Just this last week, Google announced that it was moving all web searches at Google.com to https settings which would mean that all keyword data would be encrypted and no longer flowed into Google Analytics.
Although this may sound like business as usual and a great improvement for the typical web searcher – “great, increased privacy”, it is turning the world of search and SEO upside down. This means that the small number of “not provided” notations in Google Analytics will now cover all searches. The only keyword activity you will see in your Google Analytics account will be from Google AdWords activity. No longer will you be able to identify the search terms that are bringing in your traffic organically or for that matter harvest keywords for SEO use from Analytics.
There’s lots of chatter on the web as to why Google would make this change without warning, some say it is a direct reaction to the Edward Snowden revelation and others say that it is to drive more advertisers into Google AdWords. Whichever option you’d like to embrace, at this time Google is not saying why they have taken this action, just that it is.
For many website owners this will create the need to purchase website analytics software so that they will know what is happening on their own website. If I find a good statistical package, I’ll make sure to let you know.
To learn more about this topic, I have found two excellent resources to express the real impact for website owners. I invite you to read them and then come back to my post and let me know your comments.
http://searchengineland.com/post-prism-google-secure-searches-172487
http://www.6smarketing.com/blog/keyword-data-is-dead-long-live-keyword-data-2/