You’ve launched your hackathon and now you want to know what is going on. This article is a great resource for how to do the below:
- Navigate the Metrics tab
- Export submission information
- Export registrant information
- Other helpful reports
Navigate the Metrics tab
Your metrics are only accessible once your hackathon is published and the Metrics tab provides timely reports about your hackathon along with a snapshot view of how your hackathon is going.
You can find your metrics in two ways:
- Hackathon Site. If you are logged into Devpost, you will see Manage as the last option of your hackathon’s navigation bar. Click Manage from your hackathon’s site then under the Manage hackathon tab, click Metrics.
- Your Profile. Login to your Devpost account and hover over your profile image in the top right corner. Select Manage hackathons and click the gear icon to the right of the hackathon name, then under the Manage hackathon tab, click Metrics.
Note that if you are not a hackathon organizer, you will not see Manage in your hackathon navigation bar or Manage hackathons in your avatar’s dropdown menu. To host a hackathon, please see the Host a hackathon page for more details.
The Metrics tab has two sections:
- Export submission and registrant data. This area allows you to select the report you would like to export, generate it and eventually download it. Please note that you can only generate one report at a time and it can anywhere from 5 seconds - 5 minutes depending on the amount of data within the report.
- View submissions & user activity by date. This area allows you to see a snapshot of your hackathon stats for a certain period of time.
Export submission information
You can always export your hackathon’s projects data to see how far participants are in the submission process, to judge projects, to identify projects that don’t meet requirements, or to complete any other project-related task.
To view the project data, navigate to the Metrics tab. Under the Export submission and registrant data section, select the Projects data report and click the blue Generate report > Download report buttons and a .csv file of the registrant data will be available for you.
If you’ve added custom submission form questions, you’ll find responses here in the Projects data export.
What is included in the Projects data report?
If you select Do not Include under “Personally identifiable information”, PII will not be included in the file (name, email, etc.). The below information will be provided in this report.
- Project Title
- Submission Url
- Project Status
- Judging Status
- Highest Step Completed
- Project Created At
- About The Project
- "Try it out" Links
- Video Demo Link
- Opt-In Prizes
- Built With
- Notes
- Team Colleges/Universities
- Additional Team Member Count
If you select Include under “Personally identifiable information”, the below additional items will be included.
- Submitter First Name
- Submitter Last Name
- Submitter Email
- Team Member 1 First Name
- Team Member 1 Last Name
- Team Member 1 Email
- etc.
Please keep in mind that data is self-reported, therefore, someone’s first name could be a nickname versus their legal name.
Using projects data for in-person judging
Every hackathon runs judging differently, but for most in-person hackathons, the most popular method is the “science-fair-style expo”; similar to how school science fair projects are showcased, this method allows judges to go around to each table to review hackathon projects one by one.
Most in-person events that run judging this way need a way to show hackers, judges, and sponsors where each project is located. Devpost has a built-in feature to auto-assign table numbers and share them with your hackers, judges, and sponsors. Read more about assigning table numbers through Devpost.
Using projects data for online judging
If you’re doing online judging, you do not need to download the projects data report as you’ll find all of the projects will be viewable via the judging dashboard when the judging period has opened. Read more about online judging here.
Export registrant information
To view the registrant data, navigate to the Metrics tab. Under the Export submission and registrant data section, select the Registrant data report and click the blue Generate report > Download report buttons and a .csv file of the registrant data will be available for you.
You’ll see that this report includes information about each registrant such as their first and last name, email, whether they already submitted a project to the hackathon, and much more.
What is included in the Registrant data report?
If you select Do not Include under “Personally identifiable information”, PII will not be included in the file (name, email, etc.). The below information will be provided in this report.
- Portfolio Url
- Submitted Project?
- Project URLs
- City
- State
- Country
- Project Count
- College/University Name
- Job Specialty
- Registered At
- Do you have teammates?
- Who told you about this hackathon?
If you select Include under “Personally identifiable information”, the below additional items will be included.
- First Name
- Last Name
Please also keep in mind that data is self-reported, therefore, someone’s first name could be a nickname versus their legal name.
What is the difference between the Projects data and Registrant data?
The Projects data report includes information on each hackathon project submission along with the users associated with the project versus the Registrant data report only includes information on each registrant, including hackathon registration information.
How can I use the Registrant data report?
This report will help you see the job specialties you’re hackathon is attracting. If you’re targeting a specific type of developer, this report may help you to see if you’re right on target or need to tailor your marketing efforts a bit more to generate interest from a specific specialty. Please note that registrant data is self-reported, therefore, not all registrants indicate their job specialties.
Other helpful reports
There are a few more helpful reports we would like to share with you. Depending on what you are looking for the below reports might help:
To view the specified data, navigate to the Metrics tab. Under the Export submission and registrant data section, select the desired report and click the blue Generate report > Download report buttons and a .csv file of the registrant data will be available for you.
Country data
Exporting the country data enables you to see how many registrants or submitters are from a particular country. Please keep in mind that while Devpost asks users to input their country of residence/location, they are not required to answer.
How can I use the Country data report?
This report will help you to understand your hackathon’s global reach. If you’d like to see more participation from a specific country, this report could also help you assess where to target specific marketing efforts to increase participation.
Conversion data
Devpost uses UTMs to track the registration to submitter conversion rate. This report will tell you the percentage of registrants that submitted via the UTM Source, UTM Medium, UTM Campaign, and UTM Content.
Note: UTMs are tracked for most registrants, but the report excludes registrants who block tracking in their browser, are EU users opted out of tracking, or are auto-invited as teammates to a submission and therefore did not follow the trackable registration flow.
How can I use the Conversion data Report?
This report may help you receive a better understanding of where your registrants are hearing about the hackathon, which could aid in your marketing efforts.
Progress data
The Progress data report provides an overview of how your hackathon is progressing over a period of time. The data may also help you make conclusions about your hackathon’s results, such as comparing the marketing efforts of one week to another based on how many new registrants were added.
The Progress data report is split into 4 tabs:
- Registrations and Submissions. Key metrics on registrants, teams, and projects. Note that there is a comparison between a specified date range and the overall total.
- Locations. As shown in the Country Data report, this tab also shows the number of registrants and submitters from specific countries.
- UTM conversion. Displays a comprehensive view of the conversion rate from registrant to submitter via UTMs.
- Initial referrer conversion. A user may have first landed on your hackathon page without being referred by another website; this report shows the registrant to conversion rate of those initial referring websites. Examples of initial referrers include users who may have typed the hackathon page address directly, clicked on a bookmark, clicked a link from an email, or might have security settings in their browser that prevent referrer data from being passed.
How can I use the Progress data report?
This report helps you track the progress of your hackathon, allowing you to draw conclusions on the success of your efforts. It can also be a useful tool to adjust how you engage with participants. For example, if you’re noticing that many of your registrants are looking for teammates, you may want to send a mass update to prompt participants to use the community chat (if available) as an option to collaborate.