Acquisition Reports

Understand how visitors find your website.

Overview

Acquisition reports show you where your traffic comes from — search engines, social media, referral links, direct visits, and marketing campaigns. This is essential for understanding which channels drive results and where to invest your marketing efforts.

Navigate to Acquisition in the main menu to access these reports.

All Channels

Location: Acquisition → Overview or All Channels

A high-level breakdown of traffic by channel type.

Channel Types

Using This Report

• Compare channels — Which sources drive the most traffic?
• Track trends — Are search referrals growing or declining?
• Measure mix — A healthy site typically has diverse traffic sources
• Identify opportunities — Underperforming channels may need attention

Search Engines

Location: Acquisition → Search Engines & Keywords

Traffic from organic search results.

Search Engine Breakdown

See which search engines send you traffic:

• Google
• Bing
• Yahoo
• DuckDuckGo
• Others

Keywords

See which search terms visitors used to find your site.

Important Note: Most search engines (especially Google) no longer pass keyword data for privacy reasons. You’ll see many visits listed as “Keyword not defined.” This is normal.

For better keyword data, connect Google Search Console (if available) or use the Search Engine Keywords Performance feature (Premium plans).

Search Insights

Even with limited keyword data, search reports help you:

• Track organic search traffic trends
• See which search engines matter for your site
• Compare organic search to other channels

Websites (Referrals)

Location: Acquisition → Websites

Other websites that link to you and send traffic.

Referral Reports

• Referring websites — Domains sending traffic (e.g., healthgrades.com)
• Referring URLs — Specific pages with links to your site

Why Referrals Matter

• Partnership value — See which partners send traffic
• Link opportunities — Identify sites that might link to you
• Reputation monitoring — See who’s talking about you
• Spam detection — Identify suspicious referral sources

Analyzing Referrals

Look beyond just traffic volume:

• Which referrers have low bounce rates?
• Which referrers drive goal conversions?
• Are there surprising referral sources?

Social Networks

Location: Acquisition → Social Networks

Traffic from social media platforms.

Tracked Platforms

Ghost Metrics automatically recognizes major social networks:

• Facebook
• LinkedIn
• Twitter / X
• Instagram
• YouTube
• Pinterest
• And many others

Social Reports

• Social networks — Traffic by platform
• External URLs — Shared URLs on social media
• Conversions — Goals attributed to social traffic

Social Insights

• Which platforms drive meaningful traffic?
• Is social traffic growing or declining?
• Do social visitors engage with your content?
• Which platforms drive conversions?

Campaigns

Location: Acquisition → Campaigns

Traffic from your marketing campaigns tracked with UTM parameters.

Campaign Reports

• All campaigns — Campaign names with traffic data
• Source — Traffic sources within campaigns
• Medium — Breakdown by medium (cpc, email, social, etc.)
• Content — Ad content variations (if using utm_content)
• Keywords — Search keywords (if using utm_term)

Campaign Metrics

For each campaign, see:

• Visits and visitors
• Bounce rate
• Average visit duration
• Goal conversions
• Revenue (if configured)

Measuring Campaign Success

Don’t just look at traffic. A campaign’s success should be measured by:

1. Volume — Did it drive significant traffic?
2. Quality — Did visitors engage (low bounce rate, multiple pages)?
3. Conversions — Did visitors complete goals?
4. Efficiency — Cost per conversion (compare to campaign spend)

See Campaign Tracking to learn how to set up UTM parameters.

Source and Medium

Understanding the difference:

Source

Where the traffic originated:

• google
• facebook
• newsletter
• partner_site

Medium

How the traffic arrived:

• organic (search engine results)
• cpc (paid click)
• referral (link from another site)
• email
• social

Common Source/Medium Combinations

Attribution

When a visitor completes a goal, Ghost Metrics attributes the conversion to the traffic source that brought them.

Last-Touch Attribution

Ghost Metrics uses last-touch attribution by default:

1. Visitor clicks a Google ad → lands on your site → leaves
2. Later, visitor searches your brand → clicks organic result → completes a goal
3. The conversion is attributed to organic search (the last touch)

Understanding Attribution

• Attribution helps you understand which channels drive conversions
• Last-touch gives credit to the final channel before conversion
• Consider the full journey when making decisions

Comparing Traffic Sources

To compare source performance:

1. Navigate to Acquisition → Overview
2. Sort by different metrics (visits, bounce rate, conversions)
3. Apply segments to compare specific audiences
4. Export data for deeper analysis

Quality vs Quantity

High traffic isn’t always good. Compare:

Google Ads drives fewer visitors but better quality (lower bounce, more conversions).

Exporting Acquisition Data

All acquisition reports can be exported:

1. Navigate to the report
2. Click the export icon
3. Choose your format (CSV, Excel, etc.)
4. Download

For regular marketing reports, set up scheduled exports in Custom Reports.

Next Steps

• Campaign tracking — Tag your marketing campaigns
• Goals — Measure conversions by source
• Custom reports — Build acquisition dashboards