Do you have an online store? If so, you may occasionally come across all sorts of payment providers in your Google Analytics data when tracking your payment transactions.
In this case, these web pages are incorrectly attributed as referral traffic and, therefore, as the source of the original order. Naturally, this means you won’t get accurate metrics for your online store, and it will be difficult to make decisions based on the data you collect through Google.
In this blog post, we’ll explain how to prevent this problem (spoiler: it’s easier than you think!)
When a visitor to your online store makes a purchase and checks out online, he or she is often redirected—via iDeal or PayPal, for example—to an external payment page.
Here, that new pair of shoes is then processed in a separate payment environment before your customer is redirected back to your online store, to the thank-you page. On this thank-you page, the source of the payment is reported to Google Analytics.
In some cases, this incorrectly refers to the intermediate payment page. Since all payments are processed through a payment provider or a bank, you are redirected to the thank-you page from the payment provider’s or bank’s URL.
As a result, Google Analytics thinks these URLs are a referring domain that drives conversions.
In theory, you need to tell Google Analytics that these intermediate pages should not be included in the metrics and that the original order page is the actual source of the order.
This can be set up in a few simple steps. You can exclude payment providers and banks using referral exclusions as follows:
1. First, log in to Google Analytics
2. Click ” Administrator”
3. Navigate to the ” Property” column and select “Tracking Info”
4. Select ” List of Referral Exclusions” here
5. Add the incorrect source pages here, such as banking.ideal.ing.nl
It is important to exclude both Dutch banks and payment providers. The Dutch banks and payment providers are listed below. The steps above must be repeated for each URL.
abnamro.nl asnbank.nl betalen.rabobank.nl ideal.bunq.com ideal.ing.nl ideal.knab.nl ideal.regiobank.nl ideal.triodos.nl ideal.vanlanschot.com snsbank.nl
mollie.com pay.mollie.nl paypal.com pay.multisafepay.com secure.curopayments.net pay.nl payment-web.sips-atos.com secure.ogone.com
When doing business abroad, you’ll also need to exclude foreign payment providers and banks. You can use the list below for this purpose.
3ds.bnpparibas.com 3dsecure.icicibank.com 3dsecure.icscards.nl acs2.swedbank.se acs4.3dsecure.no bancontact.girogate.be belgium-3dsecure-uvg.wlp-acs.com belgium-3dsecure.wlp-acs.com belgium-uvj-3dsecure.wlp-acs.com belfius.be bitpay.com cap.attempts.securecode.com cap.securecode.com giropay.sparkasse-lev.de kbc.be live.adyen.com mycardsecure.com payment-web.sips-atos.com secure.curopayments.net secure5.arcot.com securecode.com securesuite.co.uk securesuite.net secureyou3d.ing.be secure-shopping.commerzbank.de secure-payment.bw-bank.de sparkasse-lev.de tsys.arcot.com verifiedbyvisa.com wlp-acs.com
By following the steps above and excluding the URLs listed above, conversions that occur within a 30-minute timeframe through your online store will be properly attributed to the source page of the order.
Good luck setting up your referral exclusions and measuring and optimizing your SEO campaigns!
With a passion for SEO and an unmatched drive for results, Jarik Oosting is the driving force behind SmartRanking. With over 15 years of experience in the field, he has built an extensive body of knowledge spanning technical SEO to complex site migrations. As the founder of SmartRanking, he has assembled a team of like-minded SEO specialists who help businesses achieve sustainable online growth.
His academic background in information science at the University of Groningen, with a specialization in natural language processing, gives him a unique perspective on the world of SEO. For Jarik, it’s not just about visibility in search engines, it’s about sharing knowledge and guiding businesses toward sustainable online success. That mission also led him to write a Dutch book about GEO.