string matching allows the search to also return results for "coat" (an approximate match to "cot" with an edit distance of 1).

See also: Frosmo Search

Fuzzy matching

Fuzzy string searching

Average conversions per unique user

ACPUU

Average number of conversions completed during a specified period of time by all unique visitors on your site.

See also: Unique visitor

Average conversions per paying user

ACPPU

Average number of conversions completed during a specified period of time by visitors that complete a conversion on your site.

Average order value

AOV

Average order value is, as the name suggests, the total revenue from orders divided by the number of orders. It is an important metric for online businesses to understand their customers' buying habits in order to optimize them.

At Frosmo, average order value is commonly used for measuring the impact of product recommendations, such as the upsell or cross-sell they generate.

Average revenue per paying user

ARPPU

Average revenue brought by converted visitors during a specified period of time.

Average revenue per unique user

ARPUU

Average revenue brought by all unique visitors on your site during a specified period of time.

See also: Unique visitor

B

Back end

Back-end (or server-side) systems consist of databases, data processing components, and other server infrastructures that handle operations not directly visible to website visitors. An important function of the back-end system is to launch programs and operations in response to front-end system requests.

See also: Front end

Server-side system

Basic feature setup

Fixed set of preconfigured Frosmo Platform features and modules that together provide a website with the essentials for personalization and optimization. The features and modules serve as a tried-and-tested starting point for developing sites in a given business vertical.

You can view and manage a site's setup in the Frosmo Control Panel.

Below the fold

See Fold.

Browser

Application that allows you (visitor) to view and interact with web pages on the World Wide Web (WWW) or a local website.

No matter what device you use, be it a personal computer or a mobile device, if you're on a website, you're using a browser or at the very least an application with a browser engine.

Browsers are client applications (also known as user agents) of web servers.

See also: Visitor, Web server

Internet browser

Web browser

Browser cache

Browser's private cache that stores web page resources locally to speed up page loading times for subsequent visits to the same page. Storing resources in a cache is called caching.

Browser caching works as follows:

  • When a visitor opens a web page for the first time, the browser fetches the resources that make up the page, such as text and images, from the web server hosting the page. Since the browser and the server are running on different, geographically separated computers, fetching the resources can take a long time.

  • The browser stores the fetched resources in its cache.

  • When the visitor next opens the same page, the browser fetches the resources directly from its cache, which is a lot faster than requesting them from the server. The result is a significantly faster second page load.

  • The browser keeps fetching the resources from its cache for as long as it considers the resources to be fresh.

  • When it no longer considers a resource to be fresh, the browser checks with the web server if a new version of the resource is available. If a new version is available, the browser fetches and caches it, replacing the previously cached version. If the currently cached resource is still valid, the browser extends its freshness lifetime.

In technical terms, what the browser actually stores in its cache are the responses it receives from the web server in reply to its requests. A response may or may not include an attached resource, such as an image file. When the browser needs to make the same request again, such as getting an image it already fetched during a previous page load, the browser reuses the cached response (including any attached resources) instead of making a new request to the server.

Browser caching is a part of HTTP caching.

See also: Browser, Request, Response

Client cache

Private cache

C

Call to action

CTA

In web design and online marketing, a call to action is a visual element, such as a banner, button, or link, prompting the visitor to take some action (normally by clicking the element). The purpose of inviting a response from the visitor is to create leads and attract the visitor to enter the conversion funnel.

Cart action

Any visitor action whereby a visitor updates their shopping cart, such as by adding an item to the cart.

The Frosmo Platform tracks cart actions as cart action events. Each event contains cart action data that describes the specifics of the action that triggered the event.

See also: Cart action tracking

Cart action event

Cart action tracking

Automatic process of monitoring visitors for actions that qualify as cart actions and sending the data about those actions (cart action data) to the Frosmo back end.

The Frosmo Platform uses cart actions to track visitor affinity.

See also: Affinity, Cart action

Case

Use case of a modification, which you select when you create the modification. The case primarily determines the number of variations the modification can have and, if the modification has multiple variations, how the variation distribution is defined.

You can select from the following cases:

  • A/B test: Create a modification for comparing two or more variations against each other to determine which one performs the best. You define the variation distribution manually.

  • Multi-armed bandit: Create a multi-variation modification that automatically and continuously adjusts the variation distribution based on how well the individual variations perform over time. You define how to measure the performance and select the multi-armed bandit algorithm used by the modification.

  • Personalization: Create a single piece of content that you customize for a specific target audience. The modification has one variation, which is pre-created with the modification. You can modify the variation, but you cannot remove it.

See also: A/B test, Modification, Multi-armed bandit, Personalization, Variation distribution

Click

In the Frosmo context, a basic modification event.

A modification gets a click when a visitor clicks a part of the modification for which the Frosmo Platform tracks clicks, such as a button, link, or any element with the class frosmo-click. If the modification has no clickable parts, it cannot get a click.

The platform tracks clicks also for recommended items.

See also: Modification, Recommended item

Click-through rate

CTR

Ratio of clicks to displays or true displays that the modification gets. The Frosmo Platform tracks CTR separately for displays and true displays.

See also: Click, Display, True display

Client

Piece of computer hardware or software that uses a service provided by a server in a client-server system.

For example, a web browser is a client to a web server.

See also: Request, Response, Server

Company

In the Frosmo Platform, a company typically represents a customer or partner account.

A company can have one or more sites. The settings of company affect all sites of that company. In the Frosmo Control Panel, a user who has access to a company automatically has access to all sites of the company.

See also: Site, User

Company user

Frosmo Control Panel user with the "User" role. Company users are employees of Frosmo's customers, as opposed to Frosmo users, who are Frosmo employees.

See also: Frosmo user

Comparison group

The comparison group consists of visitors who see the original content of a web page instead of modifications. The platform automatically places a certain percentage of all visitors in the comparison group. An individual visitor always either belongs or does not belong in the comparison group.

For visitors in the comparison group to see the original content instead of a modification, the modification must have an active comparison group variation. If active, visitors in the comparison group do not see the modification, while visitors not in the comparison group see the modification normally. If the comparison group variation is inactive, all visitors see the modification, including those in the comparison group. Once a visitor enters the comparison group, that visitor will not see any modifications on the site that have an active comparison group variation.

The comparison group size is defined separately for each site. By default, a new site has a comparison group size of 50% for performance trial purposes: one half of visitors sees modifications, while the other half (comparison group) sees the original site content. Following the trial period, Frosmo sets the comparison group size to a smaller percentage, typically 10%.

See also: Modification, Site, Variation

Content delivery network

CDN

Network of global servers connected to each other and used to store and deliver web content, such as images, videos, style sheets, and JavaScript files. When a visitor browses a website, the content of the site is delivered by the CDN server with the fastest access to the visitor's location, decreasing page load time.

The Frosmo Platform uses highly reliable third-party CDNs to deliver the Frosmo JavaScript library and Frosmo-specific media files used on websites.

Content preloading

Content preloading enables loading modification content in the browser as a part of the custom script, which decreases the delay in displaying the modification, reducing flickering.

Content preloading has some limitations, however:

  • You cannot use most of the advanced modification settings.

  • If there are several modifications using content preloading on the same site, loading the custom script will be slower.

  • Since the modification is cached in the browser, the risk of the visitors seeing outdated content is increased.

You can enable content preloading in the advanced modification settings.

See also: Flickering

Content type

Property of modifications and templates, which you define when you create a modification or template. Content types allow you to create modification content with the right content templates. A modification variation can only use a template whose content type is compatible with the content type of the modification.

See also: Modification, Template, Variation

Context

Context comprises the visitor data that the Frosmo JavaScript library collects on a site and stores, as a rule, in the browser. Each visitor to a site has their own unique context for that site. The Frosmo Platform uses the context data to personalize the visitor's user experience on the site. In other words, the data provides contextual information about the visitor's interaction with the site, which allows the platform to affect and improve that interaction. In a sense, the context data is the visitor for the platform.

Context holds data about:

  • Segments to which the visitor belongs, if any

  • Conversions the visitor has completed, if any

  • Custom actions the visitor has completed, if any

  • Geographical location

  • Page visit history

  • Other data based on the visitor's activity on the site

By default, context does not contain any personal data that can be used as such to identify the visitor.

The Frosmo Platform supports the following context types:

  • Local context

  • Shared context

  • Remote shared context

As a rule, context data is stored in the browser's local storage.

See also: Frosmo JavaScript library, Local context, Local storage, Origin, Remote shared context, Shared context, Visitor, Visitor data

Conversion

Action you want your visitors to take, such as purchasing a product, launching a game, signing up for a newsletter, or watching a video. You can define a conversion to be basically any variable in visitor behavior that you want to measure. What exactly you want to define as a conversion depends on your business goals.

In the Frosmo Platform, a conversion is either a transaction or a non-purchase conversion (a conversion that does not involve a transaction).

In product and other item statistics, "most converted" is a common popularity metric that measures how many conversions included a specific item.

See also: Item, Transaction

Conversion attribution

Conversion attribution is the process by which the Frosmo Platform:

  • Determines the web content responsible for a conversion (either a transaction or a non-purchase conversion).

  • Registers the conversion for the content.

Conversion attribution is a prerequisite for generating conversion-based performance statistics for content.

By default, the Frosmo Platform automatically attributes conversions to the following content:

  • Modifications (both transactions and non-purchase conversions)

  • Recommendations (only transactions)

See also: Conversion, Modification, Recommendation

Conversion data

Conversion information collected from a site through conversion tracking. In the Frosmo Platform, the data for a conversion includes an ID, type, monetary or other value, and description.

See also: Data layer

Conversion definition

A conversion definition describes a single conversion to be tracked on a site. Conversion definitions are an alternative to data layer events for setting up conversion tracking for a site.

Conversion definitions are based on triggers, which allow you to detect a particular event, such as a click, on a web page and take a predefined action based on that event. The trigger for a conversion definition, therefore, represents the visitor action (event) that you want to track as a conversion on the site.

You create and manage conversion definitions in the Frosmo Control Panel.

See also: Conversion, Conversion tracking

Conversion rate

CR

Percentage of all visitors that actually make a conversion. The conversion rate is calculate using the following formula:

(conversions / unique visitors) x 100

The conversion rate is constantly fluctuating due to seasonal changes, marketing campaigns, and sales.

Conversion rate optimization

CRO

Approach for improving the performance of a website by increasing the proportion of visitors that complete a conversion. Optimization is based on systematically testing different versions of content or process.

Conversion optimization

Conversion tracking

Process of counting conversions on a site to measure how successfully the site is meeting its business goals. Conversion tracking is a prerequisite for conversion rate optimization.

In the Frosmo Platform, and in a more technical sense, conversion tracking is the automatic process of monitoring visitors for actions that qualify as conversions and sending the data about those actions (conversion data) to the Frosmo back end. Conversion tracking also involves counting conversions and attributing them to modifications, which the platform does automatically when it receives conversion data from a site.

See also: Conversion, Conversion definition, Data layer, Transaction tracking

Conversion type

Every conversion has a type. The type describes the category or kind of conversion that took place.

The Frosmo Platform has a single reserved conversion type, "transaction", which the platform automatically applies to transactions as part of transaction tracking. You can freely define the type of non-transaction conversions in conversion tracking.

See also: Conversion, Conversion definition, Conversion tracking, Transaction, Transaction tracking

Conversion value

You can set the conversion value as a part of a conversion definition for your site. Normally, the conversion value is the monetary value of the conversion, but you can define it to be any numerical value or leave it undefined. When a visitor completes the conversion, the given value is assigned to it.

If the conversion value is 0 or undefined, the number of conversions is shown in the conversion statistics, but the value of the conversions cannot be calculated.

See also: Conversion definition

Custom action

Any visitor action or state that you want to track and interact with on a website, and that is not a basic modification event, conversion, transaction, or product view. You can also use custom actions to find out where visitors are geographically located. The purpose of custom actions is to track what visitors are doing on a site or where they are located, and to use this information to dynamically modify their user experience in some way, for example, by showing specific content based on the page they are viewing or the city they are in.

See also: Custom action tracking

Custom event

Custom action tracking

Custom action tracking is the automatic process of monitoring visitors for actions and state changes that qualify as custom actions, and sending the data about those actions and state changes (custom action data) to the Frosmo back end.

Custom action tracking allows you to dynamically react to visitor behavior that is not tracked by conversions, transactions, or product views. You can use custom actions to, for example, show variable content based on the page a visitor is viewing or the city they are in.

See also: Custom action

Custom code

Site-specific code defined in a site's custom script.

Custom code typically implements a bespoke feature or unique functionality required by a site that the Frosmo Platform does not provide out of the box.

Frosmo developers create all custom code for a site.

See also: Custom script

Custom event

Custom events allow you to track modifications beyond clicks, displays, and true displays, which the platform handles automatically. A custom event can be about anything that you can do with or change in a modification.

Custom events are a part of the advanced tracking feature of the Frosmo Platform.

See also: Advanced tracking

Custom extension

External application you can develop and then add to the Frosmo Control Panel as a new page.

For example, instead of adding product data to a spreadsheet, you can create a form to enter the data directly in the FCP. Or, if your company has multiple sites and you need to regularly synchronize content or configurations between the sites, you can create an application for handling these tasks in the FCP.

note

Only Frosmo customer teams can create custom extensions. For more information, contact Frosmo support.

Custom renderer

In the Frosmo context, custom renderer is a site-specific function to change the default placement functionality or to add new functionality. Custom renderers can be used, for example, to show a modification only when the visitor scrolls the page, or to implement a specific type of click tracking.

note

Only Frosmo customer teams can create custom renderers. For more information, contact Frosmo support.

Custom script

The Frosmo custom script contains the configurations and code specific to a single site. These are used to modify the content and functionality of the site. The configurations include, for example, modifications whose content is preloaded, placements, segments, and triggers. The custom script runs on top of Frosmo Core and is unique to each site (or group of sites managed as a single site). Changes made to a site in the Frosmo Control Panel are automatically reflected in the custom script for that site.

The Frosmo Core library and the Frosmo custom script form the Frosmo JavaScript library.

See also: Frosmo Control Panel, Frosmo Core library, Frosmo JavaScript library

Frosmo custom script

D

Data layer

In the Frosmo Platform, the data layer is a global JavaScript object used for sending data from the customer's website to the Frosmo back end. This data is mainly used for conversion and product tracking.

Data tracking

Automatic process of monitoring visitors on a website for specific actions and collecting data about those actions. The actions represent behavior relevant to the site's business, such as viewing a product or completing a purchase. Data tracking also involves collecting contextual data about visitors, such as their device type and geolocation. The platform uses the data for various operational purposes, namely for running features that rely on the data and generating performance statistics from the data.

See also: Visitor

Decile

The platform randomly places each new visitor in one of ten deciles. The visitor stays in the same decile until they clear their browser cache. The deciles are built-in visitor segments to which you can target modifications. By default, modifications display to all ten deciles, but you can set individual modifications to target only selected deciles. The visitor's decile placement applies across all modifications on a site.

Display

In the Frosmo context, a basic modification event.

A modification gets a display when Frosmo Core has rendered the modification to the page. The display event does not require that the modification has been in the browser viewport and therefore visible to the visitor.

The platform tracks displays also for recommended items.

See also: Frosmo Core library, Modification, Recommended item, True display

Display delay

Number of seconds after which the modification is displayed once the Frosmo script has been loaded. The delay timer starts when the modification placement is verified and the modification is ready to be displayed.

You can define the display delay in the advanced modification settings.

Display interval

Display interval determines how often the same modification can be shown to visitors. You can set the interval to seconds, minutes, hours, or days in the advanced modification settings.

For example, you can define that a visitor cannot see a specific modification more often than once in three hours.

Display method

In modification placements, the display method determines how the modification is placed in relation to the target element in the page code. For example, you define the modification content to replace the original content or appear before or after it.

You can define the display delay in the advanced modification settings.

See also: Placement

Document

Document has different meanings in different contexts.

Search engines

For a search engine, a document can be:

  • Any source data that the search engine indexes for querying purposes. For example, a single file in a file system and a single web page of a website are both documents from the point of view of a search engine.

  • Record containing the indexed data for a single source document. For example, when indexing a web page, the search engine creates a single record where it stores the data it indexes from the page.

See also: Search engine

Web

Every web page is an HTML document.

See also: Document Object Model

Document Object Model

DOM

In web technology, the Document Object Model (DOM) refers to an application programming interface (API) providing a structure for the contents of an HTML, XHTML, or XML file. The DOM allows programs and scripts to dynamically access and update the content, structure, and style of the files.

To render a HTML page, most web browsers use a model resembling the DOM. The nodes of the page are organized in a tree structure, called the "DOM tree". When a web page is loaded, the browser creates a Document Object Model of the page. You can then use JavaScript to modify the HTML, CSS, and events on the page.

Domain

In the Frosmo context, domain refers to an identification string used to identify internet resources, such as computers, networks, and services.

In a URL, domain (or domain name) is the part following the network protocol. For example, in the URL http://www.example.com/index.html, the domain is www.example.com.

Domain name

Host

E

Email recommendation

Pregenerated recommendation displayed in an email.

A single email recommendation can display two or three items. By default, the item details include image, name, and price. You can customize which details to display (except for the image, which is always displayed) and how the recommendation looks.

You can include email recommendations in any type of email you send to your customers. Here are some common examples:

  • Monthly newsletters or other regular emails

  • Order confirmation emails

  • Welcome email after a visitor has registered as a user on your site

Technically, an email recommendation is a static HTML code snippet that displays pregenerated recommendation data. You create the code in the Frosmo Control Panel and use it in your email template.

See also: Item, Recommendation, Recommendation data

Estimated conversions

You can view the estimated number of conversions for a segment in the Frosmo Control Panel statistics. The estimate is based on the average segment size and number of conversions during the time range you have selected for viewing. The Frosmo Platform assumes that the development in the segment size and conversion number will continue in a similar manner for the next equivalent time range; it does not take into account any seasonal changes or other anomalies.

Estimated revenue

You can view the estimated revenue for a segment in the Frosmo Control Panel statistics. The estimate is based on the average segment size and revenue per visitor during the time range you have selected for viewing. The Frosmo Platform assumes that the development in the segment size and revenue will continue in a similar manner for the next equivalent time range; it does not take into account any seasonal changes or other anomalies.

Event

An event is fired when a specific action (such as a page view or click) takes place. You can use events to trigger other actions, such as modification displays, and create segments based on visitor actions. Events in the Frosmo context are analogous to JavaScript events.

Exposure

Exposure of a modification means the percentage of visitors on a website to whom the modification has been displayed during the last month.

F

Facet

Type of search filter that allows users to quickly narrow down search results based on a single dimension, or facet, of an item, such as brand or type.

For example, when searching for shoes on a retail site, a visitor might see brand-based facets for "Converse", "Nike", and "Sketchers". Selecting one or more of these facets would immediately limit the search results only to shoes belonging to the selected brands.

The term faceting means:

  • In a general sense, the process of applying facets to refine search results.

  • In a technical sense, the action of enabling an item attribute to be used as a search facet.

See also: Frosmo Search

Search facet

Feature

Configurable feature of the Frosmo Platform, such a modification, placement, or template.

You configure the main platform features in the Frosmo Control Panel.

See also: Feature configuration, Frosmo Control Panel

Frosmo feature

Feature configuration

Settings and other configuration options defined for a single instance of a feature, such a modification, placement, or template.

See also: Feature

Flickering

Flickering means that the original content of a web page appears for a short while (up to one second) before a content modification is loaded and displayed. Flickering may distract and confuse a visitor. The easiest way to prevent it is to place the Frosmo scripts in the <head> element of the page and use synchronous loading for the scripts.

Fold

Point at which web page content disappears below the bottom edge of the browser window. The fold typically refers to the demarcation point immediately after page load. In other words, the fold is the bottom of the browser viewport before any scrolling occurs.

"Above the fold" refers to the portion of the web page visible without scrolling down. This is the prime real estate of a web page.

"Below the fold" refers to the portion of the web page that becomes visible only when the visitor scrolls down.

Since screen resolutions, window sizes, and display settings vary between browsers, devices, and users, so does the precise location of the fold. There is no standard height for the area above the fold.

See also: Viewport

Front end

Parts of an application or website with which a user directly interacts, namely the graphical user interface (GUI). In UI development, front-end (or client-side) design and operations are implemented mainly by using HTML, CSS, and JavaScript.

See also: Back end

Client-side system

Frosmo Control Panel

FCP

Main user interface of the Frosmo Platform. You use the Control Panel to customize your websites and monitor their performance.

Under the hood, the Control Panel manages the Frosmo JavaScript library. Changes made to a site in the Control Panel are automatically reflected in the custom script for that site.

See also: Frosmo JavaScript library, Frosmo Platform

Control Panel

Frosmo Core library

The Frosmo Core library implements the core front-end functionality and services of the Frosmo Platform. The library manages modifications and segmentation, collects usage data, and fetches modification content from the back end. The library is the same for all customers and sites.

The Frosmo Core library and the Frosmo custom script form the Frosmo JavaScript library.

See also: Custom script, Frosmo JavaScript library, Frosmo Platform

Frosmo Core

Frosmo Data Pipeline

FDP

Set of components in the Frosmo back end that provides a single, consistent means of sending data to and retrieving data from the back end, and for processing and storing that data.

The Data Pipeline is used, for example, in advanced tracking and when generating recommendations.

Frosmo ID

Unique identifier that the Frosmo Platform automatically assigns to a new visitor entering a site.

The Frosmo ID uniquely identifies a visitor inside a single site. The ID allows the platform to track the visitor's interactions on the site and retrieve data specific to the visitor from the Frosmo back end.

If the same person visits multiple Frosmo-enabled sites, the platform treats the person as a different visitor on each site, assigning them one ID per site.

By default, the platform stores the ID in the local storage of the visitor's browser.

info

Technically, the platform identifies browsers, not visitors. The ID by itself does not tell the platform who actually uses a browser. The platform only sees how the browser interacts with a site (with the assumption that there is a single person operating the browser). To identify individual visitors, the ID can be combined with a separate login ID passed to the platform from the site.

See also: Visitor

Frosmo JavaScript library

Frosmo presence in the front end. The library runs on top of a customer site in the visitor's browser, integrating the site with the Frosmo Platform. The library provides both the framework for the platform to operate on the site and Frosmo's custom solutions for improving the site. The library is platform-independent and can be used together with existing web application frameworks, such as Angular and React.

The Frosmo JavaScript library consists of two parts:

  • Frosmo Core library

  • Frosmo custom script

See also: Custom script, Frosmo Core library, Frosmo Platform

Frosmo Platform

The Frosmo Platform is an AI-driven personalization and recommendation engine for improving website functionality and personalizing online user experiences. The platform also provides public APIs and other tools for personalization and content development across different online channels and devices.

The platform consists of the following main components:

  • Frosmo JavaScript library is the Frosmo presence in the front end. The library handles all modifications to the site, manages segmentation, collects usage data, and fetches content to display from the back end.

  • Frosmo back end stores the usage data collected by the Frosmo JavaScript library and processes the data for reporting and analytics purposes. The back end also stores operational data related to modifications, segments, and other configurable features. Finally, the back end provides public APIs that allow the Frosmo JavaScript library to interact with the back end, and developers to use the platform and its features from their own applications.

  • Frosmo Control Panel is the main user interface of the platform. You use the Control Panel to customize your sites and monitor their performance. The Control Panel manages the Frosmo JavaScript library and pools analytics data from the Frosmo back end.

See also: Frosmo Control Panel, Frosmo JavaScript library, Recommendation engine

Frosmo Platform instance

Regional instance of the Frosmo Platform software. The platform is hosted on multiple regional servers for improved availability. While the servers all run the same platform software, each instance services its own set of customer websites based on geographic proximity.

The URLs of the Frosmo Control Panel, API endpoints, and other platform components are instance-specific.

The current main production instances are:

  • Asia

  • Europe 1 ("EU")

  • Europe 2 ("EU2")

  • Finland ("FI1")

  • US

Frosmo Platform region

Region

Frosmo Preview

Tool for displaying a modification based on the selected placement. You can use the preview tool to see how the modification looks and behaves before activating it, debugging the modification, and viewing and configuring site settings for the preview.

Frosmo Search engine

Search engine component of Frosmo Search. The search engine provides the core functionality for implementing site search. The search engine handles everything from indexing the site's product data to processing search queries and generating search results.

Smart Discovery uses the Frosmo Search engine.

See also: Frosmo Search, product data, search engine, Smart Discovery

Frosmo Search results page

Ready-made search engine results page for sites that use Frosmo Search.

In addition to search results, the page displays:

  • Filters for further refining the search query

  • Options to sort the search results

  • Highlighting of the search term in the results

See also: Frosmo Search, search engine, Smart Discovery

Frosmo user

An FCP user who is a Frosmo employee.

See also: Company user

Funnel

Sales or purchase funnel refers to the decision-making process of a consumer leading to a purchase. In ecommerce, conversion funnel refers to a visitor's journey from becoming aware of a product or service to making a purchase or otherwise completing a conversion. The journey typically consists of a series of discrete steps, from seeing an advertisement or a search result, to navigating the ecommerce site, and finally completing a conversion. Visitor retention within the funnel can be improved through conversion optimization.

G

Game impressions

iGaming term for item list views.

Game launch

iGaming term for item views.

Game spin

iGaming term for transactions.

Geo module

The Frosmo Geo API module allows you to determine geographic areas and distances that you can then use to target visitors based on their location. You can only use the Geo module to target desktop visitors (not mobile visitors). You can enable the Geo module for your site in the Frosmo Control Panel company settings.

I

Incognito mode

Web browser feature that allows a visitor to browse websites in a temporary browser session (separate from the main session) that does not leave any traces of the visitor's online activity on their device. In incognito mode, the browser does not record the visitor's browsing history and deletes any local data created during the session, such as cookies, once the visitor ends the session.

See also: Session

Private browsing

Private mode

Item

Anything that a site sells or offers to visitors, or that the site otherwise tracks for conversions or transactions. An item can be, for example, a retail product, a blog article, an online game, a magazine subscription, or a downloadable brochure.

note

In the documentation, "item" and "product" are used interchangeably.

See also: Item attribute, Item data, Product, Product tracking

Item attribute

Single characteristic of an item, such as an ID or a name. The attributes of an item together make up the item data for the item.

An item attribute is always composed of a name and a value, such as name: 'Coconut' or type: 'Food/Fruits'.

Product tracking determines what attributes the Frosmo Platform collects and stores about items on a site.

note

In the documentation, "item attribute" and "product attribute" are used interchangeably.

See also: Item, Item data, Product attribute, Product tracking

Item boosting

In Frosmo Search, item boosting allows you to make selected items rank higher in search results.

You boost items by defining boosting rules for them. You can have a boosting rule apply to all searches on the site, or you can target searches that use specific search terms. The boosting impacts either the text match score or tiebreaking:

  • Boosting rule for specific search terms increases the text match score of matching items.

  • Boosting rule for all searches increases the boosting score of matching items. The boosting score is a tiebreaking attribute.

See also: Frosmo Search, Text match score, Tiebreaking

Item data

Item information collected from a site through product tracking. The data for an item typically includes attributes such as ID, name, category, description, image, and price.

Item data is a prerequisite for implementing recommendations and other features that revolve around items, such as segmenting visitors based on the types of items they have viewed.

note

In the documentation, "item data" and "product data" are used interchangeably.

See also: Item, Item attribute, Product data, Product tracking

Item data feed

File containing the full data for all items available on a site. The file is periodically updated to reflect changes in the item offering. The item data is typically in a JSON or XML format.

An item data feed can be both an alternative and a complement to product tracking performed directly on the site.

note

In the documentation, "item data feed" and "product data feed" are used interchangeably.

See also: Item, Item data, Product data feed, Product tracking

Item feed

Product data feed

Item list view

Visitor action whereby a visitor views a list of items. For example, a product category page is an item list since the page presents the visitor with a list of products, and viewing the page therefore counts as an item list view.

The Frosmo Platform tracks item list views as item list view events. Each event contains item list view data that describes the specifics of the view that triggered the event.

See also: Item list view tracking

Item list view event

Item list view tracking

Automatic process of monitoring visitors for actions that qualify as item list views and sending the data about those actions (item list view data) to the Frosmo back end.

The platform uses item list views to track visitor affinity.

See also: Affinity, Item list view

Item view

In a general sense, an item view is a visitor action whereby the visitor views item information on a site, typically on a product or other item page.

In a technical sense, an item view is an event that gets triggered whenever a visitor navigates to a product or other item page, or otherwise views an item on a site. Item view events accumulate item data and item view statistics for the site. Item view events are part of product tracking.

In item statistics, "most viewed" is a common popularity metric that measures how many times visitors viewed a specific item (either on a dedicated page, such as a product page, or on a listing page, such as a product category page).

note

In the documentation, "item view" and "product view" are used interchangeably.

See also: Item, Item data, Product, Product tracking, Product view

L

Label

A label is a short text tag that you can attach to modifications to filter them more easily. A label can be any word that helps you categorize or otherwise identify modifications.

You can create and manage labels in the Frosmo Control Panel or through the Graniitti API.

Landing page

LP

By definition, a landing page is any web page through which a visitor enters a site, such as the site home page or a campaign page.

However, in online marketing and ecommerce, landing page normally refers to a standalone web page that appears after a visitor clicks a search result or an online ad. The purpose of the page is to encourage the visitor to take a predefined action. The goal of that action can be lead generation (getting the visitor's contact information) or "warming up" the visitor to enter the conversion funnel to make a purchase (for example, presenting product information or a special deal).

Destination page

Lander

Layout shift

A layout shift occurs when visible content loads at different speeds or at different times on a web page, causing the page layout to dynamically change in the browser viewport while the visitor is viewing and possibly interacting with the page.

A layout shift can be intended, such as when a container expands in response to a visitor action.

An unexpected layout shift occurs when some content loads slower than other content, or when content is dynamically added to the page, resulting in the already loaded content unexpectedly changing its position when new content gets added to the page. For example, an asynchronously loaded ad banner at the top of the page might complete loading only after the rest of the page is already rendered, causing the existing content to suddenly move downwards.

Local context

Context data available only within a single site.

The Frosmo JavaScript library stores local context data in the site's local storage in the browser. As with all web storage data, a local context is specific to a given origin, which is a unique combination of protocol ("scheme"), domain ("host"), and port that form a URL. If the same visitor (technically, browser) visits two Frosmo-enabled sites with different origins, such as https://frosmo.com/ and https://docs.frosmo.com/, the library creates and maintains two separate local contexts for the visitor, one per site, effectively treating the visitor as two separate visitors.

See also: Context, Local storage, Origin, Remote shared context, Shared context, Visitor

Local cookie total

LCT

Number of visitors currently segmented.

The local cookie total is calculated daily. The calculation starts after midnight local (server) time for the previous 24-hour period. Some visitors may be segmented and then exit the segment during the same day. Therefore, the total number of visitors for a day may be higher than the local cookie total.

Local storage

Web applications use local storage to store data in the visitor's browser. All pages from the same origin (protocol and domain) can use and access the same data.

The localStorage object stores the data with no expiration date. The data persists when the browser is closed and will be available for the subsequent browser sessions.

Unlike cookies, local storage does not affect the performance of the website.

See also: Context, Origin, Session storage

Cache

M

Modification

In the Frosmo context, a real-time change to a web page designed to personalize or otherwise improve the user experience of the website and to guide visitors to complete a conversion. You can also use modifications to collect usage data from a site. You can place a modification in basically any web page element, either appending or replacing the element content.

Multi-armed bandit

The multi-armed bandit is a modification case for automatically managing and optimizing variation distribution. Multi-armed bandit modifications continuously adjust their variation distribution based on how well the variations perform over time. This way, the multi-armed bandit automatically shows the best-performing variation most often.

N

Natural language processing

NLP

Natural language processing is a type of artificial intelligence (AI) that allows computers to understand and generate human language in a meaningful and useful way. By combining various rule-based language models and machine learning (ML) techniques, NLP enables computers to perform tasks such as:

  • Convert spoken language into text.

  • Determine the intent or sentiment (positive, negative, neutral) expressed in text or speech.

  • Summarize large volumes of text.

  • Translate text from one language to another.

  • Understand questions posed in natural language and provide relevant answers.

Ultimately, the purpose of NLP is to facilitate meaningful interactions between humans and machines.

...

Negative match

Negative match is a segment for visitors who do not take a specific action on a website. This is useful when you want to use segmentation to exclude visitors not interested in specific products or services from your target audience.

See also: Segmentation

Exclude segment

Exit rule

O

Origin

In the Frosmo context, "origin" has two distinct meanings:

Source of a web resource (web security concept)

The origin of a web resource, such as a web page, script, or image, is defined by the protocol (scheme), domain (host), and port of the URL used to access the resource. For example, in the web page URL http://company.com/dir/index.html, the protocol is http, the domain is company.com, and the port is, by default, 80. If two web pages (for example, http://company.com/dir/index.html and http://company.com/dir/page.html) share the same values for these elements, they are considered to have the same origin. The URLs http://company.com/dir/index.html and http://company.com:81/dir/index.html therefore have different origins, as the latter uses port 81.

The same-origin policy is a security mechanism that prevents scripts running on a website from accessing the data on pages with a different origin.

Using shared context (a cross-origin local storage) enables data to be shared between multiple origins.

Site name in the Frosmo Platform

When you create a site in the Frosmo Control Panel, you must enter the complete URL of the site. The URL determines the name used to identify the site in the site's custom script and in the Frosmo back end. This name is also known as "origin" or "site origin".

See also: Domain, Shared context, URL

P

Page load time

Time (normally in seconds) it takes to download and display the entire content of a web page in the visitor's browser viewport.

Page type

Type of web page, such as the home page or a category page.

The Frosmo Platform uses an explicit page type setting in:

  • Placements to indicate the type of page on which a placement is used

  • Recommendation strategies to define the type of page on which a recommendation is displayed

  • Smart Discoveries to define the type of page on which a Smart Discovery is displayed

The page types available for a site depend on the site's vertical.

See also: Placement, Recommendation strategy, Smart Discovery, Vertical

Path

The path in a URL reflects the directory or file path on a computer. For example, in the URL http://www.example.com/index.html, the path is /index.html.

Perceived performance

Perceived performance refers to how fast a visitor thinks your website is regardless of how fast it technically performs.

There are several ways to make your website feel faster, such as adding progress indicators, and using button states and lazy loading.

Personalization

Making real-time changes to a website based on the attributes and behavior of the visitor. The goal of personalization is to provide a more relevant user experience and, as a result, drive conversion and create revenue. Personalization can also be used to cross-sell or upsell products and create brand loyalty through engagement.

Technically, web personalization is implemented by applying specific changes to the website based on visitor segmentation or other methods of gathering behavioral data and triggering events based on it.

In the Frosmo Control Panel, personalization also refers to a modification case for creating a piece content that you can customize for a specific target audience.

See also: Case

Placement

A placement determines where on the web page a modification is placed. In the page code, the modification is always placed in relation to a specific target element. How and where the modification is actually displayed on the page depends on the page layout.

You can create and modify placements through Frosmo Control Panel.

Preview URL

Preview URL is the absolute URL of a page where you can preview modifications assigned to a placement.

The Control Panel uses the preview URL for launching variation previews from the modification UI.

Priority

If there are several modifications with the same placement settings, priority determines which of the modifications is displayed first.

You can define the priority for a modification in the advanced modification settings.

Product

Anything that a site sells or offers to visitors, or that the site otherwise tracks for conversions or transactions. A product can be, for example, a retail product, a blog article, an online game, a magazine subscription, or a downloadable brochure.

note

In the documentation, "item" and "product" are used interchangeably.

See also: Item, Product attribute, Product data, Product tracking, Product variant

Product attribute

Single characteristic of a product, such as an ID or a name. The attributes of a product together make up the product data for the product.

A product attribute is always composed of a name and a value, such as name: 'Coconut' or type: 'Food/Fruits'.

Product tracking determines what attributes the Frosmo Platform collects and stores about products on a site.

note

In the documentation, "item attribute" and "product attribute" are used interchangeably.

See also: Item attribute, Product, Product data, Product tracking

Product data

Product information collected from a site through product tracking. The data for a product typically includes attributes such as ID, name, category, description, image, and price.

Product data is a prerequisite for implementing recommendations and other features that revolve around products, such as segmenting visitors based on the types of products they have viewed.

note

In the documentation, "item data" and "product data" are used interchangeably.

See also: Item data, Product, Product attribute, Product tracking

Product data feed

File containing the full data for all products available on a site. The file is periodically updated to reflect changes in the product offering. The product data is typically in a JSON or XML format.

A product data feed can be both an alternative and a complement to product tracking performed directly on the site.

note

In the documentation, "item data feed" and "product data feed" are used interchangeably.

See also: Item data feed, Product, Product data, Product tracking

Item data feed

Product feed

Product list view

See Item list view.

Product tracking

Product tracking is the automatic process of collecting product data from a site and counting the number of views different products receive from visitors. Product data and product view statistics are stored in the Frosmo back end.

Product tracking is essential for building a database of products to which transactions and other product conversions can be mapped, and for tracking which products visitors view. Product data and product view statistics are a prerequisite for implementing recommendations and other features that revolve around products, such as segmenting visitors based on the types of products they have viewed.

The Frosmo Platform collects product data either by pulling the data directly from product pages as they load in a visitor's browser or by reading the data from a product data feed. On a product page, the standard means of providing the product data is by triggering product view events through the data layer.

See also: Product, Product data, Product view, Data layer

Product variant

Product variants are versions of the same product that differ with regard to one or more attributes, such as color and size. For example, a smartphone model might have variants for different color and storage capacity combinations, while a shirt might have variants based on color and size.

In the Frosmo Platform, a product variant is always associated with a parent product, and a product variant can never be a parent product itself. For recommendation generation purposes, the platform calculates product variant statistics (views, conversions, transactions) for the parent product.

See also: Product, Product data

Product view

In a general sense, a product view is a visitor action whereby the visitor views product or other item information on a site, typically on a product or similar page.

In a technical sense, a product view is an event that gets triggered whenever a visitor navigates to a product or other item page, or otherwise views an item on a site. Product view events accumulate product data and product view statistics for the site. Product view events are part of product tracking.

In product statistics, "most viewed" is a common popularity metric that measures how many times visitors viewed a specific product (either on a dedicated product page or on a listing page, such as a product category page).

note

In the documentation, "item view" and "product view" are used interchangeably.

See also: Item, Item view, Product, Product data, Product tracking

View

Q

Query string

Part of the URL of a web page that contains search parameters for searching a dynamic website. A query string starts with the "?" character, and consists of a key and value separated by the "=" character. For example, in the URL http://www.example.com/index.html?search=term, the key is search and the value is term.

If there are several query parameters in a query string appended to a URL, they are separated with the "&" character.

In the Frosmo context, you can use query strings when creating segments and triggers.

R

Ranking weight

Property of searchable item attributes in Frosmo Search.

The ranking weight of an attribute determines how the attribute gets weighed relative to other searchable attributes when ranking search results. An item that has a match in a high-weight attribute is considered more relevant than an item that has a match in a low-weight attribute. The item with the high-weight attribute is therefore more likely to get a higher final ranking than the item with the low-weight attribute.

note

Ranking weight is not the only factor that determines relevance, so the item with the low-weight attribute might still end up with the higher final ranking.

You can define ranking weights for attributes in the Frosmo Control Panel.

See also: Frosmo Search, Item attribute

Recommendation

In the Frosmo Platform, a recommendation is a piece of dynamically generated content predicted to appeal to visitors and delivered through a modification. The platform generates recommendations by feeding usage data to one or more algorithms that produce relevant results from that data. The platform subsystem that controls recommendation generation is called Frosmo Recommendations.

Product recommendations, that is, recommendations generated from product and transaction data are a common category of recommendations. Examples of product recommendations include most viewed products and products purchased together.

In the documentation, "recommendation" can refer either to a set of recommended items displayed in a single web page element, such as the top 10 most viewed products displayed in a product slider, or to the modification that displays the recommendation on the site.

See also: Recommendation data, Recommended item, Usage data

Recommendation data

Raw data content of a recommendation, that is, the recommendation results. The data consists of the details of one or more recommended items. By default, the items are in descending order of rank as determined by the recommendation algorithms. The more highly an algorithm recommends an item, the higher the rank that the algorithm assigns to the item.

For example, for a product recommendation, the data consists of one or more product items, with each item containing the details of a single recommended product. The product details include information such as ID, name, type, image, and price. The highest-ranked product is returned first, the second-highest is returned second, and so on.

The Frosmo Recommendations system generates recommendation data based on recommendation strategies. The system automatically regenerates the data at regular time intervals. The exact regeneration frequency depends on the strategy settings.

Recommendation data serves as the basis for building and displaying the recommendation web page element.

See also: Recommendation, Recommendation strategy, Recommended item

Recommendation engine

Software system that uses algorithms and data analysis to suggest products, services, or content to users based on their preferences, behavior, and other factors. Recommendation engines are a common feature of ecommerce and online gaming websites, where they are used to improve user experience by providing personalized recommendations.

See also: Recommendation, Recommended item

Recommendation system

Recommender system

Recommendation strategy

Logic and settings for generating the raw data of a recommendation.

Recommendation strategies are the standard solution for generating recommendations.

See also: Recommendation, Recommendation data

Recommended item

Item included in a recommendation, such as a recommended game or product.

See also: Item, Recommendation, Recommendation data

Redesigned dashboard

In the Nome release on 2023-03-06, the dashboard of the Frosmo Control Panel was redesigned to provide more relevant information and a more intuitive user experience.

The redesigned dashboard must be separately enabled for each site.

Referrer

Visit referrer is the web page from which a visitor comes to your site. For example, if the visitor searches Google with the query "example" and accesses your website http://www.example.com from the search results, the Google web page is the referrer.

Region

See Frosmo Platform instance.

Regular expression

regex

String of characters defining a search pattern. Regexes are generally used in string processing in search engines and database queries. The regex syntax varies depending on the programming language being used.

In the Frosmo context, you can use regexes in segmentation when creating or editing segmentation rules with options that support regular expressions (URL, protocol, domain, path, and anchor). You can also use regexes when defining URL rules for placements and triggers.

Remote shared context

Shared context data stored in the Frosmo back end.

Remote shared context is required in cases where the Frosmo JavaScript library cannot store shared context data in the browser's local storage. The library uses the Context API to store and retrieve the context data to and from the back end.

Remote shared context and the Context API are currently only required if you need to support shared context in a Safari browser on Apple devices. Safari does not accept local storage data from sites the visitor has not visited, which means that sites cannot access data from the local storage of an iframe. This, in turn, renders the standard shared context solution non-operational in a Safari browser.

See also: Context, Local context, Local storage, Shared context, Visitor

Request

Message sent by a client to a server requesting some action or resource. In reply, the server sends a response back to the client.

An HTTP request is a resource request sent by a web browser or other web client to a web server. In reply, the server sends an HTTP response back to the client.

See also: Browser, Client, Response, Server, Web Server

Response

Message sent by a server to a client in reply to a request from the client. The message contains status information about whether the request succeeded. If the request asked for a resource, the response also contains the appropriate resource data.

An HTTP response is a resource response sent by a web server to a web browser or other web client in reply to an HTTP request from the client. The response contains the requested resource, if available.

See also: Client, Request, Server

Retention

On a web page, a modification is always placed in relation to a specific target element. A placement determines that target element, that is, where on the web page the modification is shown. You can create and modify placements through the Frosmo Control Panel.

Returning visitor

S

Search engine

Software system that allows users to search for information from a collection of documents or other data, such as a database, file system, or website.

A search engine typically consists of the following main components:

  • Search interface, such as a search box, for users to enter their search queries

  • Crawler for browsing through the document collection and processing the data for indexing

  • Indexer for indexing the data

  • Database for storing the indexed data

See also: Document, Frosmo Search, Frosmo Search engine, Web search engine

Search query

In a colloquial sense, a search term.

In a technical sense:

  • The process whereby a search engine executes a search operation based on a search term.

  • The request that a client application sends to a search engine for executing a search operation. The request describes what kind of a search operation to run, including what search term, filters, and sorting logic to use.

See also: Search term, Search engine

Search term

Single word or phrase that a user enters into a search engine to find information.

The Frosmo Platform treats search terms as case-insensitive and always normalizes them to lower case. For example, "Saw", "SAW", and "saw" are the same search term and show up as "saw" in search statistics.

See also: Search query

Segment

Group of visitors who share the same interests, location, website behavior, or other characteristics. Segments are used to target visitors with content that matches their needs, making the purchase funnel faster and the overall visitor experience more pleasant.

See also: Segment group, Segmentation

Segment group

You can use segment groups to:

  • Categorize segments and thus manage them more easily. For example, you can group similar segments to add them more easily in the audience settings of a modification.

  • Make segments mutually exclusive within a segment group. This means that a visitor can only be in one segment within a segment group. For example, you can define segments for visitors in major cities. If a visitor is currently segmented in city A, but gets segmented again in city B, they are automatically excluded from the segment for city A.

Segment groups are site-specific.

See also: Segment, Segmentation

Segmentation

Grouping website visitors based on their behavior, location, or other variables to enable effective adaptive content. You can define a set of rules that place a visitor into one or more segments – or remove a visitor from them. Segments are used to target specific types of visitors with content that meets their interests. Content variations displayed to a visitor depend on the segment that the visitor is in.

See also: Segment, Segment group

Selective profiling

Selective profiling is a feature that allows the Frosmo Platform to display modifications to visitors based on their profiling choice: Visitors who opt in see personalized, targeted modifications, while visitors who opt out only see non-personalized, non-targeted modifications.

See also: Modification

Selector

In the Frosmo context, a selector is used to specify a target element in which to place a modification. Selectors use CSS or jQuery syntax.

You can select or create the target elements in placement settings in the Frosmo Control Panel. To use jQuery selectors, your site must have jQuery enabled.

For CSS, the valid selectors depend on the browser versions you want your site to support, and for jQuery, on the jQuery version used on your site.

See also: Target element

Server

Piece of computer hardware or software that provides services to computer devices or programs in a client-server system.

For example, a web server is a server to web browsers.

See also: Client, Request, Response

Session

Single continuous period of time during which a visitor uses a single website.

In technical terms, the session is a series of contiguous HTTP requests triggered by the visitor in their browser as they interact with the site within a given time frame. If the visitor stops using the site – that is, the browser stops sending requests – for a sufficiently long period of time, the session expires. When the visitor next returns to the site, they start a new session.

In the Frosmo Platform, a session expires after 30 minutes of inactivity.

See also: Visitor

Browser session

Web session

Session source

Session source is the web page from which the visitor arrives to your site. It can also be direct traffic, which means that the visitor didn't come from another website but, for example, through a bookmark or by typing the URL directly in their browser.

You can define the session source(s) for a modification in the advanced modification settings to determine the visitors to whom the modification is displayed. You can view the session sources for your site in the Frosmo Control Panel statistics. The session source is defined on domain level. You can only define the session source for basic modifications.

See also: Visit referrer

Session storage

Session storage is used to store data in the visitor's browser for the active tab and the duration of the current browser session. When the visitor closes the active browser tab or window, the data is removed.

See also: Local storage, Session

Shared context

Context data shared across two or more origins.

The data content of shared context is exactly the same as that of local context, but the data is accessible from multiple origins, rather than being restricted to a single origin as with local context. The visitor data that the Frosmo JavaScript library collects for the associated origins is centrally stored in a shared context, one per visitor. This means that what a visitor does on one site or one area of a site with a distinct origin, such as a subdomain, can affect their experience on another site or area.

Shared context is required if you want to track visitors across origins, that is, if you want to treat the same visitor as a single entity across multiple origins. For example, if your site consists of the domains company.com and shop.company.com, and if you want to keep track of your visitors as they navigate between those domains, you must enable shared context for the site. If you do not, the Frosmo JavaScript library creates and maintains separate local contexts for each domain, and you cannot track the same visitor as they move from one domain to another while on the site.

As with local context data, the Frosmo JavaScript library stores shared context data in the browser's local storage. Unlike with the local context data, though, the library stores the shared context data for a static HTML document (frosmo.xdm.html) that has a Frosmo origin, not for a customer site. The library embeds the document on a web page using an <iframe> element, which allows JavaScript running on the page to access the local storage of the embedded document (a "remote local storage"). Sites (origins) that share context data use the same <iframe> element on their pages, meaning the sites have access to the same remote local storage and, therefore, to the same context data. This is what allows you to track the same visitor across multiple origins despite the origin-restriction of local storage data.

See also: Context, Local context, Local storage, Origin, Remote shared context, Visitor, Visitor data

Multiple domain support

Site

In the Frosmo Platform, a site represents an actual website of a company. Each site has its own custom script that contains the Frosmo-specific configurations and custom code for the website. Each site also has its own dedicated set of data and statistics tracked by the Frosmo Platform on the website.

A site typically corresponds to a single domain or subdomain, such as company.com or shop.company.com, but you can also manage multiple domains and subdomains with just one site. You can create multiple sites for a company. A site always belongs to a single company.

By default, the Frosmo Platform does not enforce the same-origin policy (which only allows scripts that have the same origin as a site to access data on that site).

See also: Company, Origin

Website

Sizzle selector module

Sizzle is a JavaScript CSS selector engine that supports CSS3 and jQuery selectors as well as other types of selectors and pseudo-selectors. Using Sizzle allows you to select elements on a web page based on their CSS syntax.

You can enable Sizzle for your site in the Frosmo Control Panel company settings.

Smart Discovery

Smart Discovery is both the name of a Frosmo Platform feature and the term for a web page element that implements the feature on a site.

Feature

Smart Discovery is a visual search and discovery solution that recommends item groups to website visitors. These groups are known as Smart Discovery collections. Based on a visitor's affinities, their current location on the site, and what's currently popular on the site, Smart Discovery dynamically shows the visitor a personalized selection of one or more Smart Discovery collections.

Smart Discovery uses the Frosmo Search engine but does not require site search to be implemented with Frosmo Search. Smart Discovery can work alongside any site search solution.

Web page element

A Smart Discovery is a web page element that displays Smart Discovery collections to visitors. The actual set of collections that an individual visitor sees in a Smart Discovery depends on the visitor's affinities, the specific page the visitor is currently on, and how popular different items were at the time the collections were generated. You can also exclude and pin individual collections per discovery in the Frosmo Control Panel.

A Smart Discovery is implemented as a modification.

See also: Frosmo Search, Frosmo Search engine, Modification, Page type, Smart Discovery collection, Smart Discovery data, Smart Discovery strategy

Smart Discovery collection

Recommended item group in a Smart Discovery.

Technically, a collection is a search query for a specific group of relevant items, such as "Blue Skirts" (products on a retail site) or "5 Reel Slots" (games on an iGaming site). The Frosmo Platform generates the collections for a Smart Discovery based on a specific item attribute combination, such as brand & color or brand & category, and item popularity. The attribute combination and other generation settings are defined in a Smart Discovery strategy.

For example, if a strategy uses the attribute combination brand & category, and if the most popular items in the category Power Tools/Saws belong to the brands Brandix, Cakita, and Wakita, the platform will generate the following collections for the Power Tools/Saws discovery: Brandix Saws, Cakita Saws, and Wakita Saws.

See also: Item, Item attribute, Search query, Smart Discovery, Smart Discovery strategy

Smart Discovery data

Raw data content of a Smart Discovery, that is, the Smart Discovery results. The data consists of the details of one or more Smart Discovery collections. For each collection, the details include information such as display title and the item attribute combination that defines the collection. The collections are in descending order of relevance (as determined by item popularity).

The data serves as the basis for building and displaying Smart Discovery web page elements.

The settings for generating the data are defined in a Smart Discovery strategy.

See also: Smart Discovery, Smart Discovery collection, Smart Discovery strategy

Smart Discovery engine

Recommendation engine that generates and suggests Smart Discoveries.

See also: Recommendation engine, Smart Discovery, Smart Discovery strategy

Smart Discovery system

Smart Discovery results page

Search results page optimized for Smart Discovery results, that is, for displaying the search results for Smart Discovery collections.

See also: Smart Discovery, Smart Discovery collection

Smart Discovery search results page

Smart Discovery strategy

Settings for generating Smart Discoveries for a unique combination of page type, item attributes, sort order, and optionally other variables, such as:

  • home + brand & category + most viewed

  • brand + category + most viewed

  • category + brand & category + most converted

  • category + brand & category + most viewed

In other words, a strategy defines the settings for generating the raw data of a specific set of discoveries. For example, a home page strategy will only generate a single discovery, whereas a category page strategy will generate one discovery per category.

In the Frosmo Control Panel, the Smart Discovery management UI organizes Smart Discoveries by strategy.

Strategies are also the standard solution for accessing Smart Discovery data through the Smart Discovery API.

See also: Item attribute, Page type, Smart Discovery, Smart Discovery collection, Smart Discovery data

State

Custom action with a specific value that controls whether a modification is displayed to visitors. If you set a custom action value as a state for a modification, the modification is only displayed to visitors who complete that custom action with that value. For example, you can set a modification to be displayed only to logged-in visitors by tracking login status with a basic custom action and setting the custom action's logged-in value as a state for the modification.

You select states for a modification in the advanced modification settings.

See also: Custom action, Modification

Super-Affinity

Affinity.

While this feature is officially known as "Super-Affinity", the documentation talks about "affinity" for simplicity.

See also: Affinity

T

Tag manager

Container for controlling the deployment of all other (mostly third-party) tags through a web interface. When using a tag manager, you place a single JavaScript tag (the tag manager's master tag) on every page of your website, and manage running all other scripts through that master tag.

You can use the Frosmo Platform as a tag manager to control the other JavaScript tags on your site.

Target element

A modification is always placed on a web page in relation to a specific target element. The target element can be basically any HTML element or CSS selector. If your site has jQuery enabled, you can also use jQuery selectors.

See also: Selector

Template

A template allows you to define web content once and then reuse that content across multiple modifications on your site.

The content defined in a template can be any combination of HTML, CSS, and JavaScript. Template content can also include placeholder elements, which get replaced with specific values in individual modifications that use the template.

When you create a template, you work with four key fields that together specify how the template works:

  • Content type. This indicates what type of content the template renders. Only modifications with a compatible content type can use the template in their content variations.

  • Content. This is the HTML, CSS, and JavaScript code that makes up the base template content and defines what gets rendered on the page.

  • Content options schema. This is a JSON schema that describes the customizable or configurable content in the template, if any. If you use Mustache tags in the content, and if the values for those tags must be set in a modification variation or otherwise rely on information from the variation, define the appropriate schema for the tags. If your template contains only static content or does not require any input from the variation, you do not need to define a content options schema.

  • Content prerenderer. This is JavaScript code that defines preprocessing for the template content, namely for Mustache tags, if needed, before the content gets rendered on the page.

See also: Content type, Modification, Template

Test mode

Test mode allows you to show modifications only to certain visitors for testing purposes. To use test mode, you must enable it for modifications in the Frosmo Control Panel and then activate test mode in the browser.

See also: Workspace

Text match score

In Frosmo Search, the text match score measures how closely an item (specifically, its textual information) matches the search term in a search query. The higher the score, the closer the match, and the more relevant the item.

See also: Frosmo Search, Item, Search term

Tiebreaking

In search engines, tiebreaking is the process of sorting search results that have the exact same ranking score.

Frosmo Search uses tiebreaking attributes and item boosting scores to break ties between items with the same text match score.

See also: Frosmo Search, Item boosting, Search engine, Text match score

Search result tiebreaking

Token

Single word used by a search engine to find matches between search terms and documents.

In executing a search, the search engine splits the search term into tokens and checks those tokens against ones the engine has already indexed from documents. For example, the search term "best personalization solution" contains three tokens: "best", "personalization", and "solution".

The process of splitting text into tokens is called tokenization.

See also: Document, Search engine, Search term

Search token

Tracking variation

A tracking variation is used to track the original content of a web page or site to compare it against other modification variations. You can use tracking variations instead of the comparison group when you want to show the original content to a larger number of visitors than the comparison group includes.

Transaction

Simultaneous purchase of one or more items, such as products.

In the Frosmo Platform, a transaction is a type of conversion. The platform registers each transaction, irrespective of the number of items purchased, as a single conversion.

See also: Conversion, Item, Product

Transaction data

Product purchase information collected from a site through transaction tracking. In the Frosmo Platform, the data for a transaction includes a list of purchased products and optionally a transaction ID and the total purchase value of the transaction. You can use transaction data to, for example, create product recommendations.

See also: Data layer

Transaction tracking

Transaction tracking is the automatic process of monitoring visitors for actions that qualify as transactions and sending the data about those actions (transaction data) to the Frosmo back end. Transaction tracking also involves counting transactions as conversions and attributing those conversions to modifications, which the Frosmo Platform does automatically when it receives transaction data from a site.

Transaction tracking allows you to monitor the revenue generated by your site and measure Frosmo's impact on that revenue. Transaction tracking is also a prerequisite for implementing features that rely on transaction data, such as generating recommendations and segmenting visitors based on the items they have purchased, which in turn feed into revenue generation.

See also: Transaction, Conversion, Conversion tracking, Data layer

Trigger

A trigger allows you to detect a particular event, such as a click, on a web page and take a predefined action based on that event.

You can use triggers in:

  • Conversion definitions to track conversions

  • Placements to determine when to display a modification

  • Segmentation by defining that a visitor is segmented when their actions fire a specific trigger

A trigger consists of two parts: the evaluation point (the event on the web page that causes the Frosmo Platform to check whether to fire the trigger) and the rule(s) for firing the trigger. You don't have to define any rules if you want the trigger to be fired every time an event takes place.

For example, you can configure a trigger to be fired when the Frosmo script is loaded (= evaluation point) if the current page URL is www.frosmo.com (= rule). Or, you can determine a trigger to be fired every time a visitor click a specific button (= evaluation point, no rules).

True display

In the Frosmo context, a basic modification event.

A modification gets a true display when the modification has remained visible and stationary in the browser viewport for at least 3 seconds. In addition, if the modification's width and height are both less than or equal to 300 pixels, the modification must have been fully in the viewport. If the modification's width or height is greater than 300 pixels, at least 75% of the modification must have been in the viewport.

The platform tracks true displays also for recommended items.

See also: Display, Modification, Recommended item, Viewport

U

Unique visitor

Analytics concept where a given visitor is counted only once for a given statistics even if the visitor has multiple interactions.

For example, the Daily unique visitors statistic for a modification variation counts the total number of visitors for whom the variation loaded and rendered at least once on a given day. If the variation loaded and rendered multiple times for the same visitor, the platform only counts the first time.

note

In the Frosmo Platform, and in the documentation, "visitor" is by default understood to be a unique person (browser).

See also: Visitor

Unique user

URL

URL (Uniform Resource Locator) is a reference specifying the location of a web resource and means to access that resource.

The URL of a web page contains several parts, the most important being protocol and domain.

See also: Domain, Path, Query string

Web address

URL matcher

URL matchers are used in the Frosmo Control Panel when working with placements and triggers. For placements, you use URL matchers to determine the URL of the page on which a modification is displayed. For triggers, you use URL matchers to determine the conditions for firing the trigger.

Usage data

Data that the Frosmo Platform collects or tracks on a site for analytics and personalization purposes. The data drives much of what the platform does, such as generate recommendations and segment visitors.

Usage data consists of:

  • Modification performance data (event counts and related metrics)

  • Product data (product or similar item details)

  • Visitor data (including completed conversions and transactions)

By default, the platform collects and processes only anonymous and pseudonymous information about visitors and their behavior on a website. The platform does not collect data that in itself enables the identification of an individual data subject.

See also: Conversion data, Product data, Transaction data, Visitor data

User

Person using the Frosmo Control Panel or other Frosmo applications or services, such as Frosmo Preview.

V

Variation

Variations are different content versions of the same modification.

If a modification has only one variation, all visitors see that variation. If a modification has multiple variations, you can define how the variations are distributed among visitors, that is, what percentage of visitors sees which variation.

In the case of modifications with multiple variations, whether the same visitor always sees the same variation depends on the modification case:

  • A/B test: The visitor always sees the same variation. That is, the visitor is locked to the variation that they get assigned when they first see the modification.

  • Multi-armed bandit: As a rule, the visitor sees the same variation for the duration of their session. That is, the visitor is session-locked to the variation that they get assigned when they first see the modification. If, during the session, the multi-armed bandit algorithm gives the variation 0% distribution, the platform assigns a different variation to the visitor, which the visitor then sees for the remainder of the session (unless, of course, that variation, too, suddenly gets 0% distribution, in which case the process repeats).

If the visitor clears their browser cache, opens a new window in incognito mode, or visits the site from another browser or device, the platform treats them as a new visitor and starts variation assignment from scratch.

The number of variations you can create for a modification depends on the modification case:

  • A/B test: Create multiple variations to test which variation performs best.

  • Multi-armed bandit: Create two or more variations, and select a multi-armed bandit algorithm that automatically decides the best-performing variation and adjusts the variation distribution accordingly.

  • Personalization: The modification can only have a single variation.

  • Non-personalized: The modification can only have a single variation.

See also: Case, Modification, Visitor

Revision

Variation distribution

Variation distribution determines the percentage of eligible visitors to whom a specific modification variation is actually shown.

How the variation distribution is defined depends on the selected modification case:

  • A/B test: Manually define the variation distribution.

  • Multi-armed bandit: The selected multi-armed bandit algorithm decides the best-performing variation and adjusts the variation distribution accordingly.

  • Personalization: The modification can only have a single variation and all eligible visitors get that variation.

If the modification has an active comparison group variation, a certain percentage of all visitors entering the website will not see the modification.

See also: Case

Viewport

In a web browser, the viewport is the part of the browser UI that displays the web page (web document). The viewport, or browser viewport, therefore generally refers to the portion of the web page currently visible in the browser.

See also: Fold

Browser viewport

Vertical

Business focus of a site, such as iGaming or retail.

The vertical is also a site setting in the Frosmo Platform that affects certain features, such as placements and recommendation strategies, available to the site. You set the vertical in the Frosmo Control Panel.

Business vertical

Site vertical

Visit referrer

Visit referrer is the page from which a visitor has arrived from your site. You can segment your visitors based on the referrer of their visit on URL, protocol, domain, or path level. Visitors segmented based on the visit referrer stay in the segment for a predefined period of time (1-365 days).

See also: Session source

Visitor

User of a website.

You can generally think of a visitor as a unique person browsing and interacting with a site on a single computer, smartphone, or other device.

Technically, the Frosmo Platform does not actually see the person, but the web browser they're using to access the site. A visitor, therefore, is really a browser, and visitor behavior comprises the events and requests that the visitor's actions trigger in the browser and that result in the browser communicating with a web server.

The platform automatically assigns a unique identifier, a Frosmo ID, to each new visitor (browser) that enters a site.

See also: Browser, Frosmo ID, Unique visitor, Visitor data

Visitor data

When a visitor enters a site, the Frosmo Platform starts tracking the visitor's activities on the site.

By default, the platform tracks the following data about each visitor:

  • Behavioral data

    • Affinities the visitor has and affinity groups to which the visitor belongs

    • Content modifications the visitor has seen or clicked

    • Conversions and transactions the visitor has completed

    • Custom actions the visitor has performed (optional)

    • Custom events the visitor has triggered (optional)

    • How many times the visitor has visited the site

    • Items the visitor has added to their shopping cart (optional)

    • Items the visitor has viewed

    • Item lists the visitor has viewed (optional)

    • Logins (optional)

    • Segments to which the visitors belongs

    • When the visitor has last visited the site

    • Whether this is the visitor's first visit on the site (a new visitor)

  • Contextual data

    • Visitor's browser

    • Visitor's device (mobile, desktop, tablet)

    • Visitor's geolocation (country, region, city)

See also: Visitor

Visitor affinity

See Affinity.

W

Web search engine

Search engine for websites. A web search engine can operate inside a single website to implement site search, such as Frosmo Search, or it can operate across the web, such as Google Search.

See also: Frosmo Search, Search engine

Web server

Server computer hosting one or more websites. A web server (1) stores all web pages and other web resources that make up a website and (2) delivers those resources to client applications, such as browsers, on request.

When a visitor navigates to a web page, the visitor's browser requests the page from the web server over HTTP. The web server responds by sending the page content to the browser over the same HTTP connection, after which the browser can display the page to the visitor.

See also: Browser, Visitor

Weight

If there are several modifications with the same placement settings and priority, weight determines which of the modifications is displayed most often.

For example, if modification A has a weight of 1 and modification B a weight of 3, modification A is shown 1 / (1 + 3) = 25% of the time and modification B 3 / (1 + 3) = 75% of the time.

You can define the weight of a modification in the advanced modification settings.

Workspace

Frosmo Platform feature that allows you to develop and test site features in the Frosmo Control Panel without affecting the live content of your site. You can either duplicate existing features or create new ones in a workspace, and, when you so choose, publish the features to production.

See also: Test mode