I have been getting about 2500 visits a day on average. Pretty steady, and having usually the CTR on more-less always the same level. Today I put Chitika code on my pages (set it to non-contextual). My page impressions today went to about 6500 now (11:20 PM). Despite this the number of clicks stayed at the same level and of course my CTR went down to about 40% of the usual CTR. This increase in impressions has minimal effect on CTR and earnings. I am wondering if I should contact Google about it (since this super increase in hits does not generate ore clicks, possibly invalid). I am wondering if this has to do anything with Chitika - logically shouldn't. It also doesn't seem like anyone is trying to 'kill' my Adsense account - because the number of clicks is not higher than usually (and showing it in decreased CTR). What do you think ? I am puzzled with the explenation of it. Stan
If the sudden large traffic came from search engines, and the clicks didn't increase for several days, I would be worried because you're getting targetted traffic...
Have you checked your traffic stats to see where the traffic is coming from? Did you post in any forums "Hey I added Chitika to my site, check it out"?
I think you have nothing to worry about, if the clicks were very very high probably you should worry a bit, but like this i think you should be ok... Anyway, check your logs as it has been told here!
Thanks, I am just checking the stats. I was getting 40-90 unique visits and hour, and all of the sudden at 3pm they jumepd to 656, then 4pm 1195, next hour 863 and so on, till 11-12 at 394. What's intersesting i uploaded my files with Chitika between 2 and 3 pm, it seems strangly coincidental (though I got only 2 clicks on their ads all day). Page views went up the same way. It shows that MSN search is responsible for 42.95% of Referrer URLs and one of my pages for 38.80%. Would that mean many people suddenly searched for whatever is on that page and got there using MSN search ? Referrer Domains same thing. Shows my domain as 48% and MSN as 43%. In geographics '.net' as 54% - so in proportion same as on other days with low traffic. Today I am already at 1700 visits (it's only 9:30 am), and my CTR is on the same level as yesterday - which is about half of the usual CTR. This is by just looking at Google, but I don't have my full stats yet. As I would imagine, from Google point of view I shouldn't worry. I got lots of traffic, but my CTR actually decreased. They could think suspicious if I was making way more money, but actually at this point it balances out to be about the same as before. My usual CTR is between 2 and 3. But then, on this whole Adsense thing is about increasing traffic, CTR and possibly income, so maybe I should just be happy ? It is strange though that all of the sudden the whole world would be interested and searching for what I have on that one particular page. I am a bit confused I must say, and worried only about any complications with Google. Am I paranoid ? I might call my web host to ask them if they see anything strange going on. I can't afford loosing my Adsense account! Stan
I am kind of hesitant of posting the url - have seen and heard of horror stories too much. My website is PR1 on Google, educational (biology), no sales and no gimmicks, just text and nature photos. There is that one page that looking at the stats is definitely traffic targeted by someone. There is nothing special on it, so I imagine if targeted it was picked up randomly. All the other pages are normal, just this one all of the sudden from about 0.26% to 40% instantaniously. I am trying to contact my webhost. My guess would be someone is trying to bombard this page with automatic requests trying to take me offline. I was thinking about renaming this one page to something else and see the reaction. With all these hits it generated ony 7 clicks and 48 cents in revenue (and they are probably genuine in my opinion), so I think I should be safe with Google. It seems to me that someone just targeted this url without trying to go any deeper. What do you think? Stan
When you look at the logs are you noticing that the msn referrals are from one particular key word http:// search.msn.com/results.aspx?q=samkeyword Maybe you made an unexpected jump in the serps.
In my top referrals it shows only this url: 'search.msn.com/images/details.aspx' at the top, and then in second place that url on my website. The msn search takes 28% of all referrals, the url 23% and then my domain 12% and Google search 9.5%. The rest pretty low and even. I used to have Webalizer but now I depend on my webhosts software and can't find there the msn search keyword string. Checking domain referrals my domain is first (50%), MSN second (29%) and Google third (11%). I just renamed that file and changed all the references to the old one to the new name in all of my files, uploaded and I'll see what happens. I will change back to the old name in a day to experiment. Maybe I made this huge jump in SE for some keyword, but do these things happen just like that in few inutes ? From 100 hits a month for 6 years to 1700 within half a day ? Anyway, this is the update. Stan
Dont know if anyone reads UK magazine Web Builder? Sept 2005 issue they covered information on Google's Patent that was granted back in March and in one section it mentions how they can monitor sudden spikes within your website such as a rise in the number of backlinks, traffic and among other things - apparently they will be seeing this as trying to fool their system. Dont quote me on the above as its just what I read - maybe somebody knows about this? If it was me I would email Google and ask them, they will advise you better than anyone.
Funny, about 3 days back there was a sudden surge in the traffic on two of my blogs - Chess blog where I blogged about Chess Boxing and Appliblog where I blogged about Chitika. I checked the stats and the keyword that brought me a lot of traffic was "Chess Boxing" from MSN. Next day onwards it's back to the usual trickle.