Adding Demographic Properties to the User Profile Definition

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You can extend the User profile definition by adding the properties required by the Demographic analysis models created in the Predictor resource. If your organization wants to use the Demographic segment and prediction models provided with the Predictor resource, you will need to update the User Object profile definition to collect the demographic data required to build the Demographics model. The demographic data you collect can also be used to build the Combined Demographics and Transactions segment and prediction models.

If the required demographic data is not in your user profiles, you will not be able to build the demographic segment and prediction models. Prediction models look for correlations between data, and the models treat numbers and strings identically, therefore, the profile properties can be either numbers or strings. You must use single-valued site terms to facilitate and normalize user responses to the demographic properties. Site terms are stored as strings.

Following is an overview of the steps you perform to add demographic properties to the User Object profile definition.

To add demographic properties to the User Object profile definition

  1. Add the following columns to the profile database, and create a data member for each one.
    • Age
    • Occupation
    • Marital Status
    • Gender
    • Income
    • Education
    • Children
    • Family Role
    • Region
  2. Create the following site terms:
    Site terms Site term values
    Age 20-30; 30-40; 40-50; 50-60
    Occupation President; Vice President; Manager; Administrative Assistant
    Marital Status Married; Divorced; Single; Widowed
    Gender Male; Female
    Income $20,000-35,000; $35,000-60,000; $60,000-80,000
    Education High School; College Graduate; Masters Degree; Doctorate Degree; Professional Degree
    Children 0; 1; 2; 3; 4; 5
    Family Role Head of Household; Spouse; Other
    Region North; South; East; West
  3. Add a property group to the User Object profile definition named Demographics.
  4. Add the following properties to the Demographics property group:
    Property Type Type reference
    Age Site Term Age
    Occupation Site Term Occupation
    Marital Status Site Term Marital Status
    Gender Site Term Gender
    Income Site Term Income
    Education Site Term Education
    Children Site Term Children
    Family Role Site Term Family Role
    Region Site Term Region
  5. Map each of the new properties to the corresponding data members, and mark each property as exported to the Data Warehouse.
  6. Click Save on the toolbar to save the new properties.
  7. Ask your Web designer to add the new properties to your site Registration page.
  8. Determine how long you need to wait to collect demographic data with the new profile properties on your Web site.
  9. Import the demographic, transaction, Web log file, campaign, and profile data into the Data Warehouse.
  10. Run the Predictor Model Configuration Setup Wizard in the Predictor resource to map profile data to the model configurations and add model configurations to your site.
  11. Use the Predictor resource to build the segment and prediction models.

After you build the Demographic segment and prediction models, your business manager can use the Segment Viewer module in Commerce Server Business Desk to view segment models. You can use the Predictor resource to view prediction models.

See Also

Profile Definitions

Adding a New Data Member in the Profiles Resource

Adding a New Profile Definition in the Profiles Resource

Embedding a Profile Definition in the Profiles Resource

Creating Site Terms in the Profiles Resource

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