Tag management is one of Quru’s core focuses. We are always looking to make sure our people are up to date with knowledge for any of the tag management systems (TMS) we work with. Recently, two of our guys visited Munich, Germany, for a Tealium tag management training week.
I caught up with a team member, Technical Web Analyst Tatu Kallonen, to talk with him about how the trip went and what new’s at Tealium?
Welcome back Tatu. As you can see, it’s still a bit rainy but now we also got some snow on the ground here in Helsinki.
Munich is pretty much the same as Helsinki. The same snowy weather, cold temperature, lack of daylight. Luckily the city was illuminated with lots and lots of beautiful Christmas lights that lifted the mood of otherwise so grey and dark time of year.
Before we dive into your training trip, I think it would be good to explain to the people what is a tag and what tag management is?
A tag is a piece of code that is inserted into a websites source code. It allows third-party tools to track users and their actions as well as customize their experience on the site.
Tag management is a way to organize your tags so that you can access and edit your tags with ease and in a way that supports your whole data collection strategy. Tag Management Systems (TMS) help you with this by offering a specialized interface with which managing tags is simplified even further. In most cases, you won’t have to do any coding.
Can you share with us some key benefits of having a TMS in place?
With good tag management you’re able to collect just the data you want and it’s simple and quick to edit or create new tags based on your needs. Without, you would most likely spend a lot of time looking through your code, editing it and still ending up with cases where your tag doesn’t work as intended.
Thanks. I think this helps people get a general idea of what tag management systems are and why it matters to companies. Speaking of TMS, Tealium is one of the big players in the industry. You went to Munich along with our colleague, Sampsa Eloranta, for training. What did you focus on?
Tealium is a new tool for me so my main focus is to learn the basics of how to do tag management with it and what are the biggest benefits when using it. This will help me to focus my future development towards the key areas where Tealium is in its best form.
You’ve worked with other TMS tools, like Google Tag Manager. Does Tealium differ a lot say compare to Google?
Tealium is very different from Google Tag Manager. Maybe you could consider it being more similar with Adobe’s tools but from my own point of view it felt like an unique tool the way it was structured and what benefits it is able to bring to the table.
Who participated in the training?
There were people from both Tealium customer companies and partner agencies. From Germany, Ireland, Switzerland, Austria, Hungary, France…
Pretty Eurocentric crowd. What was the trainer like?
Our trainer had a lot of experience in training but had been working for Tealium only half a year. She was very friendly and helped with all the questions we had. If she didn’t know the answer herself, she contacted her colleagues to get the answers.
It’s better to check with your colleagues for the right information than give misinformation. All and all, what did you get from the training?
I definitely got what I went there for. I’m now fairly confident in my ability to create tracking solutions with Tealium and I know where its strengths lie. Tealium offers a lot of potential when it comes to combining marketing actions with tagging. You’re able to track your users behavior on your site, automatically assign them to appropriate audiences and target them with specific actions all in one system is impressive.
I’m glad to hear that. Besides the training, did you get to explore Munich?
The trainings took always the whole day, so we only had free time in the evenings (when there was no additional work to be done). We spent that time mostly just walking around the city and looking for a restaurant to go for dinner. There was a huge Christmas market in the center of Munich where we went to as well. It was filled with people, wurst stands and holiday spirit.
That sounds nice. On that note, I think we should head out and look for that holiday spirit here.