Keyword Hero with Google Analytics

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Google Analytics is a great resource for any business who owns a website. It provides useful data about the visitors on a website, their activity and behaviors, and trends over time. Google tries to provide multiple metrics for analytics users- with one exception: organic search term report.

  Although the report is still available for users to see, an increasing number of results on this report is listed as “not provided”- a result of Google’s decision to encrypt the keyword information in Google Analytics (Modassic Marketing, 2019). This decision was made in October 2011 to protect the privacy of the users and adopt stronger security standards (Google, 2011).

Though this was a great move for the user experience and security, this encryption has left holes in the data in the analytics report, leaving marketers to look to other metrics to help them understand their traffic and know the ROI of their SEO strategies.

Fortunately for the SEO industry, a modern problem brought on modern solutions, and Keyword Hero was created. According to Julius of Analytics Media, “The Keyword Hero is the solution that puts the organic keywords back into Google Analytics. It is a comprehensive SEO tool and fully integrated into Google Analytics.”

Unlocking “Not Provided” Results.


Named “Keyword Hero,” the tool connects to your Google Analytics account and computes the keywords for your organic sessions, essentially “unlocking” the “not provided” results in Google Analytics. Keyword Hero does this through a three-step approach:

  1. Data Gathering: Keyword Hero puts together data using third-party platforms and Google platforms such as Google Analytics and Google Search Console. Pulling from nine different sources of data, Keyword Hero gathers its foundational data for analysis.
  2. Data Analysis: The keywords are then matched with their corresponding sessions in Google Analytics. Keyword Hero tries to calculate probabilities of a specific keyword match, then the data is compared to the “hard data” captured to Google Analytics and compared against it to adjust the classifications. 
  3. Data Upload: Keyword Hero then uploads the data back to the reports, allowing users to analyze the data on Google Analytics. The output data is only shown if Keyword Hero is certain, and if the probability is less than 83%, the keyword will stay as “not provided.” 

The Pros and Cons of Keyword Hero

Like any tool, there are advantages and disadvantages to using third-party tools on a platform such as Google Analytics. Overall, the biggest advantage of using Keyword Hero is that it unlocks data you would not otherwise have- so in reality, you’re not losing anything you currently have. There are a large number of advantages from using Keyword Hero, but I won’t name them all- it truly depends on how invested you become into using this tool. Some notable advantages to this tool are that:

  • You can use the now-unlocked data to correlate keywords to sales, allowing you to optimize for conversions directly in your Google Analytics reports
  • Use the data capture to develop more content around the keywords that already prove to convert into traffic or sales
  • You can understand the performance of your branded keywords in terms of generating traffic or conversions
  • You can understand the keywords for which your websites are ranking for on search engines so you can stop bidding on Google Adwords to greatly reduce ad spend.
  • The report allows you to see the search engine ranking position (SERP) of your website. This allows SEO strategists to improve those SERPs to increase the performance of keywords and increase sales.

As a third-party tool, one should expect limitations. Google is owning their Secure Search and does not plan on backing down their security for its users anytime soon. Because of this, some disadvantages of Keyword Hero as Google Analytics tools include the following:

  • Keyword Hero does not completely fix the problem of “not provided” keywords on the GA reports. If it is unable to confidently identify a keyword, it will keep bringing up “not provided” on the reports. 
  • This tool is likely more useful for websites that see higher traffic organically, and won’t be too beneficial for sites that either has lower traffic or for those whose traffic comes from paid channels (Sharma, 2019).
  • A major disadvantage of Keyword Hero is that it does not upload historical data- meaning marketers and SEO strategists alike cannot see past data, and can only begin optimizing once Keyword Hero is installed and connected.

How could gaining insights into keyword data transform your SEO?

Regaining visibility into their organic keywords could help marketers be more strategic in their planning. Rand Fishkin also believes it would have two much more wide-reaching benefits: “it would help to prove the worth of organic SEO, and would ultimately lead to better user experience and a better web” (Sentance, 2017).

“Because SEO has such a difficult time proving attribution, it doesn’t get counted and therefore businesses don’t invest in it the way they would if they could show that direct connection to revenue,” says Fishkin. “If businesses could personalize their content based on the search, it could create an improved user experience and user performance: longer time on site, lower bounce rate, higher engagement, higher conversion rate. It would absolutely be better for users.”


Conclusion.

Keyword data from organic search on Google Analytics is owned and regulated by Google, and there is no sign that they are changing their scope of Secure Search. Tools, such as Keyword Hero, will continue to provide solutions to these problems so marketers can go back to being strategic, and in turn, help proves the worth of organic SEO, and ultimately lead to the better user experience.



Resources. 

Fedorovicius, J (February, 2018)  How To Unlock (not provided) Keywords in Google Analytics. Retrieved from https://www.analyticsmania.com/post/get-rid-of-not-provided-keywords-in-google-analytics/

 Google Blog (2011) Making search more secure. Retrieved from https://googleblog.blogspot.com/2011/10/making-search-more-secure.html

 Google Marketing Platform. (2019). Keyword Hero. Retrieved from https://marketingplatform.google.com/about/partners/company/5107647938297856/gadp/5629499534213120/app/5707702298738688/listing/5634387206995968

 Keyword Hero (2019)  How It's Done. Retrieved from https://keyword-hero.com/how-its-done

 Modassic Marketing (n.d.) GOOGLE ANALYTICS KEYWORD (NOT PROVIDED) AND WHAT IT MEANS FOR YOUR SEO STRATEGY. Retrieved from https://modassicmarketing.com/google-encrypted-search-phrases-not-provided-and-what-it-means-for-your-seo-strategy

 Omni Convert (2019). Organic traffic. Retrieved from https://www.omniconvert.com/what-is/organic-traffic/#

 Patel, N (2019) How to Unlock Your ‘Not Provided’ Keywords in Google Analytics. Retrieved from https://neilpatel.com/blog/unlock-keyword-not-provided/

 Sauer, J (2019) How To Build A Complete SEO Dashboard – Keywords Included. Retrieved from https://www.jeffalytics.com/google-analytics-seo-dashboard/

 Sentance, R (2018) A world without “(not provided)”: How unlocking organic keyword data leads to a better web. Retrieved from https://searchenginewatch.com/2017/08/08/a-world-without-not-provided-how-unlocking-organic-keyword-data-leads-to-a-better-web/

 Sharma, H (n.d)  How to use Keyword Hero to reveal Not Provided Keywords in Google Analytics. Retrieved from https://www.optimizesmart.com/keyword-hero-get-not-provided-keywords-back-in-google-analytics/

Comments

  1. AnonymousApril 3, 2019 at 4:25 AM

    Hey Enma,
    Your post caught my eye in that it seems organic traffic is an area GA is really weak at. I like your app and can see where it would be very useful in quantifying data around key word search. In my app searches, I found a complimentary app that actually identifies the computer (business) origination of the organic search This is HUGE for businesses seeking to capture contact data for marketing follow-up. Yours is a bit different, but provides critical targeting data GA doesnt capture as well! Nice...

    ReplyDelete

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