Interactions are the small snapshots of your customer’s dialogue with your brand. A few basic interactions include web visits, pages viewed, or emails opened. Sitecore’s xDB automatically stores all of these interactions in a Contact record. Over time, these interactions can lead to an Outcome. Outcomes were introduced in Sitecore 8, and they are becoming more useful with each update (8.1+). Outcomes in xDB occur as a result of one or more interactions (whereas goals are triggered within an interaction).
Goals can be placed on digital actions with business value. An outcome can be a “meta-goal”. Outcomes often have a monetary value and they tend to be more high-level objectives than goals created in the Marketing Control Panel. A few examples of Outcomes are: Contact Acquisition, Marketing Lead, or Product Purchase. A good rule of thumb is that if money changes hands, and it’s a significant event that your Marketing team wants customers to achieve — use an Outcome. Each Outcome appears directly on one of your Contact’s timeline.
The out-of-the box Marketing Taxonomy in Sitecore can be customized to match your business rules. You can optionally associate a monitary value with each outcome. Remember as you set this up that multiple goals can accomplish the same Outcome. The SBOS Xccelerator is a free module which extends the functionality of Outcomes. With the SBOS Xccellerator module in place, you can automatically trigger outcomes with goals. More information on this free module can be found on Sitecore Marketplace.
The Experience Database (xDB) in Sitecore acts as a single source of truth for all of your online and offline customer interactions. By collecting data multiple channels over time, you form a detailed picture of each Contact, and how they interact with your brand. In aggregate this information becomes valuable to your business. Experience Analytics reports make this data available to marketers, enabling them to monitor key areas customer experience and even personalize visits in real time.
One limitation of Outcomes is that they cannot currently be setup by marketers, because they need to be setup programatically. Once setup, they appear in Experience Analytics and the Experience Profile and are very useful for marketers and analysts.