Setting Membership Duration for Audiences on Google Analytics

Question

I would like to ask members in the community for their view about using the new "Audiences" report in Google Analytics. (If you are not familiar with the new feature, is allows you to see performance metrics on GA of a certain audience, which is defined the same way you used to define remarketing lists through GA). See example here:

My question pertains to the "membership duration". In making remarketing lists, the membership duration determines how long you should "chase" the user with remarketing ads after a visit. But for an audience which is created for the sake of analysis only (and not remarketing), I doubt whether to limit it only to 1 day, or to include more days.

For example - let's assume that I have a product, and I want to view the metrics of an audience that watched the video, and see if they are more likely to convert than other audiences I define.

If I set membership duration on 30 days - it could be that the event happened on day no. 1, but the conversion took place on day no. 22 - therefore the conversion and metrics are telling a story of 2 different sessions (I know I can segment it further using new/returning users, but please take this only as an example). If I set the membership duration on 1 day, it will be more likely that the conversion is related to watching the video.

What are your thoughts? How would you define the membership duration?

Answer 1

Audience durations are typically bigger than 1 day because it often takes several sessions for a user to decide to buy a product. The larger and less frequent the purchase, the longer users need to think about it.

For example a user may research buying a new car for weeks or months, however they probably buy whichever toothpaste looks good off the choices on the shelf in front of them.

It is quite possible that if a user watched a video about a product and the bought the product 22 days later, that the video had an impact on their purchase decision. However, if your typical user orders from your site every couple days, a 30 day look back is going to create a lot of noise.

Base your membership duration on the order frequency of your users. If a typical user orders once a year then a 30 day duration is fine. If a typical user orders once a week, then use a duration of a few days.