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I set up a special referral page (call it "goto.htm") for the Goto search terms both for tracking purposes and for ease of visitor navigation. This page isn't linked to from anywhere on the site. Oddly, goto.htm began getting hits from msn.com almost immediately. The search strings, however, don't match our paid strings. Some are fairly close, but a couple were way off. When I visit the referring URL, I find no link to the site and no obvious sponsored search results. I've looked at quite a few of these odd hits and can never figure out how they got to the site, much less to the goto.htm page.
I was previously getting some traffic from msn.com, all of it directed to the home page (probably via a Looksmart listing). Now, the bulk of the traffic from msn.com seems to be coming into the goto.htm page. Netscape, Ixquick, AV, and other Goto partners seem more or less normal, i.e., the search phrases are the ones we bought.
Any ideas on this one?
Seems as if the search term does not find an exact match MSN generates its own search term return.
Sometimes it is WAY OFF subject.
Glad to see I am not the only one confused on this one (I posted on this exact subject earlier).
I hate bad pay for click throughs.
It is becoming MUCH worse lately with GoTo.