Moz Q&A is closed.
After more than 13 years, and tens of thousands of questions, Moz Q&A closed on 12th December 2024. Whilst we’re not completely removing the content - many posts will still be possible to view - we have locked both new posts and new replies. More details here.
Has Anyone Else Noticed A Jump In Google Analytics Traffic Since Session Parameters Were Changed?
-
Ever since Google Analytics changed their session parameters August 12th I have seen a 20% jump in organic traffic & bounce rates along with a decline in pages/visit and conversion rate.
To be clear, I don't put a whole heck of a lot of stock in these metrics as stand-alone indications of how my site is performing. I'm just trying to get to the bottom of this blip.
I noticed some other people mentioned a similar phenomenon in other SEO forums and blog comments, but nobody seems to be talking about this here at SEOMoz (unless I just haven't looked in the right place).
I'm not saying the change I noticed has anything to do with the session update, I'm just wondering if anyone else has experienced something similar so that I can either cross it off the list of possible causes or explore further.
-
Hi mate - yes I am also seeing a percentage increase of returning visitors from around 20%-80%.
This is definitely related to the session parameter change. Although I find it hard to believe that it is a "bug". Rather, as you say, I think it is because they are now calculating the ended session differently.
This does make past and present comparisons slightly challenging
Cheers
Henry
-
My returning visitor count has jumped 20% - 80% as well depending on the source. I think the key here is the following from Barry Schwartz's article:
A session now counts as "ended":
"When any traffic source value for the user changes. Traffic source information includes: utm_source, utm_medium, utm_term, utm_content, utm_id, utm_campaign, and gclid."
So returning visitors are getting counted as a separate session each time they visit your site via a different source type - at least that's how I interpret that.
It would make sense then why returning visitors has gone up... But that would mean returning visitors would go up for everyone to one degree or another depending on how engaged and how many visits to conversion a site's returning visitors average.
Hence why I want to know if everyone is seeing this phenomenon to one degree or another or are just some people seeing it?
-
Hi James,
Can I ask if you have seen a big jump in returning visitors please since the session upadate? The growth I've seen in Google is mainly returning visitors and I think GA has calculated these visits twice as the session parameters are out of whack.
Cheers
Bush
-
Since Thursday 8/11/11 some of my clients have seen a reported 20 to 150% increase in traffic from Google in their analytics stats.
Sales have increased on some of those sites as well, which makes me think it's a real increase in traffic.
their pages per visit and bounce times have also gone to hell, but I don't know if it's a session issue, or just the extra traffic they are getting isn't as targeted as before.
-
Thanks for responding Gareth. Anyone else seen weird stuff going on with their analytics?
-
Hi - Yes I've seen my clients metrics move and there are a tonne of p155ed off people out there on the Anlaytics forum and here as well - http://www.seroundtable.com/google-analytics-session-definitions-13872.html
I've been looking into this and I think just as many who have left comments, that there is a bug when calculating the session times or returning visits incorrectly being flagged as a traffic source.
There is definitely big issues around the session update.
Bush
-
I didn't say I was bothered... All I've done is put together a list of possible causes and now I am crossing them off one by one. This is a possible cause based on what I have seen other people saying... and all I want to know is if anyone else has seen a similar phenomenon.
PS - How can you be so sure?
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
-
How to change domains in Google Analytics without losing the data
Hi there, We recently changed our domain from .COM to .NET so that all our subdomains from external pages matched. Right now in Google Console we have our new .NET website being tracked, but in GA we are still tracking .COM. It is also causing issues with MOZ crawling our site because of the .COM/.NET discrepancy. My question is what is the best way to change our Google Analytics from .COM to .NET without losing historical data and what considerations do we need to change before implementing this? Our team was concerned that just downloading the old data would be too vast and it we wouldn't be able to continue manipulating it dynamically in GA. Thanks!!
Reporting & Analytics | Mar 27, 2019, 6:45 PM | cPanel-LLC.0 -
Will changing the property from http to https in Google Analytics affect main unfiltered view?
I set my client up with an unfiltered view in Google Analytics. This is the one with historical data going back for years, so I don't want to do anything that will affect this view. Recently, the website moved from HTTP to HTTPS. There's a setting for the property that will allow me to change the property name to https://EXAMPLE.com and change the default URL to https://EXAMPLE.com. Questions: 1. If I change the property name and the default URL, will this somehow affect my unfiltered view in a way that I'll lose historical data or data moving forward? 2. I have heard that changing the default URL to HTTPS will help me avoid a common problem others have experienced (where they lose the referrer in Google Analytics and a bunch of their sessions go to direct / other). Is this true?
Reporting & Analytics | Jan 29, 2019, 2:24 PM | Kevin_P3 -
Tracking 301 redirect traffic in Google Analytics
if I 301 redirect www.mywebsite.com to go to www.yourwebsite.com, how can I track the traffic in Google Analytics that is coming from mywebsite.com?? I don't think that's a referral traffic, is it?
Reporting & Analytics | Sep 1, 2017, 4:49 PM | Armen-SEO0 -
Referral Traffic vs. Campaign Traffic in Google Analytics
I have two sites: a blog and an ecommerce site. The blog funnels people to the ecommerce site. In Analytics I'm seeing declines in referral traffic from the blog to the ecommerce site. During the same time I'm seeing an increase in campaign traffic to the ecommerce site, with most campaign traffic coming from the blog. I believe the increase in campaign traffic is largely a result of simply having installed more tracking links. This leads me to believe that the declines I'm seeing in referral traffic is simply a result of the increase in campaign traffic. In other words, what was once counted and reported as being referral traffic is now being counted and reported as campaign traffic. So my question is this: In Google Analytics is campaign traffic ALSO reported as referral traffic, or is campaign traffic reported separately and not duplicated in referral traffic reports? I'll provide a concrete example to make this more clear in case it isn't: Say site X sends 1000 visits each month to site Y. Say 50 of those visits come from a single link on X. If that link is changed so that campaign Z data info added (via the Google URL Builder), would you expect to then see 950 referral visits each month from site X to site Y plus 50 campaign visits to site Y via new campaign Z, or would you continue to see 1000 referral visits plus the new 50 campaign visits? Many thanks in advance to anyone that can shed some light on this.
Reporting & Analytics | Nov 26, 2013, 1:09 AM | aaronprimal0 -
How can we view traffic from specific Twitter, Facebook, YouTube and Reddit accounts in Google Analytics?
Dear Moz Community, This is a Google Analytics question. Using Google Analytics, we're trying to identify trends of visitors on a website from specific social media accounts, i.e: twitter.com/account-x facebook.com/account-x youtube.com/account-x reddit.com/r/account-x Ideally, we would like to be able to see the success rate for specific posts on these social media accounts, and how users engaged on the website after arriving from clicking a link on one of these accounts. Is this drill-down feature currently possible in Google Analytics? Many thanks for helping!
Reporting & Analytics | Aug 24, 2013, 2:27 AM | BoomDialogue690 -
Setting Up Google Analytic with Sub Folder Sites
What is the best way of setting up Google Analytic for a website that has many sub folders? The main site is example.com and it has 40 sub folder sites like example.com/uk example.com/France etc etc Would it be advised to track a single domain in Google Analytic then create filters for the sub folder sites. Filters > Include traffic from > Sub directories Also with this method is it possible to view overall incoming website stats for everything? Previous experience would be great with this thanks 🙂
Reporting & Analytics | Apr 2, 2012, 8:43 PM | daracreative0 -
Google Analytics Admin account not allowing us to add other users?
Our Google Analytics Administrator account is not giving us access to the User Manager, and because of that we are unable to add users; have you ever ran in to a problem such as this, if so what was your solution. Thanks a Billion impressions, Vijay E2qE9.jpg
Reporting & Analytics | Nov 5, 2011, 7:59 PM | vijayvasu0 -
Why does Google Analytics think PPC traffic is organic?
I have a bastard of a problem... Google Analytics is incorrectly tracking PPC traffic as SEO which is screwing up all my reporting . I don't care for rankings, I care for actual SEO traffic and I can't be sure that what i am seeing is correct which is driving me nuts. Any ideas?
Reporting & Analytics | Aug 29, 2017, 2:06 PM | Red_Mud_Rookie1