Discrepancy between FB PPC and Google Analytics
-
This question was answered in 2011 here: http://moz.com/community/q/facebook-ppc-number-of-clicks-according-to-fb-different-than-visits-in-analytics.
Wanted to post it to the community to see if anyone had any new thoughts in the last 3 years.
I have been running campaigns on Facebook and seeing dramatic discrepancies between Facebook and GA's numbers. For example, I ran a Facebook ad campaign for a chiropractor where FB shows 35 clicks to the website, but GA only shows 2!
An attorney ran a Facbook promotion, got 4 clients who actually filled out a questionnaire online, but GA only showed 2 visitors exiting off the form completion page.
Is this because the users did not have JS/cookies enabled? Something else?
What is the recommended work around? Tracking URL?
-
The main discrepancy is going to still be the one specified in 2011: The attribution method of facebook & google tracking clicks.
FB is going to use first click attribution, GA is going to use last click attribution. Have you looked at the mutli-channel funnel reports & the first click attribution?
Facebook reports on ad clicks so depending upon the type of ad being run, you could just see your ad being clicked on for many purposes. Google has a specific definition for when a session starts. When you say Google only shows 2 users - do you mean in total or from Facebook?
Side note: Using tracking codes in sponsored posts doesn't actually show facebook / cpc being the referring resource because these show up as organic traffic in 3rd party website tracking cookies.
-
People could possibly have their browsers set to "Do Not Track" which would throw it off.
Also, their are tons of plugins out there for Firefox, Chrome and IE which specifically act to block tracking. Ghostery comes to mind, Ad Blocker Plus, etc. Mobile browsers also can add plugins like this.
The best solution is to have multiple tracking codes/devices in place, then take all of the data together over the same period of time and analyze the numbers. Don't forget your own server logs either! They are a valuable source of data. You're going to have to bring in multiple data sources and develop a range of values, similar to confidence intervals. Check: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Confidence_interval to see what I am getting at. So you would say something like, "with 95% confidence, our real traffic lies between 1,000 to 1,400 unique visitors per day" or whatever the number is. Of course track your real conversions and try to get data from your paying customers like asking them how they found you. It is amazing the intel you can gather from your actual customers. Analytics is good, but don't underestimate what customers tell you face to face.
Best of luck!
-
It could be a myriad of things. One thing I would suggest is using tracking urls that should solve, or at least shed some light on what is happening. You can use them in conjunction with AWStats to see what people are actually coming and try to figure out if it is because of a user agent or even a specific platform they might be using. It could be some facebook web phone app issue or something.
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
-
Different statistics in Google Analytics
Hi! A client of mine is having some trouble on his Google Analytics overview. When he checks the yearly report with number of visitors, new visitors, returning, ... he gets statistics that doesn't match mine. Also, he gets a notation from Google that no hits were fired, although the script is still there. On the other hand, I (logged in with another account) am seeing all statistics correctly. FYI: no filters were installed, nor segments, ... Why does the client see different and incorrect statistics? There should be a setting or something I'm overseeing. Hope you guys can help.
Reporting & Analytics | | conversal0 -
Query on google analytic benchmarking report
Hi All, First I select My Industry Vertical - ABCD then I select Region - US ( all region) then size by daily session - 10000-99999 finally reports appears "Blank" but when I decrease daily session from 10000-99999 to 1000-4999 or less then report is perfect. So what does it mean? My Avg daily session is 70k to 80k. So how to analysis benchmarking in this case? Thanks!
Reporting & Analytics | | pragnesh96390 -
How drop off works in google analytic for enhance ecommerce?
Hello Guys, I have implemented enhance ecommerce ( i.e. - https://developers.google.com/tag-manager/enhanced-ecommerce ) Now i have query how drops off actually works? Like i visited the my site, then product page then checkout step 1 page after that i close the checkout step 1 page that means checkout step 1 drop off will appear in google analytic? right? John
Reporting & Analytics | | varo0 -
Testing IP Exclusion Filters in Google Analytics
(I hope I haven't missed something simple 😉 I have add IP exclusion filters in Google Analytics. What I haven't been able to determine is how to test to see if it is working. I'd imagine there would be a dip in traffic but if a site is low volume it might not even register. Thanks!
Reporting & Analytics | | AUDigitalMarketing0 -
Google Analytics Custom Reports eMails only one reporting tab
Goog Morning from 18 degrees C mostly cloudy Wetherby UIK 🙂 I'm on a mission to get away from manual reporting and move over to eMailing custom Google analytics reports. Thanks to this tutorail http://searchenginewatch.com/article/2175001/7-Time-Saving-Google-Analytics-Custom-Reports Ive made good progress but ive hit a snag. The snag being when i email the report the recipient only recieves one 1 report tab of data. This causes a problem when you eMail a report that has multiple reporting tabs like this: http://i216.photobucket.com/albums/cc53/zymurgy_bucket/tab-export-custom-problemcopy.jpg So my question is please..."When you eMail a recipient a custom report how can you ensure they receive "All" the reporting tabs data and not just one"? Any insights welcome 🙂
Reporting & Analytics | | Nightwing0 -
What's the difference between landing pages and entrance pages on Google Analytics?
I'm confused about the difference between entrance pages and landing pages on Google Analytics. If I compare our search traffic to entrance pages with search traffic to landing pages it seems very similar -- but not identical. But this is probably because all of our GA analytics is sampled (we're a huge site). Can anyone help?
Reporting & Analytics | | CecilyP0 -
Google Analytics and backlinking
Let say I have my main site and my secondary site that is optimized for a slightly different set of keywords (nonetheless still relevant to my main site). I have several links from a secondary site to my main site. Secondary site is on a different C-block. Do you ladies and gentlemen think that if I put both websites under the same google analytics account, Google is going to penalize me or remove some of the juice that is flowing from secondary site to the main site because it would detect through GA that both sites belong to the same entity?
Reporting & Analytics | | SirMax0 -
Why isn´t my google analytics registering goals?
Hi everyone! I know this is is not the standard SEO question, but I hope you can help me with your knowledge. I set some goals in GA for the thankyou page that appears when a client requests more information on a property for sale. Problem is I have been testing them and the goals don´t get registered. I don´t know what am I doing wrong and I would really appreciate if you could help me through some light on this. I have attached an image of the option for the goal in GA. Can anybody help me? Paroa.png
Reporting & Analytics | | inmonova0