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Search term totals does not add up to the total search engine referrals

  1. morphmantheclown
    Member

    I am a statistics junkie, I use the statistics to know how to draw in more people to read the blog. It's an extremely powerful tool if you know how to use it.
    However, lately I have been stumped over how we get so many views on certain posts.
    I check the referral list and all I see are search engines. Like today, we got 166 referrals from Google alone. Along with that, we got 34 views on a certain post, that only got 2 views yesterday, so I thought I'd see why. No referrer alone have anywhere near 34 clicks, so I thought I'd check the search term list.
    Today we got a total of 24 search terms, including the "private" ones where we can't see what they searched for.

    This does not add up in the least. If the only referrals we have are search engines and todays views tops the total views on that post before, it can't be that people have typed in the URL for that specific post, yet the number of search terms (where only about half is relevant to that post, but can be relevant to 2 other posts too) is so much less than the number of search engine referrals.

    Is there a way to get more specific information, because I really wanna know where we get the views from and how they got there.

    The blog I need help with is thetorchslguide.com.

  2. notawoodpecker
    Member

    I am a statistics junkie,

    Then you should know they're never completely accurate. Time delays in updating and the multitude of blocking software and anti-tracking applications will ensure that the numbers will never add up.

  3. morphmantheclown
    Member

    Well, it's still a pretty huge difference, seeing as most people visiting our blog wouldn't know or care about anti-tracking applications or blocking software.

  4. auxclass
    Member

    Search engines also do not always pass on the search terms

  5. morphmantheclown
    Member

    That's why there's a "unknown search term" field in there, that one catches all those, but doesn't display the term. The 24 terms I talked about in the original post included those.

  6. notawoodpecker
    Member

    I've never found two sets of web stats that match each other and probably never will.

    They're just not going to add up the way you seem to want them to.

  7. morphmantheclown
    Member

    I'm not looking for a perfect matchup, I'm just looking for something that is a bit more accurate than the current stats, that are less than 12% accurate.
    I want to know where most people come from and how they got there, I don't need it for everyone, but I definitely need it for more than 12% of our readers.

    Are there any other tools available that might give more relevant statistics?

  8. timethief
    Member

    There are free third party visitor tracking programs we can use to supplement what we get from WordPress.com. Take note that as we cannot use JavaScript on our free hosted blogs and we cannot access metadata to insert the required code we WordPress.com bloggers cannot get the kind of detail you seek. I suggest using sitemeter or statcounter to supplement.

    Scroll down to "visitor tracking" on this page http://onecoolsitebloggingtips.com/popular-posts/

    Sitemeter, Statcounter, wordpress stats and all the others will never agree. Each one of them decides how and what they will count as a hit. Some count page views and some count unique visitors. Therefore, use any of the stats counters only as a general guide to hits.

    Understand that an application that is not running on the same servers your blog is on is going to be susceptible to wild fluctuations. This is because all hits have to be transferred over the internet to different servers, and there are literally thousands of things that can go wrong between the server your blog is on and the server at the stats place.

    Also be aware of the possibility that the software or hardware at the stats place may be broken and not recording, or counting things as intended. http://onecoolsitebloggingtips.com/2009/10/02/visitor-tracking-on-wordpress-com-blogs/

  9. timethief
    Member

    P.S. There is no blogger initiated advertising allowed on WordPress.com blogs and our blogs cannot be equipped for eCommerce. The stats we get are sufficient for the needs of hobby bloggers, whose income is not dependent on their blog traffic flow. if you require greater detail then you will need to hire a web host and set up your own WordPress.org install. http://support.wordpress.com/com-vs-org/

  10. morphmantheclown
    Member

    Well, it's not for the advertising, it's for expanding our viewer base. And the WordPress stats page is already on the same server, isn't it? And it is fluctuating wildly within itself.
    The same tool only have a 12% consistency with itself, so I don't know what tool would give more specific results on incoming traffic sources than that...

  11. timethief
    Member

    The bottom line is that if you are a stats focused blogger you will NOT be happy here. External stats programs require dynamic script and we bloggers cannot insert it into free hosted WordPress.com blogs. I recommend that you hire a web host and set up your own WordPress.org install.

  12. notawoodpecker
    Member

    ^^ And even then, don't look for 100% accuracy. I have two different Stats applications on mine that don't agree with each other. If I added a third, I'm sure it would differ from the other two.

  13. timethief
    Member

    @notawoodpecker
    I have tested many third party stats programs . To do that I have had to run multiple stats programs on my blog at the same time. The blog is a mature blog founded in 2007 with content dating back to 2006. My experience here at WordPress.com is what I based my recommendation above on. When we get stats focused bloggers on these WordPress.com support forums it's best to state the facts clearly, explain that one can hire a web host, set up their own WordPress.org install and use a stats program of their choice, and then stop posting to the thread.

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