Navigating the Mystery: Why Shopify Analytics Shows Spikes in Product Recommendation URLs
Hey everyone, it's your friendly Shopify expert here, diving into a really interesting, and frankly, a bit puzzling, discussion that's been bubbling up in the Shopify community. We've been seeing a flurry of merchants scratching their heads over a sudden, peculiar spike in their Shopify Analytics, specifically tied to product recommendation URLs. If you've noticed URLs like
pr_prod_strat=pinned, pr_rec_id, or _pos showing up as landing pages with bizarre numbers, you're definitely not alone. It seems this started hitting stores around May 5th, and it's something we need to unpack together.
Unpacking the "Anomaly": What Merchants Are Seeing
The core of the issue, as first highlighted by jennifeergordonn and further detailed by yuanjie with examples from silksilky.com, is this: your Shopify Analytics "Sessions by landing page" report might be showing URLs crammed with thesepr_* and _pos parameters. The really head-scratching part? Many of these rows have just 1 session, but hundreds or even thousands of pageviews. And to top it off, often a 0% bounce rate, 0% add-to-cart, and 0% conversion rate. Talk about confusing!
Now, before we jump to conclusions, let's get a crucial piece of understanding from the community, brilliantly clarified by lumine. When Shopify Analytics reports "Sessions by landing page," the "Pageviews" metric here isn't just about how many times that specific URL was viewed. Instead, it represents the total pageviews within sessions that started from that landing page. So, if a user lands on a pr_prod_strat=pinned URL and then browses 423 other pages on your store, it'll show up as 1 session and 424 pageviews on that initial landing page row. A 0% bounce rate in this context actually confirms that the user navigated further, indicating a real, engaged session. So, that 1:N pageview-to-session ratio isn't inherently unusual once you grasp this metric definition.
The real question, as lumine rightly points out, isn't the ratio itself, but "why are these pr_prod_strat URLs suddenly appearing as landing pages around May 5th when they weren't before?" This is the change we need to investigate.
Why the Sudden Change? Investigating the Causes
The community discussion brought up several strong contenders for why this might be happening:- Theme or App Updates: A recent theme update or a change in how a product recommendation app functions could be exposing these
pr_*parameters more aggressively. Perhaps they're now being rendered in canonical tags, social share cards, or even sitemaps, making them directly accessible and thus trackable as landing pages. - Shopify Search & Discovery Logic: Shopify's own Search & Discovery app, particularly if "Pinned Products" is active, might have changed its logic. This could mean recommendation slots are now serving these pinned URLs across more product pages, leading to them being clicked and tracked as entry points.
- Recommendation Widgets: Widgets like "People Also Bought," "More To Love," or "Recently Viewed" are designed to generate trackable URLs. It's possible a recent modification or activation of these widgets is behind the spike.
- Analytics Attribution or Bot Activity: While less likely to explain the 0% bounce rate, jennifeergordonn and mastroke both raised the possibility of bot or crawler activity inflating analytics data, or even subtle internal changes to Shopify's analytics attribution or bot filtering. mastroke specifically mentioned many merchants struggling with bot traffic generally disrupting analytics.
Actionable Steps for Store Owners
Based on the expert advice in the thread, here’s how you can dig into your own store's data and try to get a clearer picture:1. Review Recent Changes Around May 4-5
This is your first port of call. Think back to any modifications:
- Did you update your theme? Check your theme version history.
- Were any apps updated or installed, especially recommendation apps?
- Did you make any configuration changes within the Shopify Search & Discovery app?
2. Verify Recommendation Widget Settings
Go through your product recommendation widgets (e.g., "People Also Bought," "More To Love," "Recently Viewed"). Were any recently enabled, modified, or updated around that May 5th timeframe?
3. Cross-Reference Your Data
Don't rely solely on Shopify Analytics. Compare the traffic patterns you're seeing with other analytics tools:
- Google Analytics 4 (GA4): Check if GA4 shows similar landing page spikes for these URLs.
- Server Logs: If you have access, server logs can provide raw traffic data that might help differentiate real users from bots.
4. Monitor for Unexpected Indexing or Crawling
Are these pr_* URLs being indexed by search engines? This could lead to SEO issues. Use tools like Google Search Console to monitor if these parameter-rich URLs are appearing in your indexed pages.
5. Filter Suspicious Traffic Patterns
Look for common denominators in the anomalous data:
- Country: Is the traffic coming predominantly from unusual geographic locations?
- Device Type: Any specific device patterns?
- Referrer Source: While many were "Direct," look for any unusual referrers.
6. Refine Your Reporting for Clarity (Especially for Shopify Plus)
To get a cleaner view of your engaged traffic, lumine suggested a couple of filtering approaches:
- Segment by Bounce Rate: Create custom reports that filter for
Bounce Rate > 0. This will help you focus on sessions where users didn't immediately navigate away after landing on one of thesepr_*URLs. - Exclude URL Parameters (Shopify Plus): If you're on Shopify Plus, you might have options to exclude specific URL parameters like
pr_prod_strat=from your landing page reports. This can help normalize your data and prevent these technical parameters from cluttering your high-level analytics.