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Google refer string question

by Steviebone
3 replies
  • SEO
    • |
I have a database that tracks all incoming requests referrer field. I was looking at something today, and I'm not sure what to make of it. A good number of my refers from google are without any querystr whatsoever. In other words the header simply says:

https://www.google.com/
others have normal parameters, some of which are usually encrypted.

It looks as though ALL the requests from https are this way and the non-secured http have a query string.

It's been awhile since I studied this. Is this normal? Or should I be investigating further? I use this information to track the number of times someone lands on one of my pages from google (and other sources). The numbers have NEVER been an exact match with WMT or GA. What am I missing here? Can referral headers be easily spoofed? And what would the purpose of that be?

My first thought was that Google was being even more secretive now and simpy providing no information at all for requests from logged in users.
#google #question #refer #string
  • Profile picture of the author AntonioSeegars1
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    • Profile picture of the author savidge4
      Originally Posted by AntonioSeegars1 View Post

      This may not be the answer, but it's possible that those are queries from a bot.
      That is NOT the answer but thanks for participating!

      Steviebone, yes your assumptions are correct, signed in and no data. I think it goes a bit deeper than that.. and probably falls into "popular" keywords and no data. I have a site that's targets a particular wordpress theme and the log data as well as GA is a big goose egg. as in NO keyword data what so ever in relation to the theme name. And yet I am ranked top 10's and in many cases 4 and 5 top 10's all over the place. and have 50,000 visitors a month LOL
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      • Profile picture of the author Steviebone
        Originally Posted by savidge4 View Post

        That is NOT the answer but thanks for participating!

        Steviebone, yes your assumptions are correct, signed in and no data. I think it goes a bit deeper than that.. and probably falls into "popular" keywords and no data. I have a site that's targets a particular wordpress theme and the log data as well as GA is a big goose egg. as in NO keyword data what so ever in relation to the theme name. And yet I am ranked top 10's and in many cases 4 and 5 top 10's all over the place. and have 50,000 visitors a month LOL
        My guess is the day is coming when we have nothing to go on but the info Google is willing to share. I have run extensive tests and can say with some certainty that relying on WMT and GA is also not absolute. In my tests, data collected locally often does not match that of those two services. The information gathered by these services may not be complete, especially in larger sites.

        The best bet is to collect data from multiple sources and compare. The most accurate data is the data you can track internally within scripting (one of the advantages of a scripted site.)

        This of course doesn't help with info about Google queries.

        Thanks again.
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        • Profile picture of the author savidge4
          Originally Posted by Steviebone View Post

          The best bet is to collect data from multiple sources and compare. The most accurate data is the data you can track internally within scripting (one of the advantages of a scripted site.)

          Source source and source... right there with you. Google is what Google is... its a source of traffic. there may be volume but study after study shows that is not where the buyers are. I will take Bing, Yahoo and Aol any day of the week. AND I still get the data I need to move forward and progress and target better.
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