The curse of (not provided) data....
-
Buongiorno from 23 degrees C Wetherby UK
Do you ever get the impression Google doesnt Like SEO practitioners? Thing is the (not provided) snag in the key word Analytics data is a complete pain in arse. Yes you can go into webmaster tools and get a feel for organic keyword data but the joy stops abruptly when you need a full picture of traffic acquisition from a specific keyword.
So my question is please:
"When a client asks, give me traffic data acquired from an organic phrase". How on earth can you give an accurate answer? And to add salt into the wound the traffic data is going to be less so your SEO efforts are going to take a hit".Is the answer use another analytics service?
Grazie tanto,
David -
Unfortunately, using another analytics provider won't help, because Google strips the keyword information from the referrer string before it ever hits your analytics software. Hence, no analytics provider will be able to give you that information. (and some theorize this is exactly why Google did it - to stop certain 3rd parties from collecting keyword data that Google itself makes money on)
So what can you do? A few options:
1. Use the data from Google Webmaster Tools: A lot of folks argue (myself included) that the data isn't as usefull, but at least it's something.
2. Urge your client to move away from keyword based reporting. Annie Cushing made an excellent presentation on this topic: http://www.slideshare.net/anniecushing/breaking-up-with-your-organic-keyword-data
3. Use any one of several workarounds to better understand your not provided data. Here's a partial list: http://cyrusshepard.com/7-fantastic-seo-tips-for-googles-not-provided-keywords/
In the end we're likely never to get those keywords back, so we'll have to work with alternative solutions.
-
One potential way around this is to capture the search term form the URL parameters of the refering URL when a user enters your site from a search engine. But then you need to store that and somehow pass it back to yourselves, and you will not be able to tie it into your analytics data that i am aware off.
Additionally im not sure of the top of my head that the referral URL is sent from firefox or people in private session / logged into Google so if that is the case then this method wont actually help you...
-
Unfortunately, the power here lies with the user who is performing the search. For example, if they use an incognito window or other method to browse and search anonymously, then this information is not going to be tracked. There's pretty much nothing you can do about it.
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
-
Does subdomain (or sub sub domain) affect analytics data of root site?
We self-host our public website, but over time have also added subdomains onto it that are not public and are for internal or even client portals. I am seeking advice as to whether those subdomains affect the analytics data (self referrals, visits, bounces) of the public site that I am tasked with analyzing. I feel that it does skew the data but need to build a solid case to move the public website to a new domain, so as to leave the existing one in tact with all of its subs.
Reporting & Analytics | | MarketingGroup0 -
Something does not add up with WMTs search analytics data
we recently replatformed our main site and switched to https. For the first 2-3 weeks after we moved organic traffic was great, we did not lose any ( increased a little), but then it dropped off significantly. Attached is a screenshot from one of our main keywords that dropped off. You can see click (blue) and impressions (red) dropped off, and the position became unstable, but in the last week it has stabilised to about the same position it was before, but the clicking and impressions are still very low. The keyword is generic (for our industry) and there would not be any major seasonal changes in the search volume. I can't make sense of this data, could be be wrong? Kd3p5f9.jpg
Reporting & Analytics | | PaddyDisplays1 -
Structured Data dropped suddenly
Just noticed a large drop in Webmaster tools of our structured data graphs. Both "items" and "items with errors" dropped. It is across the board on all our sites. Even checked some of the sites that I do consulting work for, and they dropped. My assumption is that this is another Google glitch, similar to what we saw last year, and in March of this year, where is corrected itself. Anyone else seeing anything on their end?
Reporting & Analytics | | tdawson090 -
Reported data in Multi-channel funnels in GA wrong?
I'd love to start using the Multi-channel funnels feature in Google Analytics but I have zero confidence in the reported data as it seems to bear no relationship to the standard ecomm reports. To be specific, in August 2013, MCF is reporting the following for email campaigns: Assisted conversions = 20
Reporting & Analytics | | Bluesnapper
Assisted conversion value = £1,405.91
Last Click or Direct Conversions = 14
Last Click or Direct Conversion Value = £369.57 Now switching to the traffic sources report, GA reports for the email campaigns revenue was £1,226,41 over the same period across 21 transactions. My interpretation of this is that the email campaigns were the "last-click" and delivered £1,226,41 and 21 "conversions" (as I have no goals configured in this GA view, conversions = transactions I believe) That leaves the MCF last-click report short by £856.84 (£1,226,41 - £369.57) I can see no reason why this should be so unless I'm not interpreting the data correctly! Anybody have any suggestions/ideas as to what's going on? Any help appreciated.0 -
How long does Google Analytics store data?
Hello All, How long analytics keep the data for one website? at least two years at least 25 months other I guess that they guarantee at least 25 months, but it might be more.
Reporting & Analytics | | CommercePundit
Anyone has any other suggestion? Thanks,0 -
Number of clicks / organic traffic - different data in Google Analytics and Webmaster Tools
Hi. I have a little problem. When I open Google Webmaster Tools I see 3000 clicks (in Traffic - Search queries - Clicks). But when I open Google Analytics I see much more visits from search engine (Google) - it´s 4-5 times more! It´s a huge difference, don´t you think? Do you know, where is the problem? What causes this diffence? thanks a lot
Reporting & Analytics | | mysho0 -
How do you compare year-over-year keyword analysis without (Not Provided) screwing everything up?
We have a seasonal business. It is of no use to compare this month to last month or even this week to last week. The only real benchmark is to compare the same time period a year ago. I'd like to know how well I'm doing for a certain keyword. If I compare this month's performance to the same month's performance a year ago, I get corrupt results as much is now hidden in (Not Provided). Any solutions?
Reporting & Analytics | | tatermarketing1 -
Analytics giving crazy impossible data?
When I look at my Analytics using any of my segments, they don't work. It shows zero visits for the segment until April 30th, then the visitors for the segment shoots up to above the number for all visits! Anyone else experiencing this bizarre data?
Reporting & Analytics | | mascotmike0