Google does not disclose part of the natural search data by default, and Google is still expanding this proportion. Using Google Analytics (Google Analytics) can help you understand this part of the non-public data to a certain extent.
This article aims to help you solve your problems and get more out of your organic search data.
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There is a lot of difference between an agency and a client, especially when it comes to the number of websites that are run. However, there are also shareable resources that add value to both agents and clients.
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Data sources are an example of this, where consistent data analysis and reporting is important when we encounter disagreements.
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certainly,Google Analyticsis one such data source, and as a free tool, it is equally important for agencies and brands. I use Google Analytics on a daily basis and it helps our technical team understand how the site is performing, both positive and negative.
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Recently, Google has made some tweaks to Google Analytics. Some of these tweaks, especially in terms of user experience and usability, have really started to benefit users.
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On the other hand, while Google helps users, it does away with something else: making data increasingly difficult to obtain, especially when it comes to organic search data.
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This post aims to further demonstrate the value of organic search data to your business and your customers with some in-depth, actionable recommendations.
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The most controversial limitation of Google Analytics is keyword data. Google restricts keywords for "safety" and to protect the privacy of searchers.
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If you log in to a Google page to search, the webmaster cannot see the keywords you searched for. It started with a small set of keywords, but the number has been growing steadily. It was not until the end of 2013 that Google announced that the keyword data of all accounts would be hidden. In fact, about 80-90% of the organic data we see on a daily basis is hidden.


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1. Undisclosed search data (not provided)
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This is just some innocuous little thing in Google Analytics. I hope that in this article, I can solve more practical problems for you, let us start to decipher these private data.
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Google's non-public natural search data (not provided) is a nightmare for SEO workers! Making SEO work faces two major challenges: one is the inability to identify brand and non-brand traffic, and the other is the inability to distinguish between non-brand traffic and keyword search traffic. Let's see how to solve these problems.
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2. Brand and non-brand
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Not provided data makes our job difficult, but it does give us usable data. As mentioned above, there is usually about 15% keyword data in the data. The buzzwords that appear here are all inferred, and we need to apply 15% of the available keyword data and their structure to the remaining hidden.
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method
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If only we could figure out the available data for brand and non-brand segmentation. We can then infer the split percentage. First, we need to define "what is a brand", and to do this, we have to go through an advanced filter to remove all web traffic coming through related brand terms.
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For example: Our brand is GA Tips, and our website is GA Tips.com. We need to tell Google Analytics what our brand's keywords are, which usually come from brand changes, such as GA tips, GAtips, etc., and changing URLs, such as GAtips.com, www.GAtips.com, etc.
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First go to this page, use Google Analytics: acquisition > keywords > organic, make sure the main dimension is set to "keywords". Then click the "advanced" button below the "search box".


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Here are some options that need to be set as follows:


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In the text field, enter your brand's keywords in the following format:
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GAtips|GA tips|www.gatips.com|gatips.com and more.
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You can enter the variable keywords as accurately as possible, some brands may also need to include the brand name of the product. For example: Apple may include "iphone" in the name term. You can also use popular misspellings to make keywords accurate and diverse.
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Once you have entered all the keywords, click "Apply" and then click the "Shortcut" button at the top of the page.


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You can then name your filter setting and save it to your shortcut menu in the left navigation bar so you can easily access it later. This removes the organic keyword report for all branded keywords, leaving only non-branded and not provided data.
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If we collect all natural data traffic, and delete the not provided data, this gives us a usable data set. Then, excluding the not provided data provided by the non-brand filter, we are left with a combination of provided organic search data and non-brand data.
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The difference between these two figures is the sum of the data provided by the brands. From this perspective, simply calculate the brand and non-brand percentages by removing the non-brand data from the total data provided, and finally, apply the two percentages to the total organic traffic data to get the brand and non-brand numbers.
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Tracking this data over time allows us to step up or down our surveillance on brands and non-brands, which in turn can show changes in brand and non-brand rankings.
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Third, I also mentioned another problem with not provided data: it limits the ability to track traffic from non-brand keywords.
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The key here is the landing page. Take the time to see what keywords each page is ranking for, which is why tools like SEMrush and Searchmetrics are great. Understanding this allows us to make informed decisions about increasing or decreasing specific landing pages.
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For the name GAtips, let's say the page we've identified: gatips.com/really-cool-analytics-hacks ranks for the search terms "GA hacks" and "analytics hacks"
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We don't know if these terms generate traffic to the page using Google Analytics (although we can use Webmaster Tools), because for the not provided data, all we can do is check the position, on the page with traffic changes, find the page in Ranking on Google. If we know that the rankings for “GA hacks” dropped, then we can specify that a landing page traffic drop accordingly.
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Webmaster Tools is a critical source of keyword data, although it can be a bit vague and inaccurate. But using it to analyze your page rank gives you a real sense of how your keyword traffic is performing.
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4. Other tips on how to use Google Analytics
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Now that we have solved the main problem, here are some very convenient and effective methods for you to choose, because you may encounter some problems when using Google Analytics on a daily basis.
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Why does Google Analytics show a session page for a certain date range, but after adding in a date outside that range, it becomes a completely different page (this also applies to the number of landing pages for individuals)?
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What Google doesn't tell you is that in most cases, Google Analytics gives a reference sample data. The more visitors to your webpage, the more realistic this data will be.
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The ultimate solution is, either go to PPC (very expensive).
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Personally, I pull out the numbers in the date range alone, without comparison, then add the comparison and get the number in the previous one date range. It's a small manual, but it's functional and predictable.
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UA codes can change things too, so make sure you have the latest code on your website.
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If Google can't associate a session with a page, it will record it as a session, but the page is specified with no null values. This can happen for several reasons, including the user not finishing the page load.
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The server makes the request, but doesn't load the page.
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It should be clear that the solution is to identify which pages are assigning settings. Not set is often for a specific page type, such as an event or a category page on the website, so you have to check the page style.
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Total organic traffic for a date range will not be affected by unset traffic, but if you want to calculate the unset percentage, you can extrapolate more realistically for each landing page. Comparing my rankings to previous weeks, months, and years, my rankings are flat, but my landing page traffic is down. why is that? How can this situation be alleviated?
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This is a common question in Google Analytics, but Google Analytics provides traffic data for landing pages, so it's worth discussing. If rankings are flat and traffic is down, it’s likely a market-driven cause.
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Use the Google Trends tool to see search demand for terms at the right time and place. Export this as CSV. Google assigns 1 number out of 100 each week to fall within the date range, so the weekly numbers are relative to the surrounding days.
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Weekly CSV export of traffic to your landing pages, analyze weekly numbers from Google Trends. You can see demand patterns between demand modulation and traffic behavior.
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Also check the search volume of Google Keyword Planner for the same period in the previous year and the previous month. You may see a similar dip, indicating that this is a seasonal change.
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Many people in the industry believe that organic search traffic is controlled by Google Analytics, which is a distorted statement.
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Groupon is known to be conducting an experiment to understand the true impact of this phenomenon as it affects all Google Analytics profiles. This is largely due to browsers failing to properly report the origin of the traffic, with IE being the culprit.
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To understand the real impact, Groupon spent six hours removing search results from Google to see how much the direct channel was reduced. Since visits without organic data, which gives us a real look at actual visit data for direct traffic, found the fact that about 50% of direct traffic visits long URLs, those pages that go beyond the subfolder level drop by about 50 %. The end result is that organic data is actually more traffic than Google Analytics reports.
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Moz ran a similar experiment, with generally slightly different results. It did confirm something in common with Groupon's findings though, as direct traffic to long URLs dropped again by around 50%.
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Analyze direct traffic to see how much of it goes to long URLs. Divide the traffic by 2 (or 50%) to get the organic direct traffic data based on the data we got from Moz and Groupon.
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Although there are still many deficiencies in Google Analytics, Google Analytics can indeed help you solve some problems.