sorting out referral spam
TRANSCRIPT
![Page 3: Sorting Out Referral Spam](https://reader036.vdocuments.net/reader036/viewer/2022062515/55d6fd90bb61eb344d8b4648/html5/thumbnails/3.jpg)
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Referrer spam is a kind of spamdexing (spamming aimed at search engines).
The technique involves making repeated web site requests using a fake referrer URL to the site the spammer wishes to advertise.
Sites that publish their access logs, including referrer statistics, will then inadvertently link back to the spammer's site. These links will be indexed
by search engines as they crawl the access logs.
This benefits the spammer because the free link improves the spammer site's search engine ranking owing to link-counting algorithms that search
engines use.
![Page 7: Sorting Out Referral Spam](https://reader036.vdocuments.net/reader036/viewer/2022062515/55d6fd90bb61eb344d8b4648/html5/thumbnails/7.jpg)
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Ghost referrers - buy-cheap-online.info
Creepy crawlers - semalt
Well behaved bots and spiders
![Page 9: Sorting Out Referral Spam](https://reader036.vdocuments.net/reader036/viewer/2022062515/55d6fd90bb61eb344d8b4648/html5/thumbnails/9.jpg)
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Your htaccess file
google analytics filters
![Page 11: Sorting Out Referral Spam](https://reader036.vdocuments.net/reader036/viewer/2022062515/55d6fd90bb61eb344d8b4648/html5/thumbnails/11.jpg)
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Always keep an unfiltered view
Create a test view that mirrors the
main view before making any changes
![Page 13: Sorting Out Referral Spam](https://reader036.vdocuments.net/reader036/viewer/2022062515/55d6fd90bb61eb344d8b4648/html5/thumbnails/13.jpg)
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These sites never actually visit your site
they just post fake page views to google’s tracking service
Can't be blocked via htaccessso you Must use a filter
![Page 15: Sorting Out Referral Spam](https://reader036.vdocuments.net/reader036/viewer/2022062515/55d6fd90bb61eb344d8b4648/html5/thumbnails/15.jpg)
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Set up a filter on your campaign source and exclude all matching
domains for known crawlers
![Page 17: Sorting Out Referral Spam](https://reader036.vdocuments.net/reader036/viewer/2022062515/55d6fd90bb61eb344d8b4648/html5/thumbnails/17.jpg)
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Admin - view settings Check box to exclude hits from all
known bots and spiders
![Page 18: Sorting Out Referral Spam](https://reader036.vdocuments.net/reader036/viewer/2022062515/55d6fd90bb61eb344d8b4648/html5/thumbnails/18.jpg)
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Admin - view settings Check box to exclude hits from all
known bots and spiders
![Page 19: Sorting Out Referral Spam](https://reader036.vdocuments.net/reader036/viewer/2022062515/55d6fd90bb61eb344d8b4648/html5/thumbnails/19.jpg)
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Or take the hassle out of doing all the hard work
![Page 21: Sorting Out Referral Spam](https://reader036.vdocuments.net/reader036/viewer/2022062515/55d6fd90bb61eb344d8b4648/html5/thumbnails/21.jpg)
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Gogrowat
http://growthhacking.boyddigital.co.uk/