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Hi Kate and thanks for your reply.

I completely agree. Reporting on a keyword basis is a little old hat now and we should look at overall visits to the site along with other pre defined KPI's agreed with our client (nice article Kate). However; the question remains.

Google provide 2 sources of overall traffic volume (GA and WMT) and they seem to show completely different results.

(Copied from above)
Here's another one for 1st May - 25th May:
GA - Organic search - Total sessions  - 874
GWT - Search Analytics - Total Clicks  - 431 (New System, all filters removed)
GWT - Search Analytics - Total Clicks  - 1755 (Old System, all filters removed)
CRAZY RESULTS!

A lot of the data provided by Google is calculated on No of Visits. If the data showing No of visits is incorrect then the rest of the data becomes incorrect. Taking the results above and using GA as a benchmark, the two results shown in WMT are approx 50% more and 50% less than the bechmark. So the results you report could be 50% either side from the actual. Does this make sense? If WMT is more accurate then I would have to recalculate the results provided in GA.

Example (using data above)
if Total Sales = 10
(GA Results of 874) Conversion Rate  = 1.14%
(WMT New Results of 431) Conversion Rate  = 2.32%
(WMT Old Results of 1755) Conversion Rate  = 0.57%

The old saying of "You can't argue with maths" is only applicable if the data you're working with is correct in the first place.

HI Cesar

If you're worried about them you could always use the dissavow tool. The truth is we can never be in total control of backlinks as anyone can link to a website. Automated tools pull in content from Blogs, RSS etc. As long as your profile isn't biased to the Dark Side I wouldn't worry too much.

Keep an eye on it and use the dissavow tool if required.

Thanks for your replies Martijn and Alick300.

I know they hide the keyword data but why show it in the first place. If Google want to give their users the best possible user experience then why show conflicting data and confuse their users?

The issue I have with this is that if this brand term in question is showing 17 sessions in GA but 90 clicks in GWT, which system is showing the correct overall Session Volume or does that metric simply not exist?

If I select a date range 1st May - 25th May and the same brand term, here's what I get:
GA - Brand term - 17 Sessions
GA Queries - Brand term - 90 Clicks (shown in GA from webmaster tools)
GWT Search Analytics - Brand term - 111 Clicks

Each result would have an affect on Total Sessions for that date range. This is only looking at one keyword and looking at other keywords it shows a similar discrepancy between the two systems.

Here's another one for 1st May - 25th May:
GA - Organic search - Total sessions  - 874
GWT - Search Analytics - Total Clicks  - 431 (New System, all filters removed)
GWT - Search Analytics - Total Clicks  - 1755 (Old System, all filters removed)
CRAZY RESULTS!

To me this means Google Analytics isn't reporting accurate visitor data which we use to make data driven decisions. When I'm asked by my client "How many visitors have we had this month", do I reply "Between 431 and 1755"?

Hi Guys

I've been looking at the data for a client in Google analytics and I was wondering if anyone knows why some of the data doesn't tally up. In my case its the following:

Under Aquisition
No of Sessions for a Keyword shown in Organic Search tab (compared to)
No of Clicks for a Query in the Search Engine Optimisation tab

For example, for a brand term, Google are showing 17 Sessions in Organic Search.
For the same term Google are showing 90 Clicks in the Queries section of Search Engine Optimisation

OK, we know that Google are a little cloak and dagger regarding keyword data but surely Sessions and Clicks for the same keyword should be identical unless I'm missing something.

HI Cesar

If you're worried about them you could always use the dissavow tool. The truth is we can never be in total control of backlinks as anyone can link to a website. Automated tools pull in content from Blogs, RSS etc. As long as your profile isn't biased to the Dark Side I wouldn't worry too much.

Keep an eye on it and use the dissavow tool if required.