Classification Best Practices Guide

Why Classification Matters

Accurate classification ensures your consent experience functions correctly, respects user preferences, and helps maintain long-term consistency across your site. This guide outlines how to group, classify, and manage discoveries effectively.

What Does “Classify” Mean?

When we say “classify,” we mean identifying what a piece of code (like a script or cookie) is doing on your website.

For example:

• Is it tracking visitors for analytics?

• Is it necessary for your site to function (like a login script)?

• Is it designed to personalize or market to your users?

Classifying discoveries helps Osano enforce the correct behavior based on your visitors' consent preferences. It’s like organizing everything into clearly labeled categories — such as Essential, Analytics, Marketing, or Personalization.

Start with Rule Groupings

Group discoveries together based on what they do, not just where they come from.

• Why: Grouping by behavior makes your classifications more scalable and easier to manage.

• How: Use domain-level rules, path matching, or tags to classify similar items together. These rules apply automatically to matching current and future discoveries.

Bulk Classification Best Practices

Bulk classification saves time — but must be used carefully.

Recommended Scenario All scripts from https://www.analytics-tool.com/ are used for analytics. You can safely group them and classify them as Analytics.

Caution Scenario A single vendor’s scripts include both Essential and Marketing functionality. Bulk classifying everything from that domain could result in inaccurate enforcement.

How to Bulk Classify (Simplified Explanation)

Let’s say your site has these three scripts:

https://www.osano.com/script1.js  
https://www.osano.com/script2.js  
https://www.osano.com/script3.js

Each one performs the same function — for example, tracking user behavior for analytics.

Rather than classify each script individually, follow these steps:

1. Create one rule using:

   https://www.osano.com/

1. Assign the correct classification (e.g., Analytics).

2. Save the rule (using the floppy disc icon)

Now, any discovery that starts with https://www.osano.com/ will be automatically assigned the same classification.

This is bulk classification — using one rule to automatically apply a consistent classification across multiple similar items.

Use “Ignore” Sparingly

Avoid ignoring large numbers of discoveries without review.

• Why not ignore? Ignored items may still load in Permissive mode and affect site behavior or compliance. In strict mode, all ignored items are blocked from loading.

• What to do instead:

• Group and classify wherever possible

• Only use “Ignore” when you are certain the item is irrelevant

• Document the reason

Choosing a Grouping Method

Path Matching (Recommended) Use path segments in URLs to group and classify discoveries. Example: https://www.website.com/cdn/cookie-lib/ can be used to group all scripts under that path within the same consent category (Essential, Marketing, Analytics, or Personalization).

Regular Expressions (Advanced) Regular expressions are flexible but require technical familiarity. Only use them if you are confident in their behavior.

System Behavior to Understand

• Classification rules are applied retroactively to matching existing discoveries.

• They also apply automatically to future discoveries that match the same pattern.

• Grouping and classifying by rule helps keep your implementation consistent and manageable over time.

Resources

• Classification Rules Documentation

• Cookie Consent Classification Overview Video

Summary: Best Practices at a Glance