Cookies

What is a cookie?

Most sites today make use of cookies – these are small files that a website stores on the user’s computer in order to enhance the functionality of the website.

Cookies used on this website

This website uses relatively few cookies. Cookies used on this site are for the following purposes:

  • Facilitates use of Google Analytics

These cookies are not harmful in any way, nor do we collect any personal information on website users. If you so wish, you can disable cookies by changing the security options in your web browser.

Further details are listed below.

Cookie name Cookie description
__utma A persistent cookie – remains on a computer, unless it expires or the cookie cache is cleared. It tracks visitors. Metrics associated with the Google __utma cookie include: first visit (unique visit), last visit (returning visit). This also includes Days and Visits to purchase calculations which afford ecommerce websites with data intelligence around purchasing sales funnels.
__utmb & __utmc These cookies work in tandem to calculate visit length. Google __utmb cookie demarks the exact arrival time, then Google __utmc registers the precise exit time of the user. Because __utmb counts entrance visits, it is a session cookie, and expires at the end of the session, e.g. when the user leaves the page. A timestamp of 30 minutes must pass before Google cookie __utmc expires. Given__utmc cannot tell if a browser or website session ends. Therefore, if no new page view is recorded in 30 minutes the cookie is expired. This is a standard ‘grace period’ in web analytics. Ominture and WebTrends among many others follow the same procedure.
__utmz Cookie __utmz monitors the HTTP Referrer and notes where a visitor arrived from, with the referrer siloed into type (Search engine (organic or cpc), direct, social and unaccounted). From the HTTP Referrer the __utmz Cookie also registers, what keyword generated the visit plus geolocation data. This cookie lasts six months. In tracking terms this Cookie is perhaps the most important as it will tell you about your traffic and help with conversion information such as what source / medium / keyword to attribute for a Goal Conversion.
__utmv Google __utmv Cookie lasts ‘forever’. It is a persistent cookie. It is used for segmentation, data experimentation and the __utmv works hand in hand with the __utmz cookie to improve cookie targeting capabilities.