Moz Q&A is closed.
After more than 13 years, and tens of thousands of questions, Moz Q&A closed on 12th December 2024. Whilst we’re not completely removing the content - many posts will still be possible to view - we have locked both new posts and new replies. More details here.
Why does Google Analytics think PPC traffic is organic?
-
I have a bastard of a problem... Google Analytics is incorrectly tracking PPC traffic as SEO which is screwing up all my reporting .
I don't care for rankings, I care for actual SEO traffic and I can't be sure that what i am seeing is correct which is driving me nuts.
Any ideas?
-
Ralph, If you're using a call tracking Software doing Dynamic Number insertion like Mongoose Metrics does, The visit will appear in many cases to Analytics to be Organic or Direct. Since tools like that use a URL Extension to Know when to insert the tracking number, you can add a Custom Channel Grouping and Define the following rule:
Landing Page URL -- Contains -- mm_replace=true (that rule is specific to Mongoose Metrics, but most will have some common phrase in the URL extension that you can use)
-
Hey Ralph,
I know this was posted a while ago but I'm running into the same issue. Our PPC urls are showing up as "organic" landing pages and screwing up organic traffic and conversion data. Did you ever hear back from Google on this?
Thanks!
-
Google analytics will place Ppc traffic in the "direct traffic" bucket if you do not tag your ppc campaigns correctly. Google Adwords is easy, just enable auto tagging. In AdCenter, you need to make sure that you use utm codes in all of your keyword destination urls...otherwise google analytics will just place this traffic in the direct traffic category.
There was a good blog post about this last month. http://www.seomoz.org/blog/why-google-analytics-tagging-matters-whiteboard-friday
-
Thanks Damion... I have got Google looking at it now so fingers crossed they can find the fault.
-
I fully sympathise, and I fully identify with your assessment of it as a bastard of a problem!
Just to be square on the baseline stuff, is your Analytics correctly linked to your Adwords account? Incorrect linking can cause all manner of weirdness. It's pretty easy to link accounts these days but it didn't used to be, so if the adwords and/or analytics accounts for this site are more than a couple of years old that could be causing a problem.
Secondly, is Adwords auto-tagging set up correctly? It could be that Adwords isn't passing on the correct URL handling parameters, and so in the absence of appended campaign data Analytics is interpreting it all as a referral from Google, and therefore as organic traffic.
-
When I have "organic only" segmenting on i.e. non paid search traffic, it is showing that the top organic keywords are keywords that i have no top 30 rankings in organic, yet my ppc ad is number one.
Biggest traffic driver - cheap flights - no rankings for this domain, but the sister domain is on page 2
Second biggest - cheap hotels - pos 15-16 -
What makes you think it's adding your PPC traffic to your organic report? When you are in Analytics and click on Traffic Sources, do you see "google (organic)" as one of the sources? Are you saying google is adding PPC visits to that row in the traffic sources table?
Browse Questions
Explore more categories
-
Moz Tools
Chat with the community about the Moz tools.
-
SEO Tactics
Discuss the SEO process with fellow marketers
-
Community
Discuss industry events, jobs, and news!
-
Digital Marketing
Chat about tactics outside of SEO
-
Research & Trends
Dive into research and trends in the search industry.
-
Support
Connect on product support and feature requests.
Related Questions
-
Strange landing page in Google Analytics
Hello MOZ Community, The website in question is https://x-y.com/ When i looked at the landing pages report in GA , x-y.com is appended at the end of every URL like this. https://x-y.com/x-y.com When i open the above URL in GA interface, it shows page not found. This is obvious as there is no such URL.
Reporting & Analytics | | Johnroger
The metrics like sessions, Users, Bounce rate all look good. In the property settings, The default URL is written like this http:// cell-gate.com (Please note that s is missing in property settings). But how is traffic tracked correctly How do i solve this problem. What settings should we change to make the landing pages report look ok Thanks0 -
Is there a way to filter all computers on a specific IPv6 network in Google Analytics?
Is there a quick way of filtering the IP addresses for all the computers on a network that's using IPv6? I want to filter out visits to our websites from the devices on our office network, but each computer (and phone and tablet) seems to have a different address. It _looks _like they all start the same way, though. One computer is xxxx:xxxx:xxxx:xxxx:aaaa:aaaa:aaaa:aaaa, another is xxxx:xxxx:xxxx:xxxx:bbbb:bbbb:bbbb:bbbb, my phone is xxxx:xxxx:xxxx:xxxx:cccc:cccc:cccc:cccc, etc. Does this mean that xxxx:xxxx:xxxx:xxxx is the address for our network as a whole, and I can just set up a Google Analytics filter for "IP addresses starting with..."? Or would doing that also filter out hits from, like, every visitor within a 20 mile radius of our office? If I need to simply put in the individual addresses for each and every device, I will. I'm just hoping it doesn't come to that. Thanks!
Reporting & Analytics | | BrianAlpert780 -
UTM Links Showing Up as Separate Pages in Google Analytics
Hey everyone, I was just looking at landing pages in Google Analytics, and in addition to just the URL of the landing page, the UTM links are being listed as separate pages. Is this normal? I anticipated seeing the landing page URL and then using the secondary dimension to see source/medium. If this isn't normal, what would I check next?
Reporting & Analytics | | rachelmeyer0 -
Google Analytics reporting traffic for 404 pages
Hi guys, Unique issue with google analytics reporting for one of our sites. GA is reporting sessions for 404 pages (landing pages, organic traffic) e.g. for this page: http://www.milkandlove.com.au/breastfeeding-dresses/index.php the page is currently a 404 page but GA (see screenshot) is reporting organic traffic (to the landing page). Does anyone know any reasons why this is happening? Cheers. http://www.milkandlove.com.au/breastfeeding-dresses/index.php GK0zDzj.jpg
Reporting & Analytics | | jayoliverwright2 -
Google Analytics Question - Impressions & Queries Up, Sessions Down
I'm working with a client who, according to the Google Query report, impressions and sessions are up since we've started work with them about 6 months ago, but Google sessions are down. In moz, we're seeing a gradual, but steady increase in search visibility specifically with Google. Note: this is all organic. From when we started tracking queries, the first month we were tracking there were 43,581 impressions and 690 click throughs for the month. This past month there were 98,293 queries and 1015 clicks throughs for the month (granted not year over year data) - of these 1,015 clicks, 995 of them were from web. However, for those same time periods, sessions from Google are down over 30% - 1,750 vs. 1,189. I'm not sure how to interpret this. I realize that clicks and sessions are not a straightforward comparison, but I would think that if clicks were up according to the query report that sessions would also be up. Is it that some of these clicks are bouncing and therefore not being tracked as a session? Is there a potential issue with how data is being tracked?
Reporting & Analytics | | Corporate_Communications0 -
No-indexed pages are still showing up as landing pages in Google Analytics
Hello, My website is a local job board. I de-indexed all of the job listing pages on my site (anything that starts with http://www.localwisejobs.com/job/). When I search site:localwisejobs.com/job/, nothing shows up. So I think that means the pages are not being indexed. When I look in Google Analytics at Acquisition > Search Engine Optimization > Landing Pages, none of the job listing pages show up. But when I look at Acquisition > Channels > Organic and then click Landing Page as the primary dimension, the /job pages show up in there. Why am I seeing this discrepency in Organic Landing pages? And why would the /job pages be showing up as landing pages even though they aren't indexed?
Reporting & Analytics | | mztobias0 -
How to track what people type on my text boxes on Google Analytics?
Hi there! In our website, we have a few text boxes that users need to use to complete the goal. The boxes aren't search boxes, but it's still important to us to track what people type on it. I'm looking for a way to track the data through the "event" feature in Google Analytics, but it seems that this tracker can only calculate clicks, or video views etc. Does anyone knows how to track do it?
Reporting & Analytics | | ivan.precisodisso0 -
Google Analytics: Difference Between Goal Conversions & Goal Completions
When using Google Analytics, what is the difference between total goal conversions and total goal completions? We have many goals set up in a lead generation environment. Therefore, the only element of conversion is submitted a lead and arriving on the "Thank You" page. THose thank you pages are tagged accordingly. When we run reports though, the number of "Total Goal Conversions" and "Total Goal Completions" never match up.
Reporting & Analytics | | eMagineSEO0