Why are your website analytics statistics different than your ads statistics?

For a comprehensive understanding of your website traffic, it is important to know about the differences between the biggest tracking platforms and how they collect data. There are some cases when your Google or Facebook ads data might not match your Analytics data. Here are some of the most common reasons.

Google tracks clicks whereas Analytics tools track sessions. There are several reasons that these metrics may differ:

1. A customer may click your ad multiple times. When one person clicks an ad multiple times in the same session, AdWords record multiple clicks while Analytics tools recognize the separate page views as one session.
2. A person might click on an ad, and then later, during a different session return directly to the site through a bookmark or a saved link. This would register as one click in AdWords but multiple sessions in Analytics.
3. Someone might click on your ad and then change her mind and prevent the page from fully loading by clicking to another page or by pressing the browser Stop or Back buttons. In this case, Analytics will not register a session, but AdWords still counts this as a click.

It is well known that tracking platforms (e.g., Google Analytics, Google Ads, Facebook Analytics) track visits, clicks, and traffic differently. Therefore you may see different metrics on different platforms.
 

Here are some examples:

• Clicks vs. Sessions: Some services (e.g., Google Ads) track every click a visitor makes, whereas other services (e.g., Google Analytics) only track one click per session
• Filtering of invalid clicks: Some services filter out invalid clicks, while others show all clicks
• Tracking blocked by browser extension: Some browser extensions block tracking by certain tracking services and prevent these services from collecting data

For more useful information about the difference in tracking methods between Google Analytics and Google AdWords you can check the Wix blog too, in case you are a Wix customer — Please keep in mind that some of this information applies to other services as well, such as Facebook Analytics or Visitor Analytics.

If you want to learn how to improve your overall website content or traffic, check our blog and learn more about what is pay per click or unrequested advertising and go through our comparison on SEO vs. Pay Per Click Search Network.