Google Analytics traffic sources. How Yandex and Google count refusals

Why install two systems on the site at once? Isn't one enough? Will not be enough. Ideally, even two will not be enough. What are the features of each of them?

"Yandex.Metrica"

• Availability of the WebVisor tool, which records video of the user’s visit to the site. You can watch a fascinating film about how users, for example, try to find a product. IN Google Analytics there is no such.

• Users of Yandex.Metrica note better visualization: graphs and diagrams are designed in a suitable format for presentations. Useful for marketers when preparing reports.

• Heatmap of page clicks. This is a great tool when you need to understand where users are clicking. Also useful for argumentation: it’s very easy to prove to colleagues that no one sees this button, and this banner attracts too much attention.

Google Analytics

• E-commerce. It is more convenient to configure than in Metrica, it transmits more parameters. There is an advanced E-commerce with which you can perform optimization miracles.

• Convenient notification system. Traffic dropped by 20%? Has the conversion doubled? Google will send alerts directly to your email.

• There are views that allow you to divide data by performer: give SEO specialists only SEO traffic for analysis, and contextual specialists only traffic from advertising campaigns. Very useful feature for those who interact with several contractors and do not want to disclose too much information.

• Relatively simple integration with CRM. Measurement protocol allows you to integrate Google Analytics with anything. You can, for example, pull up the status of delivered goods into it; goods that were returned; confirmed orders, etc. Especially useful for those for whom online conversion is the first step of offline sales.

Web analytics dictionary

A session is a period of time during which a user is actively interacting with your website or application. All site or app usage data is associated with a session: page views, events, e-commerce transactions, etc.

Page views are visits to a single page. For some reason, a session and a page view are often confused, so please note that these are fundamentally different concepts.

Unique views - the number of visits during which the specified pages were viewed at least once. Not to be confused with regular views.

IN this session Page 1 has 2 views and only 1 unique view

Entries - the number of visits to your site that started from the specified page.

Exit percentage - the percentage of website exits made from the specified page. Let's look at the diagram again to make it clearer.

The purple session has 3 page views. Orange session has 2 page views

Page 1: 2 views and 1 exit (orange session ended) - 50% exits

Page 3: 1 view and 1 exit (purple session ended) - 100% exits

Bounce rate is the percentage of visits during which no more than one page was opened, i.e., in which the visitor leaves the site from the login page. In this case, the visitor does not perform any tracked targeted actions. Let's look at the drawing.

Let's look at another one.

In the first case, this is a failure: only one page was viewed during the session. In the second case, there was no refusal: 2 pages were viewed. This is how refusal differs from exit. There is no refusal without a way out, but there is a way out without refusal.

Some useful things to keep in mind about bounce rates:

1. This is not an exit percentage.

2. The bounce rate becomes relevant only after the counters are properly configured. For example, on a one-page landing page you can set an event to scroll the page - scrolling will act as a transition between pages.

Source- the last resource the user visited before coming to your content: a search engine (for example, Google) or a website (example.com).

Channel- source type, for example:

• organic- regular search;
• cpc- search advertising with pay per click;
• referral- transition from the website;
• direct- direct entry (click from bookmarks or go from the browser address bar).

More source/channel examples:

• yandex/cpc- clicking on advertising from Yandex;
• (direct) / (none)- direct access to the site;
• google/organic- transition from Google search;
• example.com/referral- follow a link from example.com.

The source/channel link is formed based on the utm tags of the link; this data can be changed. For example, if you want to track traffic from email newsletters, you need to enter utm_source=email in the link.

Basic reports: what to watch, how to draw conclusions

How to open Analytics and immediately determine what problems are on the site? By and large, no way: to determine what problems there are on the site, serious research and testing will be required. But some conclusions can be drawn based on standard reports.

The two most important reports we'll look at are Traffic Sources and Behavior. Using the first one, you can quickly assess the number of channels and traffic sources and their quality. The second is to see how well the site performs its website function: which pages work well, which ones scare away customers, etc.

Traffic Sources reports

Traffic Sources Tab > All Traffic Tab > Source/Channel Tab

This section shows the quality of traffic by channel. Usually everyone is interested in 4 types of traffic:

• To evaluate the context: google/cpc and yandex/cpc
• To evaluate SEO: google/organic and yandex/organic

To view traffic on the selected channel, you need to set a filter:

Usually the filter works as shown in the screenshots. If not, check with the contractor what is written in the utm_medium and utm_source of the traffic he brings. Yes, you can directly ask: “What is written in the utm_medium and utm_source of the traffic that you bring.” We enter the answer instead of cpc or organic and get data on this traffic.

	What are we watching?	What do we think
	Bounce Rate	Store, service website (2+ pages): high bounce rate - you need to check campaigns and semantics or improve the usability of the site. Landing page or blog: a high bounce rate is the norm for this type of page. Please set up advanced goals to further track user behavior on the page. For example, scroll tracking.
	Let's see how many visits there are by channel Let's see where orders come from	If the conversion rate for a channel is low, you need to optimize the channel or increase the landing page conversion rate through testing. If the channel conversion is ok, you need to scale it up.

The table contains the phrase “if the conversion is low.” You can see the conversion for the configured goals here:

Select a goal and look at the conversion rate for it. If the goals are not set, you need to set them up urgently. Evaluating traffic without specific goals is a waste of time and effort.

Behavior reports

In behavior reports we will look at how the pages of our site perform.

Behavior Tab > Site Content Menu:

• “All pages” - data on user indicators for all pages of the site;
• “Attendance analysis” - the same thing, but the pages are divided into folders (by structure);
• “Login pages” - which page is opened first;
• “Exit pages” - which page is looked at before leaving the site.

To view statistics for the selected page, you need to set a filter.

In the filter we put a piece of the URL of the page of interest after the domain name of the site.

For example:

	What are we watching?	What do we think
	Bounce Rate	Store, service website (2+ pages): high bounce rate - you need to work on the usability of the site. Landing page or blog: a high bounce rate is the norm for this type of page. Please set up advanced goals to further track user behavior on the page.
	Percentage of exits for pages (blocks) that are important for the site: Card Product basket	Big percentage exits by important pages. It is necessary to conduct a usability audit of the relevant pages to identify the reasons.

Segments

Besides general information, you can see the quality of traffic by individual segments (SEO traffic, traffic from context, from mailing lists, etc.).

Standard segments will help us with this:

The second part of this material will be released soon, in which I will consider basic settings Google Analytics. How can you tell if something important is not configured? How to set up some goals yourself and why you need it.

Let's return to the series of articles “Working with Google Analytics”. Today we propose to talk about the report that we often use when conducting website audits. You can find it using the link “Traffic sources => All traffic”. We already mentioned this type of report in the first article about Google Analytics, and now we want to tell you how it can be used in your work.

The first thing we see in the “ Traffic sources => All traffic", - a graph of the number of transitions by day and the sources from which users come to the site. This is what the main report looks like:

We wrote earlier that a special mark is placed near the traffic source:
Organic– transition from search results;
Referral– transitions from sites linking to your domain;
CPC traffic– clicks on advertisements;
Direct none– traffic from bookmarks, direct traffic, etc.

By analyzing the primary report, you can determine which source brings greatest number transitions, and which one is problematic. This is especially important to understand if you are investing in attracting traffic from a specific source (for example, contextual advertising). However, this report is most valuable because it allows you to flexibly segment the received traffic and make comparisons over specified periods.

To analyze, first of all, select the source you are interested in by clicking on it in the general list.

Now you have a graph in front of you that reflects the dynamics of transitions for one specific channel, and not for all sources.
Pay attention to the discrepancy between the general dynamics of transitions and the dynamics of a separate source! It often happens that, looking at the total traffic, we do not see any problem, but when we look at the traffic from a separate source, we observe a sharp drop. This usually reveals the application of a filter and the period in which it was applied.
It also helps track seasonal declines.

Now we need to use the filter " Additional parameter»:

There are quite a few filtering parameters, each of them is useful under certain conditions. I will focus on the most popular ones.

First of all this filter by keyword (Additional parameter - Traffic sources - Keyword ). By selecting it, you get a list of keywords that led to transitions to your site.
Now you can clearly see how many visits this or that request brings, for what requests users view a large number of pages, and which ones have high level refusals.

This report is especially useful if you have goals set up. This makes it possible to track which queries are the most converting and bring real sales.

For example, one of our customers had low conversion rates despite a fairly high number of visits. Thanks to this report, we were able to see that many of the queries that were clicked on were non-topic and had a high bounce rate. Knowing this helped create a competent promotion strategy.
Unfortunately, getting this request information from search engine You won’t be able to Google, this feature was “disabled” not long ago. For Yandex it still works.

Not less important Landing Page filter (Additional parameter - Traffic source - Landing page). By selecting this filter, we can get information about the login page.

This data can also be used for analysis and certain conclusions. For example, you have traffic, and the queries that bring users to your site are thematic, but the conversion is still low. In this case, it is worth checking which pages users are visiting. It is likely that the page is inconvenient or does not fully meet visitors' expectations.

This is what the landing page report looks like:

There are also a number of filters aimed for contextual advertising analytics:

If your business is “tied” to any city or region, the filter section will be useful to you "Visitors":

It will help you find out which cities and regions the traffic is coming from. This is what the generated report looks like:

For technical debugging of the site, solving problems with layout, etc., filter settings are applicable "Technologies":

For example, you may notice that the bounce rate among users of one browser is significantly higher than the bounce rate of others. Then it’s worth looking at how the site is displayed in this browser - it’s likely that there are problems with the layout.

Another important feature this report provides is a comparison between two periods.

Most often, we make comparisons in the event of a serious drop in positions - to analyze the difference.

You can compare the number of transitions for each day. It looks like this:

When making comparisons, be sure to take into account seasonality and possible differences between the two days of the week.

Also in this situation, we make comparisons by queries and pages. To do this, by selecting two periods, use the previously described filters.

Then the report looks like this.

One of the conditions for successful advertising campaign on the Internet - attracting high-quality, targeted, interested traffic. All traffic sources can be divided into four main channels: search traffic, advertising traffic, referral traffic, direct traffic.

IN Lately V separate channels distinguish email newsletters and traffic from social networks, although, by and large, they are parts of direct, referral or advertising traffic, depending on the situation. Let's look at each of them in more detail.

Search traffic

This is traffic coming from organic, i.e. natural, free search engine results. These are the top ten places that all sites strive to get to. SERPs are built as a result of sites being ranked by search engine algorithms based on many factors (their number is measured in thousands). Accordingly, in order to get to 1st place, you need to be as relevant as possible to all these factors. A set of measures aimed at search engine optimization website is called (Search Engine Optimization).

The huge number of factors that need to be taken into account often causes panic and misunderstanding of the promotion process among people who are not involved in this professionally, which, in turn, gives rise to many misconceptions about this industry: some people think that it is actually very simple and has enough influence on several factors, others believe that the result should be as fast as possible, others do not understand at all why they should pay money to SEO studios, because organic results are free results, and people go to the site for free.

Promotion results, as well as website ranking, depend on many factors:

• quality of contractor's work;
• changes in search engine algorithms;
• level of client involvement in the promotion process;
• the quality of the client’s business as a whole;
• and much more.

People who are disappointed in SEO usually blame everything on just one factor - the quality of the contractor’s work, not even wanting to think about other reasons. High-quality SEO, especially in competitive areas, always takes a lot of time (can take up to several years) and cannot cost a penny, but at the same time, it is always reliable and has a lasting effect. By developing your website in the right direction, search traffic will constantly grow, and moving a high-quality website from the TOP position will be much more difficult than one that got there by accident as a result of using “holes” in search engine algorithms.

Advertising traffic

Perhaps the most diverse channel for attracting traffic by type of source. These include:

• contextual advertising;
• media advertising;
• targeting and retargeting advertising;
• partnership programs;
• advertising on social networks;
• advertising in aggregators;
• and much more.

The main thing that all advertising traffic has in common is that it is always paid. Payment models can be very diverse: per click (CPC), per action (CPA), per views (CPM), per orders (CPO) and others. Unlike search traffic, it has an immediate start, but is always more expensive and does not have any effect after the end of advertising. While advertising is running, there is traffic; if you stop advertising, there is no traffic.

Referral traffic

Referral traffic includes transitions from other sites. At the same time, these can be both natural transitions and transitions from paid posts or articles. The quality of natural referral traffic is extremely difficult to control, because anyone can place a link on a forum, on a social network or on their website. The same rules apply to paid posts as for advertising traffic.

Direct traffic

TO this channel These include direct visits when people enter a URL or go from bookmarks. Typically, this is a user returning to the site who originally came from one of the three sources listed above. The exception is people who came to the site after seeing its address in offline advertising (flyers, billboards, TV advertising, etc.).

February 07, 2018

This section of Google Analytics provides reports on various traffic sources. "Traffic Sources" comprises: “Overview”, “All traffic”, “AdWords", "SearchConsole", "Social networks" And "Campaigns".

The traffic source overview contains information on default channel groups - a set of labels that can be assigned to different traffic sources based on certain rules. Standard channel group "Default Channel Grouping" in Google Analytics includes 9 different labels. More on this in the next article.

Each channel group label corresponds to indicators from three categories: "Traffic Sources", "Actions" And . This combination is called ABC metric groups in Google Analytics.

• Group A (Acquisition - incoming traffic);
• Group B (Behavior - user behavior on the site);
• Group C (Conversion - conversions, targeted actions).

For each of the ABC metrics group, you can sort those indicators that belong to it. For example, you can filter the indicator by group C (conversions) "Income" in descending order and see which channel brought in the most money.

To change the channel group, you need to click below the selection.

When analyzing data in all reports "Traffic Sources" selection of comparison period is available.

By clicking on any of the channel groups, we will move from report to report "Traffic sources - All traffic - Channels." For example, when navigating Organic Search a report with the main parameter will open "Keyword".

Note: about what it is (notset) And (notprovided), .

And when navigating through direct traffic (Direct), the main parameter in the reports is .

Google Analytics identifies traffic sources by HTTP_(referrer), which is one of the client (browser) request headers. It contains the request source URL. If you go from one page to another, the referer will contain the address of the first page.

If there is no referrer, Analytics will include such a visit in direct traffic (Direct).

You can select . Also available: "Source or Channel", "Source", "Channel" And "Other" (“Browser”, “City”, “Country”, “Language”, “Login Page”, “Keyword”, “Ad Content” etc.)

The report looks similar "Source/channel", in which the main parameter is "Source or Channel".

By applying an additional parameter and an advanced filter (for example, "Device type" And "Source or Channel" contains google), we can analyze the data and determine the most efficient channel promotion.

The report contains information about traffic that Google Analytics could not classify as either organic or any other, despite the received address of the page from which the transition was made (referrer).

Note: in the example source yandex.ru is a 100% organic search engine free search. However, Google was unable to recognize it correctly and assigned all sessions to referral traffic. To avoid this in the future, it is necessary at the resource level in the section "Tracking code" add yandex.ru as .

To view the full address of the page from which the transition was made, add as additional parameter "FullReferral URL":

By using "Efficiency cards" you can visually assess the volume of incoming traffic from a particular channel and its overall value.

The main indicator affects the size of the rectangle (larger = larger), and the additional indicator affects its color (larger = greener).

Even though the referral channel has one of the largest values ​​for the main parameter (sessions) and the size of the rectangle looks appropriate, its secondary indicator (pages/session) is one of the smallest and therefore the rectangle is colored red.

When we click on one of the channels, we will be taken to a lower level, where information will also be presented in the form of colored rectangles.

These reports can help you analyze what users do on your site after they click on an AdWords ad.

By Google default Analytics provides integrated reports on button usage +1 . This means that if the code is installed on the page analytics.js and button +1 , all clicks on it will be automatically counted as social interactions by every piece of tracking code on that page.

Report "User Paths" contains the same information as a similar report in the section "Audience", which we talked about in the previous article.

Campaigns

The last 4 reports included in the section "Traffic Sources"- This “All Campaigns”, “Paid Keywords”, “Unpaid Keywords” And .

Main parameter: "Campaign", "Source", "Channel", "Source or Channel" And "Other".

Reports "Paid Keywords" And "Unpaid Keywords" contain information about the traffic that came to the site from advertisements and free organic search respectively.

Main parameter: "Keyword", " Search query", "Source", "Channel", "Campaign" And "Other".

Thanks to the report, all data from different advertising systems can be combined in Google Analytics and compared by effectiveness in one place.

Main parameter: "Source or Channel", "Campaign" And "Keyword".

Learn how to set up data import.

• Vk.com -

When it comes to direct traffic in Google Analytics, there are two deeply ingrained misconceptions.

The first is that direct traffic is almost always caused by users entering a site URL into address bar browser (or click on a bookmark). The second misconception is that direct traffic is a bad thing; not because it has any effect Negative influence on the operation of the site, but because it is not subject to further analysis.

Most digital marketers believe that direct traffic is an inevitable inconvenience. As a result, discussions on this topic focus on ways to assign it to other channels and troubleshoot problems associated with it.

In this article we will talk about a modern view of direct traffic in Google Analytics. Not only will we look at how data on referral sources can be lost, but we will also look at several tools and tactics that can be used to reduce the level of direct traffic in your reports. Finally, we'll learn how advanced analysis and segmentation can unlock the mysteries of direct traffic and shed light on what your most valuable users might actually be.

What is direct traffic?

In short, Google Analytics records direct traffic when there is no data about how the user came to the site. Or if the transition source was configured to be ignored. In general, direct traffic can be thought of as backup option in Google Analytics for those cases when the system could not attribute the session to a specific source.

To understand why direct traffic occurs, it is important to understand how GA handles traffic sources.

IN general outline and without regard to user-configurable overrides, GA follows the following chain of checks:

AdWords Settings > Campaign Overrides > UTM Parameters > Search Engine Referrals > Other Site Referrals > Previous Timed Campaign > Direct Traffic

Note the penultimate processing step (previous campaign in the waiting period), which significantly affects the Direct channel. For example, a user learns about your site through organic search, and a week later returns through a direct link. Both sessions will be attributed to organic search. In fact, campaign data is retained for up to six months by default. The key point The point here is that Google Analytics is already trying to minimize the impact of direct traffic on you.

What causes direct traffic?

Contrary to popular belief, there are actually many reasons why a session might be missing campaign and traffic source data. Below we will look at the most common of them.

1. Manual input addresses and bookmarks

This is a classic scenario for getting direct traffic. If the user enters the site URL into the browser's address bar or clicks on a bookmark in the browser, then this session will be counted as direct traffic.

1. HTTPS >HTTP

Note that this is by default behavior. This is part of how the secure protocol was designed, and does not affect other scenarios: HTTP-HTTP, HTTPS-HTTPS, and even HTTP-HTTPS transitions all carry referral data.

Therefore, if your referral traffic has decreased, but your direct traffic has increased, perhaps one of your main referral sources has moved to HTTPS. The reverse is also true: if you switch to HTTPS and link to HTTP sites, the traffic you send to them will be recorded by Google Analytics as direct.

If your referrers have moved to HTTPS and you have remained on HTTP, you should also consider migrating your site to HTTPS. Having done this (and updated backlinks so that they point to an HTTPS URL), you will get back the referral data that was previously lost.

If, on the other hand, you've already switched to HTTPS and are concerned about your users registering as direct traffic on affiliate sites, you can set up a referrer meta tag. This is a way to tell the browser to pass referral data to sites over HTTP. It can be implemented as an element or HTTP header.

1. Missing or broken tracking code

Let's say you changed the template landing page and forgot to add the GA tracking code. Or, imagine that the Google Tag Manager container is a bunch of poorly configured triggers and the tracking code simply does not fire.

So, users end up on a page with a missing tracking code. They click on the link and go to the page where the code is there. From the point of view of Google Analytics, the first request will be a visit to the second page, and your own website (self-referral) will act as the referral source. If your domain is included in the list of excluded referral sources (according to the default settings), the session will be registered as direct. This will happen even if the first URL contains UTM parameters.

As a short term solution, you can simply add the missing tracking code. To prevent this from happening again, conduct a thorough audit of Google Analytics, move to implementing tracking through Google Tag Manager, and promote a culture of data-driven marketing.

1. Incorrect redirect

Everything is simple here. Don't use meta refresh or redirect to JavaScript based: They may erase or replace referral data, resulting in direct traffic to Google Analytics. Also keep a close eye on server-side redirects and check your redirect file frequently. Complex chains of redirects increase the likelihood of losing referral data, as well as UTM parameters.

Again, control what you can: use carefully crafted 301 redirects to retain referral data where possible.

1. Non-web documents

Links in documents Microsoft Word, presentation or PDF files do not convey referral information. By default, users who click on these links are recorded as direct traffic. Transitions from mobile applications(especially those that have a built-in browser) are also deprived of referral data.

To a certain extent this is inevitable. Similar to so-called “dark social” visits (discussed in detail below), non-web links are bound to generate some amount of direct traffic. However, you can always control the controllable.

If you post science articles or offer to download PDF documents, you should add UTM parameters to the embedded hyperlinks. Probably no email campaign is launched without tracking set up, so why would you distribute other types of materials without tracking this process? In some cases, this is even more important, given that these materials have durability that email campaigns lack.

Below is an example of a URL with UTM parameters that will be added to the document as a hyperlink:

https://builtvisible.com/embedded-whitepaper-url/?…_medium=offline_document&utm_campaign=201711_utm_whitepape r

The same goes for URLs in offline content. For core campaigns, it's common to choose a short, memorable URL (such as moz.com/tv/) and create an entirely new landing page. You can bypass page creation altogether by simply redirecting this URL to an existing page URL that is properly tagged with UTM parameters.

So, whether you tag URLs directly, use forwarded URLs, or—if you don't like UTM parameters—track hashes (URL snippets) using Google Tag Manager, the takeaway is the same: use campaign parameters wherever appropriate.

1. "Dark» social traffic

This is a large source of referrals and probably the least understood by marketers.

The term “dark social” was first used in 2012 by Alexis Madrigal in an article for The Atlantic. Essentially, it refers to social sharing methods that cannot be easily attributed to a specific source. Among them - Email, instant messages, Skype, WhatsApp, Facebook Messenger and so on.

Recent studies have shown that more than 80% of what people share on publisher and company sites now comes from these private channels. In terms of the number of active users, instant messengers surpass social media. All activity generated by these platforms is usually recorded by analytics systems as direct traffic.

People who use the controversial phrase "marketing in social media" usually means advertising: you broadcast your message and hope people hear it. Even if you overcome consumer apathy with a well-targeted campaign, any subsequent interactions are affected by their public nature. The privacy of so-called “dark social” channels instead represents a potential goldmine for more personal, targeted and relevant interactions with high conversion potential. The nebulous and difficult-to-track world of dark social holds enormous potential for effective marketing.

So how can we minimize the amount of such traffic that is recorded as direct clicks? The sad truth is that there are no silver bullets: proper attribution of this traffic requires careful campaign tracking.

The optimal approach will vary greatly depending on your industry, audience, offer, etc. However, for many websites, a good first step is to provide user-friendly and properly configured sharing buttons for private platforms such as email, WhatsApp, and Slack. This will allow users to share URLs with UTM parameters appended to them (or shortened URLs redirected to those addresses). This way you can illuminate some of your “dark” social traffic.

Checklist: minimizing direct traffic

To minimize direct traffic in your reporting, follow these steps:

• Go toHTTPS. A secure protocol is not only about access to HTTP/2 and the future of the Internet. It also has a huge positive influence on your ability to track referral traffic.
• Optimize redirects. Avoid redirect chains and ditch client-side redirects in favor of carefully crafted server-side 301 redirects. If you are using shortened URLs to redirect to pages with UTM parameters, check that you have configured everything correctly.
• Use campaign tags. Even among data-driven marketers, there is a common belief that UTM begins and ends with the inclusion of automatic tagging in the software for mailing lists. Others go to the other extreme, even labeling internal links. Control what you can control and you will be able to track the results of your work more effectively.
• Conduct an auditGoogleAnalyticss. Data integrity is vital, so consider this when assessing the effectiveness of your work. A GA audit is about more than just checking for missing tracking codes. A good audit includes a review of the measurement plan and thorough testing at the page and resource level.

Follow these principles and you can see significant reductions in your direct traffic in Google Analytics. Next example includes a transition to HTTPS, GTM and a complete overhaul of internal campaign tracking processes within six months:

However, the saga of direct traffic does not end there! Once this channel is clear, what remains can become one of the most valuable traffic segments.

Analyze why direct traffic can be really valuable

For the reasons we've already discussed, traffic from bookmarks and dark social is an extremely valuable segment to analyze. These will likely be some of your most loyal and engaged users, and it's not uncommon to see a noticeably higher conversion rate for a pure direct channel compared to the site average. You should make an effort to get to know these people better.

The number of potential avenues to explore is endless, but here are some good starting points:

• Create meaningful user segments by defining subgroups within direct traffic based on landing page, location, device, repeat visits and purchasing patterns.
• Track meaningful engagement metrics using modern GTM triggers such as scroll and element visibility tracking. Measure how your direct users use and view your content.
• Watch for correlations with your other marketing activities and use them as opportunities to improve your tagging and segmentation techniques. Set up custom alerts to monitor spikes in direct traffic.
• Check out the Goal Map and Behavior Map reports to understand how your direct traffic is converting.
• Ask your users for help! If you've isolated a valuable segment of traffic that's eluding deeper analysis, add a button to your page that offers visitors a free e-book or other useful material if they tell you how they discovered your page.
• Start thinking (if you haven’t already) about such an indicator as LTV (life time value). Revisiting the attribution model and implementing user IDs are good steps to overcome apathy and frustration with direct traffic.