Strange activity with direct traffic.

[rianpatrick]

Hey folks,

Direct traffic in Google Analytics is very unpredictable as it is hard to say how many people will type in the URL directly, click through an email, or click through a link. Even then, there can be a steady pattern observed in these falls and spikes. One of my clients was displaying a wavy pattern, with their traffic staying steady for a while, before dropping off and regaining the same position.
I checked if there was any problem with the newsletter, blog posts or the paid traffic. But I can’t find anything wrong. Does anyone have any ideas?

Thanks

[PhilipSEO]

Originally Posted by rianpatrick

Hey folks,

Direct traffic in Google Analytics is very unpredictable as it is hard to say how many people will type in the URL directly, click through an email, or click through a link. Even then, there can be a steady pattern observed in these falls and spikes. One of my clients was displaying a wavy pattern, with their traffic staying steady for a while, before dropping off and regaining the same position.
I checked if there was any problem with the newsletter, blog posts or the paid traffic. But I can’t find anything wrong. Does anyone have any ideas?

Thanks

Yeah! I can't prove this but I have a pretty good idea. Google recently introduced "secure search" via TSL/SLS (https) and it's becoming more popular. Those searches don't show up as redular Google searches in Analytics. I have watched this a lot and I am betting that those searches are showing up as direct traffic.