Re: [twitter-dev] Re: disparities between bit.ly Google Analytics?
Google Analytics is javascript based which means a browser or some environment that can execute JS needs to open a page for a pageview There are many more HTTP requests for a given URL. Bots, spiders, aggregators etc. Since Bit.ly and other shorteners are doing 301 redirects, they can't really discern between the requests. Well, maybe they could with some well known agents, but it is not really feasible to detect every one out there. At least that probably accounts for much of the discrepancy.
[twitter-dev] Re: disparities between bit.ly Google Analytics?
The official Bit.ly Answer: What you're seeing are total decodes, as opposed to total click- throughs measured by JavaScript on the page. Decodes can be caused by bots, and by applications, like browser plug-ins, which expand the underlying url without causing a click-through. If you download a browser plug-in that automatically expands short urls, for instance, it looks a lot like a human user to an analytics program. Absent JavaScript on the page, it's hard to distinguish between a decode and an intentional click-through. At the end of the day, Bit.ly complements rather than replaces JavaScript-based analytics utililties like Google Analytics or Chartbeat. You should probably read the following articles when you get a sec: http://searchengineland.com/how-twitter-might-send-far-more-traffic-than-you-think-21482 http://searchengineland.com/is-twitter-sending-you-500-to-1600-more-traffic-than-you-might-think-22696 Rex Bit.ly Community Mgr. On Feb 21, 8:36 pm, neal rauhauser nrauhau...@gmail.com wrote: Is anyone else seeing dramatic disparities between what bit.ly reports and what Google Analytics reports in terms of clicks? We're seeing like 10:1 over reporting from bit.ly ... if Google Analytics is right. -- mailto:n...@layer3arts.com // GoogleTalk: nrauhau...@gmail.com GV: 202-642-1717
Re: [twitter-dev] Re: disparities between bit.ly Google Analytics?
Thanks!! We see so much in the social media marketing space about measuring ROI and competing on analytics that it's difficult to get executive buy-in where we know they should be going. Real-time is where the analytics market is going - I'm really surprised Google hasn't put up something like that yet, since Woopra and Clicky already do that. -- M. Edward (Ed) Borasky borasky-research.net/m-edward-ed-borasky/ A mathematician is a device for turning coffee into theorems. ~ Paul Erdos Quoting Rex Dixon rexduffdi...@gmail.com: The official Bit.ly Answer: What you're seeing are total decodes, as opposed to total click- throughs measured by JavaScript on the page. Decodes can be caused by bots, and by applications, like browser plug-ins, which expand the underlying url without causing a click-through. If you download a browser plug-in that automatically expands short urls, for instance, it looks a lot like a human user to an analytics program. Absent JavaScript on the page, it's hard to distinguish between a decode and an intentional click-through. At the end of the day, Bit.ly complements rather than replaces JavaScript-based analytics utililties like Google Analytics or Chartbeat. You should probably read the following articles when you get a sec: http://searchengineland.com/how-twitter-might-send-far-more-traffic-than-you-think-21482 http://searchengineland.com/is-twitter-sending-you-500-to-1600-more-traffic-than-you-might-think-22696 Rex Bit.ly Community Mgr. On Feb 21, 8:36 pm, neal rauhauser nrauhau...@gmail.com wrote: Is anyone else seeing dramatic disparities between what bit.ly reports and what Google Analytics reports in terms of clicks? We're seeing like 10:1 over reporting from bit.ly ... if Google Analytics is right. -- mailto:n...@layer3arts.com // GoogleTalk: nrauhau...@gmail.com GV: 202-642-1717
[twitter-dev] Re: disparities between bit.ly Google Analytics?
I would stick with Google Analytics. I think they take out all the requests by search bots and all duplicate requests and report actual legit requests by users. Who knows how bit.ly does their click tracking, I sure don't On Feb 21, 9:36 pm, neal rauhauser nrauhau...@gmail.com wrote: Is anyone else seeing dramatic disparities between what bit.ly reports and what Google Analytics reports in terms of clicks? We're seeing like 10:1 over reporting from bit.ly ... if Google Analytics is right. -- mailto:n...@layer3arts.com // GoogleTalk: nrauhau...@gmail.com GV: 202-642-1717
Re: [twitter-dev] Re: disparities between bit.ly Google Analytics?
The problem is this - we are doing promo stuff on Twitter, we were using http://tr.im but they never got back to us with an API key, and now we're using bit.ly. It's slick but if it's gonna be off by a factor of 10 for these low volume links we have a real reporting problem - we don't always get Google Analytics access to the sites in question. On Sun, Feb 21, 2010 at 8:53 PM, Dmitri Snytkine d.snytk...@gmail.comwrote: I would stick with Google Analytics. I think they take out all the requests by search bots and all duplicate requests and report actual legit requests by users. Who knows how bit.ly does their click tracking, I sure don't On Feb 21, 9:36 pm, neal rauhauser nrauhau...@gmail.com wrote: Is anyone else seeing dramatic disparities between what bit.lyreports and what Google Analytics reports in terms of clicks? We're seeing like 10:1 over reporting from bit.ly ... if Google Analytics is right. -- mailto:n...@layer3arts.com // GoogleTalk: nrauhau...@gmail.com GV: 202-642-1717 -- mailto:n...@layer3arts.com // GoogleTalk: nrauhau...@gmail.com GV: 202-642-1717
