Killer,

Sorry I fell out of the loop on this one. I have to say that Takeshi has done beyond an above admirable job on laying out the issues of how referrers become direct. I think two things stand out to me: yes the installation of your GA code could be wrong and it should be before the closing head tag . Often people will put it in the footer and occasionally someone enters it more than once.

I think another thing you have to look at is you are comparing Chartbeat to GA and they provide two types of analytics. The numbers, of course, are different. Chartbeat was out before GA had realtime and, I think, it was intended for the real time needs. It claims to have better data for publishers and I have no way of comparing. Since it has been around for some time, I would think it has some real traction, but you have to be careful as you are comparing two different services.

Another thing that gives me a slight amount of concern about the issue is that they have a section on how they help you sell more ads (when you are a publisher). That type of data makes me a bit nervous. It may be the real deal, it just makes me nervous when something claims to help you prove your position.

The question re your site is a bit skewed in the way you present it. What is the other data re that site? How many total directs? How many organic visits? How many PPC visits? Etc. You cannot just conclude that there cannot be that many directs without all the data. How many total visits would be the first place to look.

As to the expert on analytics and your GA code, you can do it your self. Look at view page source (typically a right click function). When you have the page with the code on it, do a control lookup (command or Control  plus  F on). Then in the search box, type in UA- and see where it occurs. There should be only one occurrence of UA-XXXXXXXX-1 or -12, etc.

If you see it more than once it is likely a problem, but not always. If it is in the header and footer, typically you will see an artificially low 2% or less bounce rate. You can also do a lookup of the closing head tag and see if it is after the analytics code.)

I hope this helps you a bit.

Robert

Killer

I saw this in the Moz Top 10 this morning and had to reach out to you. Very interesting stuff on organic traffic showing as direct. While not referral showing as direct, I think you will see the implications. Best

Groupon organic vs direct test.

All Star

Great point on number 2!

Best

Digirank,

I do not see how you could use it for that, but admittedly have kicked your ball over to our head of dev just to be sure. Curious, how would you want to use it for schema given it is set to be more for tracking?

Best

As to using the full sentence, the first part was about speaking to his clients regarding research and I did use the ... to show that the copied portion was the end of that compound sentence. That is the correct way to utilize a quote wherein only the germaine is pointed out. I did not disagree with speaking to the client re research.

You are correct you did not say - use software - and I did make it seem as if you did. You have my apology for that.

My point was not about the use of software though; did you think it was?  My point was about not creating your own content which takes time and effort and, instead, choosing to take someone else's content and change a few words so that you can post it as your new content.

As to posting my clients on a free directory I did not say that I did. I suggested some legal publishers (they are actually blogs for the legal community). So, I guess you should buy what you are selling and not state that I said something I did not. There are actually blogs around things like personal injury with high DA and PA and you can pay to be a blogger on their networks. They get quite a bit of links from them.

We do blogs within Pharma, Personal Injury, Bankruptcy, Complex business litigation, etc.

Best

This is not a function of Google Places. These are called Place labels and they are set algorithmically. Having your Places verified helps but doesn't guarantee it. This is from Google: 

Having

The place labels shown on Google Maps are determined algorithmically based on a large number of factors, so there is no way to guarantee placement of your business on the map as a place label. One factor these algorithms consider is the accuracy of the business listing and the richness of the content associated with the listing, so you can improve the chances that your business will receive a place label if you claim it in Google Places.

Best