Number of referrals from searches
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In my statistics, the number given of search engine terms under Search Engine Terms is always less than the number given of searches under Referrals. Yesterday, for example, Search Engine Terms named two search terms, plus 25 unknown search terms, to give a total search terms of 27; but there were 42 referrals from search engines. Why the difference?
The blog I need help with is: (visible only to logged in users)
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Hi there,
Search engines like Google only make the data on the search terms available to us in very few cases. So while we can still see that someone clicked on a search result in Google to get to your site, we have no way of seeing what they searched for, because Google simply doesn’t provide that information to us.
Also keep in mind that different search engines send us different data. So while one might tell us there was a search term but they’re not showing us what it is (unknown search term), another search engine might just leave the search term data out completely, meaning it won’t generate a stat for a search term, only for the referral.
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Thank you for responding, but that is not what I asked. I am aware that when someone is logged into Google I cannot see what they searched for to reach me.
The question concerns the two different totals for searches. In “Referrers”, the number of referrers from searches is always much higher than the number of known or unknown search engine terms. Why?
The vast majority of searches come from Google, according to the “Referrers” box: yesterday 42 searches, 35 of them Google, of which 9 Google.com. Does Google send different data depending on the country it comes from?
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I answered that question as well:
Also keep in mind that different search engines send us different data. So while one might tell us there was a search term but they’re not showing us what it is (unknown search term), another search engine might just leave the search term data out completely, meaning it won’t generate a stat for a search term, only for the referral.
If a search engines sends us no information on search terms whatsoever, it won’t generate any stat under search terms while still generating a stat under referrals. This is opposed to Google, for example, who tells us there is a search term, but just don’t reveal to us what it is.
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That still does not explain the difference.
Yesterday, Referrer Google search 35, total search terms 27.
25th Sep, Google 29, TST 26.
24th Sep, Google 32, TST 23.Even if Bing, Duckduckgo, Yahoo etc never sent information on search terms, not even “unknown” search term, it would not explain it.
If you don’t know, that’s OK.
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All that means is that in some cases Google sends us search term info, and in other cases they don’t, as I’ve explained already. This is not something we control – we can only display the data we receive from search engines.
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