Analytics tagging parameters effect on site SEO
-
One of the effective tools used in analytics tagging is the use of analytics parameters that starts with '?' or '#'.
Example on site tagging:
- Main link: www.domainname.com./category/sub-category/
- www.domainname.com./category/sub-category/?lid=topnav
- www.domainname.com./category/sub-category/?lid=sidenav
All three links link to the same landing page, with an extra parameter.
Using email or campaign tagging:
- www.domainname.com./category/sub-category/
- www.domainname.com./category/sub-category/?utm_source=launch&utm_medium=email&utm_term=html&utm_content=getscoop&utm_campaign=hwdyrwm2012
With that we create many tagged links based on the campaign internal strategy. How do these effect indexing, and link juice? How do thy effect SEO in general?
-
I do lots of tagging with the Google Analytics URL parameters. It's hard to get around using them for tracking. To get around the duplicate content issues, I:
- Set all pages with the parameters to rel=canonical to the appropriate pages.
- Let Google know those parameters don't change the page content within Google Webmaster Tools. The canonical should take care of this, but it shouldn't hurt to do both.
- Let Bing know those parameters don't change the page content in Bing Webmaster Tools. Again, the canonical should be on top of this, but just in case.
-
From what I've seen on sites I've managed, these types of URLs create lots of duplicate content issues. All the sudden Google and Bing see that there are many different links pointing to the exact same content. For example, Google and Bing will look at it and say "hey, www.domainname.com./category/sub-category/ is the same thing as www.domainname.com./category/sub-category/?lid=whatever...they have duplicate content on this site". Trust me, you don't want this to happen to you...it can be no big deal or it can be a very messy situation.
Back to your question, using a query string on your URL isn't too big a deal if the URLs are inside ads or inside an email campaign because those links aren't likely to be found or used by the search engines. (Somebody could share that URL in a way that this URL could be found...but that is rare.)
However, if you are using the parameters in your link building efforts you are communicating to Google/Bing/the world at large that you are linking to different pages (for example, they'll see links to www.domainname.com./category/sub-category/, www.domainname.com./category/sub-category/?lid=whatever, www.domainname.com./category/sub-category/?utm_source=something, etc.) and could treat those as different URLs which would dilute your link juice to a given page (I've seen some instances where they treated the URL as the same thing despite the query string - still though, why take the risk with your links?).
Additionally, if you have those links on your website all the sudden you are indicating to Google/Bing that these are distinct and different URLs that they should index (you are telling them that you have a page on your site called www.domainname.com./category/sub-category/?lid=topnav and another page called www.domainname.com./category/sub-category/?lid=sidenav). Most often I see Google or Bing pick one of these URLs and index that, ignoring the other URL(s) to a similar page. Alternatively though they could not index either URL because you are linking to duplicate content. If this is a key page, you don't want to chance it not getting indexed!
To get around this and accomplish the same tracking, I usually don't use utm tracking except in emails, ads and similar types of campaigns. To keep track of the traffic from link building efforts I watch the referrals in Google Analytics. To keep track of traffic from social, I rely on bit.ly. It isn't always as clean, but it avoids other issues with duplicate content.
For tracking on site, I use event tracking in Google. This type of link has no impact on SEO at all (it is a JavaScript onclick event). Event tracking has the added advantage that nobody can skew your data. For example, if you are using ?lid=link-location on your site and somebody copies that exact URL with that query string, puts that exact URL somewhere else AND then clicks on that link (still with the query string) all the sudden you have an ?lid source from a location that didn't come from that location. With event tracking, you can know exactly what location it came from (and a lot of other cool things in Google - for instance, did people who clicked on the product link from the top nav or the side nav convert more?).
Here is the link to Google's event tracking. http://code.google.com/apis/analytics/docs/tracking/eventTrackerGuide.html
One other thing I'll throw out here is that if you are using these kinds of parameters (even if you aren't) you should make sure that domain.com/category/sub-category/ has a canonical element that tells Google/Bing which version of that page you'd prefer they index. That way even if you have a link out there somewhere with a query string, Google/Bing can lump that query string version into the canonical version. That said, Google and Bing have both said canonical tags are suggestions - meaning they have the right to ignore it. So, while I have canonical elements on all the sites I manage, I'm not relying on the canonical element as my only line of defense when it comes to duplicate content.
Anyway, I hope I added a few thoughts that help answer your question.
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
-
Can you track two Google Analytics Accounts on one site?
If you have a site that had an old analytics account and then implemented a new one is it possible to run tracking code that records to both accounts without causing your site or data issues? We are doing this so we don't loose data at any point - ideally it wouldn't have been split between the two but making one redundant isn't an option. Ideally we would have merged the data from both accounts and had one - however the research we have done points to this not being a possibility - unless one of you guys knows different? It would be great if anyone has experience on any this.. Thanks
Reporting & Analytics | | ChrisAllbones0 -
AHHH... Google Analytics just changed!
There's now an acquisitions tab.. but I can't figure out how to sort referral traffic by referral path.
Reporting & Analytics | | S.S.N0 -
Goal Totals in Google Analytics
How do I get a cumulative tally of all the goals reached in google analytics? I've been using the percentages currently, but I was wondering if there was an easier way. Thanks
Reporting & Analytics | | OOMDODigital0 -
No Social Sources in Google Analytics - what am I doing wrong?
Hello Everyone, I'm having a strange issue: I DO NOT have in my Google Analytics the "Social" tab under the Traffic Sources category. Look at the first image of this post: http://marketingland.com/google-analytics-social-reports-8138 How do you "get" that to show? Hope somebody has this issue and can help, Thanks a lot, Alex
Reporting & Analytics | | pwpaneuro0 -
Google Keyword Tool versus Google Analytics
Hi I'm trying to establish a methodology to best show the gap between potential and realised organic keyword traffic. To obtain potential keyword traffic I'm using the Google Adwords keyword tool to derive local monthly search volumes for exact keyword matches. To get the realised data I'm using Google Analytics. However, to get the I'm confused as to which is the best way of getting a comparable metric from Google Analytics (GA). I was using custom reports and the 'organic searches' metric. However, this provides different values to a standard report selecting non-paid search in the default advanced segments. What is the best report/metric in GA to use for both organic and paid search volumes that would be comparable to the Google Adwords keyword tool. Thanks Neil
Reporting & Analytics | | mccormackmorrison0 -
Regular Expressions in Google Analytics
I want to use the Google Analytics landing page reports to look at the bounce rate of top level pages excluding the homepage. So pages with urls: www.example.com/example Does anyone know a regular expression that will allow me to do this? Just to clarify I do not want to look at the bounce rate of the homepage or any pages deeper than www.example.com/example e.g: www.example.com/example/example www.example.com/example/example/example etc Thanks in advance
Reporting & Analytics | | CPLDistribution0 -
.com version and .org version of site
So i just discovered that a site I now managae has a .com version - as well as the .org version that is the one everyone knows about! I'm guessing this is not a good thing... So the whole site eg www.abc.org/example has a mirror page www.abc.com/example.... What should I do about this? Is it really bad to have 2 versions out there? Thanks!
Reporting & Analytics | | inhouseninja0 -
Analytics URL Tagging
For some reason I can't get Google Analytics to pick up my URL tags, am I doing something wrong? http://www.example.com/?utm_source=carscom&utm_campaign=3rdparty&utm_medium=referral
Reporting & Analytics | | kylesuss0