Google Encryption to Increase ‘Not Provided’ Keywords in UK

In October 2011, Google made an announcement regarding a change to encrypted search queries within Google.com. This involves an SSL encryption protocol which is automatically applied to all users logged in to Google (Gmail, Google+ etc.) and also searches made directly via https://www.google.com (notice the ‘s’ in the URL).

While the secure protocol was not a new feature in Google, the latest update meant that all searches via the secure server would no longer pass keyword referral data. While Google’s announcement initially suggested this was to protect users’ privacy, the SEO community speculated whether Google’s intent was otherwise.

What was particularly suspicious about the update was that the secure keyword data would remain available for paid search referrals, suggesting that Google were intending to encourage paid search, rather than protect users’ privacy. While other sources suggested that privacy was a genuine concern, with the Google+ API allowing webmasters to track search queries down specifically to any individual.

How does it affect us?

Since the update, analytics packages have returned encrypted keyword data as ‘not provided’, while other keywords appear to dip in visits. With the update only implemented on Google.com, US sites have taken the biggest hit, while UK sites have been affected on smaller scale until now…

On 5^th March 2012, Google announced that this feature will be pushed out across their localised domains as well, affecting referrals from Google UK as well as Google.com. The announcement states that this will be introduced “over the next few weeks”; therefore UK sites should see an impact by the end of March.

UK webmasters should expect to see a further increase in traffic filed under the keyword ‘not provided’, which Google’s Matt Cutts “estimated even at full roll-out, this would still be in the single-digit percentages.” Although, external research into the impact on US sites shows the average figures to be closer to 11%.

What to do?

With secure keyword referrals returning ‘not provided’, all websites will lose a fraction of keyword data, which is unavoidable. However, there are various ways to make use of the data such as sorting visits by landing page, to determine what keywords may have contributed towards the unknown data. This is particularly useful for websites where individual landing pages correlate closely with specific keywords. In cases where more than 20% of data is being lost and it is having a significantly negative impact, iCrossing suggests that further actions should be taken to make the most of the lost keyword data.

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