What is Responsible for All My "Direct" Traffic?
-
We have a broad content site - the majority of our traffic overall comes in via deep links.Google analytics consistently shows 17-20% of daily traffic under the "direct" bucket, with the rest of the traffic about equally split between Referring sites and Organic search.However, if we look at the specific content in the "direct" bucket, the URLs that are being hit do tend to mirror rather closely the Search traffic. The close mapping to our Search traffic doesn't seem to make much sense - while some of it is probably bookmarks, it seems doubtful that that could be responsible for more than, say, 20% of this direct traffici based on the # of pages and types of pages (many of the pages that do well in search are honestly not ones that someone would be likely to bookmark). The traffic reported by google as "direct" for a given day tracks a lot closer to Search than Referral URLs (which tend to be he more viral content on our site). Any idea what could be causing this traffic to show as Direct? Do people tend to bookmark pages while doing searches to come back to them or something? THANKS everyone for the responses. Still not quite sure what it is, continuing to look into it, particularly technical issues that the link to the Avinash post might prove very helpful for
-
I would double check and make sure that all your campaigns: Email, Bing/other networks PPC & Retargeting ads etc. All have Google's utm parameters setup on them. These are all areas that webmasters tend to overlook. The PPC ads tend to still be listed under organic search, but you can't segment out the paid or non-paid Bing (other network PPC) traffic without the tracking installed. Here is a great blog post that Avinash wrote on tracking direct traffic correctly. I would start here and make sure you have everything setup correctly before looking for other nuances. http://www.kaushik.net/avinash/2010/09/excellent-web-analytics-tip-analyze-direct-traffic.html
-
I'm curious about this too as I get a lot of "direct traffic." I know for a fact that my content is shared via Twitter using a lot of different URL shorteners. I'm guessing (and trying to determine as fact or fiction) that the clicks on the links result in "direct traffic" showing up in Google Analytics. With my domain name - itinerantentrepreneur.com - which I can barely spell most of the time, I seriously doubt people are typing it in by hand And yes, I purchased an alternate domain name and pointed it to my site.
-
Would any of the pages that are getting a lot of direct traffic also be popular for a home page, or as a tab that someone would keep open on their browser? Also, I've seen some shopping carts strip referral data and Google then refers to them as (direct). Try to do a visitor audit and see if there are any pages or functions on your site that turn someone from being a search or referral visit into a direct visit.
-
Might also be type-ins and people using your site as a start-up page or desk-top email software.
-
Oh yeah - there's those pesky bots out there as well...
-
Robots?
-
Quite often when you see such a significant correlation between direct traffic URLs and search traffic, this is due to people who previously visited the site and bookmarked it, or got the link sent to them from someone who did.
Got a burning SEO question?
Subscribe to Moz Pro to gain full access to Q&A, answer questions, and ask your own.
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
-
GA traffic locations must be wrong? Most hits from a state we don't do business in!
I launched a website earlier this year. Very limited traffic, 200-300 a month. It is an info site for a specialized business. However, when I review my GA traffic reports, 20% of our traffic comes from one city in Virginia. (although the company does business in many states, it does not in Virginia) or anything close. The bounce rate is 97%! Could it be a web scraper or some kind of redirect?
Search Behavior | | bakergraphix_yahoo.com0 -
Higher rankings, low traffic
Hello There, My question is the following: How come my rankings are much higher than when I started with the optimization process (1 year ago) but my organic traffic is lower compared to the previous year (it didn't increase at all)? NB - I haven’t received any penalization and the keywords I am targeting are definitively searched and are the most important for my company. Thanks a lot 🙂
Search Behavior | | Midleton0 -
Free Tool that allows you to compare traffic for multiple websites
I'm banging my head on this one. In the past I was able to use Compete.com, Quancast, Google Trends, and Alexa, but now all these sites either required you to have Pro membership (pay) or they discontinue it like Google Trends for website. I need to do this comparison for one of my client... their traffic versus 4 of their competitors. Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated. Have a blessed Day, Benny
Search Behavior | | ACann1 -
SERP with no "www"
I have noticed that Google SERP without login is showing the domains without " www " - all of them. Have you seen this too? What does it mean for us?
Search Behavior | | Elchanan0 -
Why do all traffic curves show a "saw tooth" pattern in Google Analytics
Greetings Mozzers This sounds like a dumb question, but it's bothering me just the same and I would like to think what the fine community of SEO experts at MOZ thinks I have taken a look at the traffic curve for about 20 different sites in very different industries (home improvement, wedding party supplies, pet feeding systems) and it seems to me that they all show a saw tooth pattern, more or less like the one below.
Search Behavior | | Masoko-T0 -
301 Re-Direct
Last Year I re-named a catergory on my site because it had bad backlinks, the new catergory is coming up the search engines nicely, in webmaster tools it shows the old catergory as a 404, would it be wise to put a 301 re-direct on to my new catergory, if not what is the best way to deal with it?
Search Behavior | | Palmbourne0 -
Can you track "Add to home screen" for ios devices?
I was curious to know if there was a way to track in analytics users "adding to home screen" on ios devices. With the new ios map not receiving so much love and google maps "web app" process getting more attention, I feel knowing this stat would help us decide if we really need a native app or not. Our customers don't normally return within the year and when they do its about 2-3 (normally on a desk top), To us it does not completely justify the idea of making a native app with the world being so app heavy now a days. Any thoughts are always appreciated.
Search Behavior | | sknott0 -
UK Requiring "Opt-In" for Cookies. Suggestions on Compliance?
The UK is now requiring that websites, targeting UK visitors and/or hosted in the UK, to provide an "opt-in" option for cookie tracking. While I don't target UK audiences, I do foresee this potentially being an issue for US business. Anyone have any suggestions as to how web publishers, in the UK, will easily implement this change will not impacting their targeted advertising revenue?
Search Behavior | | ChristineCadena0