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Author Topic: Google killing referral data via SSL  (Read 10844 times)

bill

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Google killing referral data via SSL
« on: October 19, 2011, 02:05:13 AM »
http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2011/10/making-search-more-secure.html
Quote
What does this mean for sites that receive clicks from Google search results? When you search from https://www.google.com, websites you visit from our organic search listings will still know that you came from Google, but won't receive information about each individual query.

No more keyword data in my server logs?  >:(
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Gurtie

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Re: Google killing referral data via SSL
« Reply #1 on: October 19, 2011, 05:27:20 AM »
bastards.
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Torben

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Re: Google killing referral data via SSL
« Reply #2 on: October 19, 2011, 07:27:56 AM »
Any idea about what percentage of users actually log in to Google?
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Gurtie

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Re: Google killing referral data via SSL
« Reply #3 on: October 19, 2011, 07:53:05 AM »
well, on the plus side, we're about to find that out quite accurately for some sites. Which will be good because it'll help me prioritise the +1 items on my list.

When autocomplete came in I worked out logged in users to probably being about 3% (or something really low) of all internet users in the UK, based on inaccurate figures, gmail usage and some sheer guesswork. Possibly more people stay logged in now because of +1? Doubt it.

Even 3% is a pain in the arse though - especially when you're mid way through developing long tail traffic on a site. Webmaster centrals 1000 to aggregated results won't really go that far for a lot of sites :(

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Rooftop

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Re: Google killing referral data via SSL
« Reply #4 on: October 19, 2011, 08:23:27 AM »
Cutts said last night that it was a single figure percentage. At the time I wasn't sure whether he meant to the users logged in on .com were a single-figure of all searches, or whether logged in ones were a single figure.  Hoping from gurties data it is the latter.

Sucks though. Sucks unbelievably.  On a selfish front, if that % is any higher I probably need to now scrap 6 months work I've been doing on something.
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grnidone

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Re: Google killing referral data via SSL
« Reply #5 on: October 19, 2011, 05:29:47 PM »
Why are they doing this?  Is it to make SEO more difficult so it is more difficult to manipulate search results?  What is the purpose of Google doing this?  What would keep them from redirecting *all* of their search results so we'd get *no* referrers?
« Last Edit: October 19, 2011, 05:34:09 PM by grnidone »
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littleman

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Re: Google killing referral data via SSL
« Reply #6 on: October 19, 2011, 06:39:54 PM »
Not a good thing for SEO.  That said, it would be trivial for browsers to start carrying referer data for SSL to non-SSL.  The data is there, it just needs to be passed on. 

The silver lining?  I could see this being good for affiliates as it makes it that much harder for merchants to deconstruct their affiliates traffic sources.
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PaulH

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Re: Google killing referral data via SSL
« Reply #7 on: October 19, 2011, 07:22:54 PM »
My bet is Google will soon allow you to see more keywords via webmaster tools and Analytics integration.
They want more people to switch
Then for their new enterprise analytics customers they will show all keywords.
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joedavies1987

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Re: Google killing referral data via SSL
« Reply #8 on: October 20, 2011, 11:28:02 AM »
(not provided) will soon be the most converting keyword ever then??

Good job we brought the emd domain

www.notprovided.co.uk
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TallTroll

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Re: Google killing referral data via SSL
« Reply #9 on: February 08, 2012, 06:42:57 PM »
Listening to the Strike Point w Jason / Mikkel discussing this. Would I be right in thinking you could trap the info by "fronting" any given domain with HTTPS, then global 301 > HTTP equivalent page? Or would you be more concerned about the possible loss of trust if a SSL cert fails for some reason
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grnidone

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Re: Google killing referral data via SSL
« Reply #10 on: February 09, 2012, 10:52:57 PM »
Again, I ask:  what is the purpose of Google doing this?
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Woz

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Re: Google killing referral data via SSL
« Reply #11 on: February 09, 2012, 11:09:07 PM »
"All your keywords/referrals are belong to us."
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TallTroll

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Re: Google killing referral data via SSL
« Reply #12 on: February 10, 2012, 04:06:56 AM »
@Jason

OK, I'd thought they were sending a null field, not a fake one
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Rumbas

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Re: Google killing referral data via SSL
« Reply #13 on: February 10, 2012, 01:37:58 PM »
>why

So they can sell their corporate clients access to the data for a premium fee.. and screw with the SEO's in same time? :)
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Adam C

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Re: Google killing referral data via SSL
« Reply #14 on: February 10, 2012, 03:20:38 PM »
incidentally we're tracking the split of logged in/not logged in users, and seeing in the UK only around 2.5% from logged in users, but more like 15% in the US.
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