Before we get into the most common causes of stats discrepancies, it’s important to understand one thing:
You can trust the stats you see in ClickMagick.
Tracking and attribution may look simple on the surface – just clicks and conversions – but under the hood, it’s one of the most technically complex parts of digital marketing.
There are dozens of things that can cause tracking to break or go out of sync, and most tools simply aren’t built to handle the full range of real-world edge cases.
At ClickMagick, tracking isn’t just an afterthought – it’s the entire focus of our platform.
Our founder has been building tracking systems since 1996, and over the past 11 years the ClickMagick team has seen (and solved) every possible tracking challenge you can imagine.
While other tools bolt tracking onto broader platforms or neglect it altogether, we’ve spent years perfecting ours with one goal in mind: giving you the most accurate, reliable data possible.
So when you see a discrepancy, rest assured – it’s not because ClickMagick is wrong.
It’s almost always because something outside of ClickMagick is off. Below, we’ll walk you through exactly why that happens and what you can do about it.
Reason #1 – The other apps you use just aren’t very accurate
You can’t really blame them. Tracking is hard, and unless you have an entire team dedicated to tracking and attribution it would be absolutely impossible to compete with ClickMagick in terms of tracking and attribution accuracy.
If you’ve just recently started using ClickMagick, your stats will not match the other marketing apps you’re already using due to all the prospects in your funnel before you started to use ClickMagick.
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For example, imagine that someone clicks your Facebook Ad on Monday and enters your funnel, you start using ClickMagick on Tuesday, and then that prospect purchases on Wednesday …
That sale will probably show up in your ad account and other marketing apps you’re already using – but it won’t be tracked in ClickMagick because the ad click happened before you started using ClickMagick.
You’ll start to see actionable stats within just a few days, but depending on the length of your sales cycle, it could be weeks or even months before most or all of your conversions are tracked in ClickMagick.
Reason #3 – There’s a problem with your Tracking Code
Your ClickMagick Tracking Code needs to be “installed” correctly to get accurate stats, so if things are “missing” in ClickMagick, you’ll want to start here.
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For example, maybe you’re doing a split test and forgot to add the ClickMagick Tracking Code to all of the test variations, which would cause the traffic going to those variations to not be tracked.
Or maybe your page builder isn’t outputting your Tracking Code correctly – which causes people using certain browsers to not be tracked correctly.
(Some page builders do some VERY weird and technically incorrect things – which is why we have many specific how-to articles for adding your Tracking Code using specific page builders.)
Reason #4 – GDPR Privacy/Cookie Banners & Apps
If you have any type of privacy/cookie banner on your website that asks visitors to consent to accepting cookies and data collection, in most cases they can’t be tracked if they decline.
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If you are subject to GDPR or other privacy related regulations, and your intent is to be compliant with them, you may have needed to install a privacy/cookie banner or app on your site or store.
This gives the visitor the ability to accept or decline the use of cookies and data collection for analytics purposes.
If the visitor declines then unfortunately they can’t be tracked properly by any tracking system, as giving them that choice is the purpose of the regulations that you’ve chosen to abide by.
So unfortunately, if you utilize such a privacy/cookie banner or app on your site or store, you should expect that some percentage of your visitors’ activity and sales just can’t be tracked.
The good news is that this is not really a problem from an analytics standpoint because you’ll still receive the same actionable insights, and your key metrics – like your conversion rates, average lifetime value, etc. – are not affected in any statistically significant way if a relatively small percentage of visitors choose not to be tracked.
Reason #5 – You have non-dedicated “thank you” pages
If you’re not using one of our sales tracking integrations, you’ll need to add tracking code to your “thank you” pages.
The ideal “thank you” page is a dedicated page or screen that visitors or buyers see just once after a conversion occurs e.g. an opt-in or sale. This is best because it ensures you won’t ever have to worry about duplicate conversions.
On the other hand, if you’re adding conversion tracking code to pages that visitors can easily reach in multiple ways, over and over again, you may need to make a small tweak to your ClickMagick setup.
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There is now an entire article dedicated to this topic. Please see the article below:
Reason #6 – Different time periods, often due to time zone differences
To accurately compare two different sets of stats, you first have to make sure that you’re looking at the same time period on both sides. Comparing apples to apples, as they say.
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To help with this, ClickMagick allows you to display your stats in any time zone you want via the Time Zone setting in your Account Settings.
You can also specify a custom time zone for each Project, overriding the default time zone in your account settings.
Reason #7 – Differences in counting “unique” clicks
The biggest issue here is that most traffic sources don’t publicly share how they determine a unique click, so it’s unlikely that the number of unique clicks shown in ClickMagick will exactly match your traffic source.
The big ad networks – like Google, Facebook, Microsoft Ads and TikTok – all use black box algorithms and don’t tell anyone how they count clicks. But what is obvious is that they will often charge you for multiple “unique” clicks from the same person in a short period of time, even within a matter of hours.
Ad networks are also known to adjust the number of clicks they say you’ve received after the fact, based on post-click analysis and other factors, so their numbers can change depending on when you look at it.
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When counting clicks, many traffic sources and other “dumb” apps show a raw click count. If the same person clicks on a specific link three times in a short period of time, they will show three clicks.
On the other hand, ClickMagick “remembers” your visitors. So unless you change your default settings, if the same person clicks a specific link three times on the same day, we’ll show three total clicks but just one unique visitor.
To generate statistically significant stats you can use to grow your business, this is exactly what you want. If we used raw click counts when calculating important stats like conversion rates, they would all be inaccurate.
Some clicks are also untrackable. For example, if the requesting client doesn’t execute javascript or accept cookies. In a case like this, other “dumb” apps will count it as a standard click, but ClickMagick won’t – because if the user isn’t trackable, we don’t want to pollute your primary stats with untrackable clicks.
The important thing to keep in mind is that you should focus on things that can be tracked and optimized and only pay attention to statistically valid stats.
You shouldn’t think of ClickMagick as a raw “click tracker.” You can always view your “non-standard” clicks in ClickMagick – things like untrackable clicks and “bot” clicks – but these are separated from your main stats.
Our primary goal is to show you the most statistically valid and actionable stats possible regarding important things like your conversion rates, ROI and LTV.
This is super important, so if you have any questions, please don’t hesitate to contact us.
Reason #8 – You have “leaks” in your tracking or untracked organic traffic
By default, ClickMagick will only track visitors who arrive at your site via a proper UTM-powered link, which includes valid utm_source, utm_medium and utm_campaign values at a minimum.
If you also want to track organic traffic, you need to purposely enable that in your click tracking code.
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You could be getting traffic from ads or other sources you’re not properly tracking with ClickMagick, and while you may see events like opt-ins in your autoresponder, for example, they won’t be tracked by ClickMagick.
Oftentimes it’s just a case of setting up some new ads and forgetting to include proper UTM parameters for tracking.
Many people use ClickMagick only to track and optimize their paid ads – if you also want to track organic traffic and the resulting conversions in ClickMagick, you’ll want to make sure to enable organic tracking as well.
Reason #9 – You’re receiving fraudulent or “fake” clicks
This is less likely with the major ad platforms, but there’s quite a bit of fraudulent traffic being bought and sold on some of the smaller ad networks, some of the CPV/PPV ad networks, and most certainly when it comes to “solo ads.”
These fake clicks are normally counted as real clicks by “dumb” platforms that can’t tell the difference, but ClickMagick separates these from your primary stats to preserve their accuracy.
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If you’re paying for traffic, other people are making money selling it to you. Unfortunately, the lure of easy money leads to some publishers and traffic providers generating and selling fake “clicks” on smaller ad platforms without the resources to combat it or when selling traffic directly to the buyer, as in the case with solo ads.
One example that can cause serious stats discrepancies between solo ad buyers and sellers is when sellers generate additional worthless clicks to make more money.
Usually, an unscrupulous traffic seller will set up a page with multiple hidden “iframes” that all point to the same rotator. Then when an end-user lands on the page, multiple “clicks” will be generated at the same time.
The end-user never actually sees any of the webpages, yet their web browser still generates clicks to each URL – and these clicks can’t always be tracked properly.
Fraudsters are often quite sophisticated, and there’s often nothing you or we can do about it, and fraudulent traffic will lead to stats discrepancies.
Reason #10 – Bots “clicking” your ads and links
The main issue is that many bots do not follow redirects, so a bot may “click” on your ad or other promotional links but not follow the redirect to your landing page the way a normal browser would, so you never see the click.
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A “bot” (short for “robot”) is software that is programmed to do specific tasks. To learn more, please see:
And while you’d expect ad networks like Google and Facebook to have highly advanced systems to protect you from this sort of thing, the truth is that their automated systems do not prevent or catch all the bots “clicking” on your ads. You’re paying for some percentage of bot clicks.
Lucky for you, ClickMagick has world-class bot detection systems – perfected over the past eight years and billions of clicks processed – that identify and “flag” many of these bots that slip through the cracks at the ad network level.
You can always view your “non-standard” clicks in ClickMagick – things like untrackable clicks and “bot” clicks – but by default, these are separated from your real clicks ...
Because this is the only way to ensure that all of your other important stats – like your conversion rates – are as accurate as possible.
Reason #11 – Prospects and customers repeatedly clicking on your paid ads
Rather than use bookmarks, many Internet users simply Google your product or brand name and click whatever shows up at the top when they want to get back to your site.
Usually, this will be your paid ad, and when they click it repeatedly over time, your ad network counts these as unique clicks and charge you over and over and over again.
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Imagine the following scenario ...
A user clicks one of your Google ads and ultimately purchases your product.
They forgot to bookmark your site, so a week later they type the name of your site or product into Google and click the first listing right at the top — which unfortunately happens to be your paid ad.
They are just trying to get back to your site, but Google just counted and charged you for another “unique” click, whereas ClickMagick may not count this as another unique click depending on your settings.
If you’re not already aware of this problem, you may be shocked to learn that instead of bookmarking their favorite sites, many users actually just use Google search to find sites they want to go back to, and if your paid ad is listed right at the top, you get charged over and over again each time they click on it.
If you take the time and have the ability to look into this, you’ll probably discover that you have many users who do this multiple times per week, and they’re inflating your ad costs by a noticeable amount.
Fortunately, we’ve created a one-of-a-kind solution for this that allows you to block these people from repeatedly clicking your ads, allowing you to prevent a LOT of wasted ad spend. You can learn how in this article:
Here’s what to do if you still think there’s an issue ...
First, know that “discrepancies” are expected for many of the reasons discussed above.
And remember – you shouldn’t think of ClickMagick as a raw “click tracker.” ClickMagick aims to provide you with statistically significant and actionable stats that will help you optimize your marketing …
… and it doesn’t matter if Facebook reports 1,002 raw ad clicks and ClickMagick reports 982 unique visitors.
When it comes to optimizing your marketing, the numbers that ClickMagick provides will always be “correct” and infinitely more useful than those you see on other platforms.
With that being said, if you have a large discrepancy that you can’t figure out or you have any questions, don’t hesitate to reach out any time, and we’ll be happy to help!
Article 622 Last updated: 11/11/2025 12:09:59 PM https://www.clickmagick.com/kb/?article=622
