Channels report in Piwik PRO shows you the various channels visitors are using to visit your site or app. By default, Piwik PRO assigns the incoming traffic to five different channels based on data available in the page URL and the HTTP header of the referrer.
Following is the list of the default channels that Piwik PRO uses:
- Campaign
- Direct entry
- Search engine
- Social
- Website
How Piwik PRO Groups The Traffic Under Various Channels
When a visitor arrives on the site, Piwik PRO code on the page/app sends a request to Piwik PRO server. Piwik PRO checks the page URL and HTTP header of the referrer to identify how the visitor arrived on the site. Based on the information it find, it automatically assigned the visitor to one of the channels listed above. Below you will find the various checks and classification in the order they they are performed by Piwik PRO
Campaign
If the URL, that the visitor landed on, contains campaign name parameters (utm_campaign, pk_campaign or custom ones) or glicd (an id passed by google from google ads and other sources) paramater, then it categorizes the channel as follows:
- If both campaign parameters and glicd is available then it assigned the channel name as Campaign. Source and medium are set to the values contained in utm_source and utm_medium (or pk_source and pk_medium or custom ones).
- When a page URL only includes the glicd and no campaign parameters then Piwik PRO sets the source as google and medium as cpc.
- If the URL contains two or more parameters of the same type, Piwik PRO will extract the value from the parameter that appears last in the list in the parameters that you have defined for campaigns.
- If the page URL contains the same parameter multiple times then Piwik PRO uses the value from the last parameter.
- If the page URL includes the same parameter in the URL and the URL fragment then Piwik PRO uses the value from URL fragment.
Direct entry
If Piwik PRO doesn’t detect any campaign parameters in a page’s URL, it checks the HTTP header of the referrer. If either of the following condition is met then Piwik PRO assigns the channel as Direct entry.
- HTTP header is empty
- HTTP header contains one of the domains specified in Administration > Sites & apps > Data collection > Site or app address
Search engine
If campaign or direct entry is not assigned then Piwik PRO checks if the referrer HTTP header contains a search engine name then Search engine is assigned as the channel.
Social
Next, if the HTTP header of the referrer contains a social media platform name then Piwik PRO assigned Social as the channel.
Website
Next, if the HTTP header of the referrer contains any other URL then "Website" channel is assigned, the source of the visit is the referring site's domain name and the medium is listed as referral.
Finally : Direct entry
If none of the above checks can assign a channel then a default value of Direct entry is used to group the visit.
What if the above classification is not what you need?
If the above channel classification does not work for you then you can create custom classification. Reach out to us to get help with custom channel classification.
Need Help with Piwik PRO?
We are here to help and support you with all your Piwik PRO questions and implementations. Contact us at support@optizent.com or fill the contact us form for no-obligation consultation.