Landing page URL appearing as keyword
-
Hi Mozers,
I've recently experienced the URLs of my key landing pages coming up as keywords.
This has been on the rise since early July (when it was relatively insignificant) to the current position (see image below) where they make up the majority of my top keywords.
Drilling down into a bit more detail, this seems to be almost exclusively Desktop traffic but in terms of Technology there are no clear standouts (seems to be mostly Windows OS and Chrome).
Has anyone else been experiencing this?
-
These keywords are not appearing in Webmaster tools at all so I'm thinking it could just be an Analytics quirk, still weird that no-one else has picked up on it.
The only annotation I have on my Analytics is that the Data Highlighting tool was used (in Webmaster Tools) on these pages. Potentially linked but I still can't see how?
-
Weirdly it's only 4/5 of my main landing pages this is happening for - that does make me think it might be something to do with links so I'll look into that.
Usage stats are amazing so it wouldn't think it's scrapers:
| 2.65 | 00:02:46 | 73.24% | 15.11% |
Those stats look like direct traffic so I thought it could be a browser problem (searching for a URL instead of going to it when typed in the address bar?) but again, it seems to be across all browsers and I'd expect someone else to have picked up on it.
| | | | | |
-
Hmm, interesting.
Like Richard mentioned, any particular links to those pages? even nofollowed?
Another few things to analyze:
-> Average time on site for those visits? Is it very low?
-> User agent data - Segment and Filter Robot Traffic?
There are more and more scrappers who crawl search results for particular queries (especially to monitor stuff).
-
Just a few ideas:
- Rumus brings up a good point. You have to ask yourself, why people are searching for you using URL's? I would definitely take a look at the demographics page of your analytics and see if this can help paint a prettier picture for you. Obviously you want to look at the location of your visitors like Rumus pointed out, but I would also look at device and operating system, to see if there's not a common pattern.
- I would also look at your webmaster and hosting company. People searching by a particular URL, makes me wonder if the page is working at all times of the day?
- Also I would do a link analysis of those pages. Are people listing that URL and not linking to it? If so that would be weird, but it's definitely an idea.
I hope that helps!
-
No, nothing out of the ordinary there and I certainly wouldn't expect someone to be analyzing it so much that it comes up as one of my top keywords.
-
Look at the geographical data and see if they all come from the same place. It might be that somebody is analyzing your URL's!
-
Image attached to this post
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
-
In Google Analytic Experiment I want to Judge Performance of Page Along with Pageviews, Bounces, Transaction etc
Hi All, For my ecommerce site for mobile site category page I have redesign the page in 2 different ways so one original page and 2 new designs. Now I want to do A/B testing with google experiment. I want to measure performance of page via pageviews, bounce rate, exit rate, conversion rate, add to basket etc. Now in objective for this experiment I can select anyone thing either Pageviews, or bounces or transaction or goal. So my query is 1) I cannot select all objective together? 2) or for same page I have to create too many experiments by selecting each objective? 3) exit rate or add to basket objective is not in experiment list so? Thanks!
Reporting & Analytics | | dsouzac0 -
Webmaster Tools Pages and Queries
In Google Webmaster Tools, under Search Analytics, what is the difference between positions in queries and positions in pages?
Reporting & Analytics | | CostumeD0 -
Why do WMT's Search Analytics & GA's Real Time Keywords Differ?
I took a screen shot of the keywords from Google Analytics Real Time Keywords for Google / Organic. Then I waited a week and filtered Google Webmaster Tools' Search Analytics for queries with those keywords. None of them showed up. Why not? What I missing? Why do some keywords show up in Google Analytics RT for Google / Organic while most others are in Not Provided? I see WMT's Search Analytics says that it doesn't always show queries that "are made a very small number of times or those that contain personal or sensitive information." But most of my queries are like that. Anybody know any patterns / criteria that leads WMT to show some but not others? Thanks
Reporting & Analytics | | GilReich0 -
URLS are top keywords in GA?
Hey Moz, For some reason on my father's website, michaelpadway.com, the top 2 keywords from organic are complete urls from his site. This doesn't makeugh sense to me. Any ideas?
Reporting & Analytics | | MarloSchneider1 -
Impressions in GWT have dropped to nothing, but my page is still ranking normally
Hello Everyone, I'm seeing a strange issue. On the 22nd of this month Webmasters tools started showing 6 impressions per day down from hundreds or thousands. I thought I was hit with a huge penalty for my keywords but they are still ranking where they have for the past month or two on Google. In analytics my organic traffic is stable. It just seems to be GWT showing the massive drop. My domain is: http://Patchofland.com Any Thoughts? Thanks in advance!
Reporting & Analytics | | PatchofLand0 -
URL String Tracking Question--Need help!
I am doing some research for a freelance project and found a URL receiving a decent amount of traffic from search with this url string after the normal page url (xxx.com/credit-card-counseling.aspx?match=e&query=debthelper.com&id=22097628847&id=1810807655) Is this some sort of GA tracking code? Why would it be used on that page to track organic search hits if that happens automatically? Would love some help figuring this out! Thanks,
Reporting & Analytics | | RickyShockley0 -
Entrance keyword for specific landing page Google Analytics V5
Hi all I cant seem to find a way to get Entrance keywords for a specific landing page in version 5 of Google Analytics. Any quick tips? Thanks a million Fredrik
Reporting & Analytics | | Resultify0 -
Keyword tracking using Advanced Segment
I would like to see visits for only and only the following 2 keywords using advanced segment in GA. logo design india and logodesign Here's how i set up the Advancned Segment - Keyword > Matches Regular Expression > logo design india|logodesign The problem is that advanced segment report is also displaying visits for keyword thelogodesigns. Have i set it up correctly ?
Reporting & Analytics | | seoug_20050