In last few years, we have seen that the numbers of the hateful ‘not provided’ term has increased dramatically. It always annoys users whenever they find it in their organic search terms reports. With rising number of results prefixed with ‘not provided’ in google analytics report, it is becoming more challenging job for the internet marketing experts to break into what people are looking for and how they are directed to a website.

The referral data comprises of some important information in context to the keywords that are leveraged to conduct search by targeted audience. Google can check this information, but the sad part is that the website owners and the Google analytics account holders are unable to see it.

This not provided information somehow impact upon the exact evaluation of ROI on particular terms. Before we see how to overcome this problem, it is essential to check how many keywords are listed as ‘not provided’ terms and if the listing of such terms is rising. As all the methods shown here are not customized to provide you with a complete solution, it is important to spare some time to decode these results on own.

Learn some basics of the ‘Not Provided’ Keyword

Why some data is hidden and not provided to users?

If you are not aware, Google changed the way it gathers data from search two years ago in order to ensure privacy of the end users. if a user is logged into any of the Google products like Gmail or You Tube and perform search, then search results will be published over an SSL, which is a secure connection and thus data related to this particular search will remain hidden.

What are the disadvantages of losing keyword data?

• It is a barrier in conducting exact evaluation of SEO performance
• You won’t be able to trace organic traffic from search terms used in Google using analytics
• Finding new keyword opportunities will become more difficult
• Online marketing professionals will witness a demand for a completely new metric set to measure their SEO efforts
• SEO professionals need to increase the number of keywords checked in Google for page rankings

5 Ways You Can Break into ‘Not Provided’ Keywords

Landing Pages

Which keywords are you targeting in your organic search marketing campaign? Have you put into practice the best techniques for content optimization? If yes, you can crack keywords that are drawing in organic traffic to your site by just going through top landing pages via site content.

If you want to check which landing page of your site is getting highest traffic, you can add a secondary dimension for source. Considering that you have pulled out all the stops to optimize your pages for particular keywords, you can easily see which keywords or content is driving more traffic from Google Search Results.

Create Filter

There is another way you can reveal the ‘not provided’ information by Google – mine into Google Analytics and know what visitors were looking for on your site; it will give you more idea of users’ behaviors. Just long into your Google Analytics account, click on ‘Admin’ and then on ‘Profiles’, and you can choose the name of the profile you want to work with.

Once done, select the filters tab to create a new filter in your analytics account. This filter will help you unlock the ‘not provided’ terms.

Site Search

Create a set up for site search tracking by enabling the same in Google Analytics. It will provide you with the keywords that users search for when they arrive on your website using your site’s search box.

Webmaster Tools

Use Google Webmaster tools to learn about the top search queries and the top pages for all the clicks your site receives in Google search results. The tools don’t show data prior to last 90 days, but it is certainly a good technique of measuring the real-time rankings and traffic of your site.

Anchor Text

This is another way you can crack the keywords your site is being ranked for. You just need to check the anchor text used to link your site. There are many tools available out there which will allow you to explore the anchor text cloud of your own site.

Or you may also the visual explorer tool to know the pages that gets more links and then sort anchor text using the number of links. Keep checking your anchor text at a regular interval in order to find more terms to receive natural links and create a perfect organic search marketing campaign.

To Sum It Up:

There is no fool-proof way to access the ‘not provided’ data by Google but if you are a website owner who is missing on a great deal of data regarding their site’s organic traffic, it is worth investing your time and resources in executing these 4 ways.