Block ecommerce-seo.org referrer spam in Google Analytics
This page explains what ecommerce-seo.org is, why ecommerce-seo.org is spamming your Google Analytics data, and how to block ecommerce-seo.org referrer spam and spam from other domain names.
We found 3 solutions!
1. Campaign Source Filter | 2. Campaign Referral Path Filter | 3. Language Settings Filter
What is ecommerce-seo.org?
Ecommerce-seo.org is a domain name associated with Semalt.com. Semalt is a blackhat SEO company with a low trust rating. Semalt uses the ecommerce-seo.org domain name to market their website by spamming Google Analytics accounts around the world. This is nothing new to them, Semalt has been utilizing the referrer spam method for years in order to obtain traffic to their websites.
Semalt will utilize various methods in order to make it appear as if someone (or a large amount of people) was referred to a website from ecommerce-seo.org although no one actually was. Website owners and people who monitor Google Analytics information will notice real-time and historical referral traffic from ecommerce-seo.org. Most of the time spam will make it appear as if someone was referred to a website multiple times in order to position the referral traffic data at the top of the accumulated list of domain names.
When a website owner or someone monitoring the data sees the fake referral traffic from ecommerce-seo.org they are likely to wonder why someone is vising their website from ecommerce-seo.org. Semalt uses this technique to trick people into visiting their website and purchasing their SEO services.
Although this might sound innocent, referrer spam can actually ruin your data and make it difficult to understand your website’s exact information. The traffic acquired from fake referrals can affect most of the data in your GA reports. For example, the fake referrals will appear to land on a single webpage on your website and leave from the same website and this will create a 100% bounce rate. If your website is targeted by referrer spammers you may not be able to identify your website’s actual bounce rate unless you filter the traffic out.
1. Campaign Source Filter
A campaign source filter can be used to block all ecommerce-seo.org referral traffic in Google Analytics.
1. Open your Google Analytics account and go to the Admin tab > Click Filters on the right side in the VIEW section.
2. Click the + ADD FILTER button to create a new exclude filter.
3. Add Vc.ru or something you can easily remember as the Filter Name.
4. Select the Custom Filter Type.
5. In Filter Field, find and select Campaign Source in the list. In the Filter Pattern text box, add ecommerce-seo.org and click the blue Save button on the bottom of the webpage. To add multiple URLs to the same filter you can make a Filter Pattern similar to this with a | between each URL: Example.com | Example\.com | Vc.ru
2. Campaign Referral Path Filter
A campaign referral path filter can be used to block single webpages.
1. Open your Google Analytics account and go to the Admin tab > Click Filters on the right side in the VIEW section.
2. Click the + ADD FILTER button to create a new exclude filter.
3. Add Vc.ru or something you can easily remember as the Filter Name.
4. Select the Custom Filter Type.
5. In Filter Field, find and select Campaign Referral Path in the list. In the Filter Pattern text box, add a permalink from the referred URL and click the blue Save button on the bottom of the webpage
3. Language Settings Filter
Some spam may appear in your language settings as keywords, phrases, and searched terms. A language settings filter can be used to block language spam in Google Analytics.
1. Log in to your Google Analytics account and go to the Admin tab
2. In the “View” column select Filters and then click + Add Filter
3. Add a Filter Name: Language Spam (or something you can easily remember)
4. Go to: Filter Type > Custom > Exclude
5. Select Filter Field: Language settings
6. Add a Filter Pattern: \s[^s]*\s|.{15,}|\.|,
7. Click on the blue text that says Verify this filter to see a preview table of how this filter will work in your account. You should only see language spam on the left side of the table: filter-verification-language-spam
8. After you verify the filter click the Save button on the bottom of the page
Very new to this world and very appreciative that you’ve shared your knowledge and solutions to keep the innocent safe
Thank you–this just exploded in my Analytics yesterday and I wasn’t sure what it was.