Why are there daily visits from Council Bluffs on my site?

[pixidaisy]

Hi all

on a daily basis we are getting 3 visits from this city in the US and this  has been happening over a couple of months.  I have tried to figure out what organisation is out there with no success and wondered whether anyone else has witnessed the same ?

[TheDigitalYeti · Accepted solution]

Hi,

I have been doing some research and found out the cause, the Shopify Speed Report. You can find the topic here; https://community.shopify.com/c/Online-Store-Speed/Online-Store-Speed-Report/m-p/908894#M390

Shopify runs the speed report using a Google Developer tool (the Google data centre is based in Council Bluffs, USA) which tests 3 pages, Homepage, a popular collection page and a popular product page. Shopify then compares this result to other similar Shopify sites. This test is run daily!

For some sites this is not a problem, but for some smaller sites this can screw with your analytics and conversion rate metrics. If you get 3000 hits a day, 3 extra visits is not an issue - it's only 0.1%. Not every site is as big as that. My site is small and got tested twice today (15th Nov) for some reason. If you use Google Analytics you can exclude these visits from the report. I do not trust Google with my data as I have caught them doing things with my data before, and these visits are messing with the analytics in Shopify.

So if this feature is negatively affecting you, make sure to reach out to Shopify and ask them to turn it off.

Better yet ask them to give you, the store owner, the choice of when or if your site is tested. Manually, Daily, Weekly, Monthly or Annually.

[danteamk]

I'm so glad you posted about this, because I'm also having the same thing happening.

It's usually 6 visits per day from Council Bluffs.

I'm wondering if it's related to some app/extension, but I haven't installed any new one recently.

Another thing that crossed my mind is if the developer of the theme I'm using is from there. I use the theme Broadcast.

[pixidaisy]

Hi

I am on on a different theme so may not be that.

I did download Ping last month or so but other than that nothing. Usually I get 3 visits a day, all in quick succession so can only guess it is some sort of spying software. It is a pity Shopify will not assist in the blocking of such visitors.

Surprised no one else has raised this before

[A_Pepper]

I’ve had the same visits from Council Bluffs IA to my store. 3 views almost every day for the past few weeks. I haven’t downloaded any new apps or made any real changes to my store recently. 
I’m not sure why I’m getting these views either..

[boominkid]

Same issue!

[danteamk]

This is so weird. I feel like some spyware is doing this to be able to get some information from my store or something. Creepy!

Shopify cancelled their hotline and it's hard to talk to them nowadays, which is a shame. The stock price sky-rocketing and they cut on the most basic thing we need, which is talking to them.

The forums and help center are not effective most of times. I don't know what they're thinking...

[DVeith16]

I’m seeing the same! Council Bluffs, multiple times per day, no explanation. Does Agiou review these?

[Karen_Brewer]

Agreed! The same thing is happening to our website with this traffic. It impossible to get great support from Shopify like the first five years of working on their platform.  

I guess I’ll pull this traffic and block from my Google Analytics account.

[BBHC]

I pulled reports and my site is also consistently getting visits from Council Bluffs.  I came here to find out if anyone else is having this same issue.  Happy it’s not just me but still wondering what is going on. 

[OttantottoPianS]

Hi, I have 3 regular Daily visits from Council Bluffs! I have tried five different themes and it still stalks my store no fault. I have opened my store late September and it started mid November.

[Ethereal]

I am also having the same scenario happen. It has been about 2 weeks since daily reviews from CB Iowa have started. I am not sure what the deal with that is, but I would love it if we can keep this thread going until we find the cause. 

Hopefully Shopify's customer service call line will come back after C19, but I feel like they will fall victim to the same mindset most tech companies have of not aiding the customer.

[pixidaisy]

Think you are right there. Covid seems to be the new excuse to let customer service take a back seat and reset to a lower level of expectation

[Dinafit]

We’re getting thousands of council bluffs apparently over 1000 sessions coming from iowa 

[Joechsle]

Yes I believe it is a spyware program. I have 3 visits almost daily for months now. Before it was some other city I don’t remember, I emailed Shopify to be removed from their spyware and it happened for a few months and now it started again. These are companies that spy on your website to determine your best sellers and sell the info to who will buy it. It’s shameful I agree but as far as I know it is not illegal. 

[Inluxeltebar]

I’ve had a minimum of 3 per day from Council Bluffs, Iowa for months. My store uses the boundless theme. 

[gozuikw]

 

[gozuikw]

hi , I was also getting the same three views from council bluffs on each day. I have installed the screen recording app , from where I see ,a one direct view on a store , I have checked the ip , it's a same from council bluffs. 

 

[Zoolander]

It seems there is nothing to worry about, it appears to be Google's data centre. I checked the IP another reply had posted. I have had the same visits for a few months, very frustrating, I even blocked Iowa with an app and the hits kept coming. Shopify chat told me a month ago it was probably Google, and indeed that is what it appears to be. 

[Joechsle]

Thanks for the info, but what are they checking?

[design-goat]

I just noticed that my 2nd highest visits are from this city, and I don’t have any connections there. I’ve never even heard of it! I did a google search and found your post. Wondering if there is some Shopify connection. 

[RolandP]

I have more visits from someone/ something in Council Bluffs, IA, than any other visitor, including myself. Every day, many visits from Council Bluffs. 

What is it exactly?

Thank you,

Roland

[TheDigitalYeti]

I have done some testing and found this is caused by Shopify's new Site Speed Report feature. I have written more about it in the post here;

https://community.shopify.com/c/Online-Store-Speed/Online-Store-Speed-Report/m-p/908894#M390

Make sure you contact Shopify Support and get them to change the feature if it is affecting you.

[shboutique]

I have the same challenge to unfold, in the past 30 days I had 84 visits from Council Bluffs 🤔 

[Zoolander]

yes, I have to manually filter Council Bluffs (and my dynamic IP address) to view the analytics honestly. It is frustrating that there is no way to set regular filters so I don't have to do this 3 times a day 

[Jimcecere]

I have only had Shopify since April and site visits from Council Bluffs come daily. I don’t know why, either and would like to know. 

[Keke227]

I am so glad I am not the only person seeing this. I get 3 visits a day from Council Bluffs around 1am

[TheDigitalYeti · Accepted solution]

Hi,

I have been doing some research and found out the cause, the Shopify Speed Report. You can find the topic here; https://community.shopify.com/c/Online-Store-Speed/Online-Store-Speed-Report/m-p/908894#M390

Shopify runs the speed report using a Google Developer tool (the Google data centre is based in Council Bluffs, USA) which tests 3 pages, Homepage, a popular collection page and a popular product page. Shopify then compares this result to other similar Shopify sites. This test is run daily!

For some sites this is not a problem, but for some smaller sites this can screw with your analytics and conversion rate metrics. If you get 3000 hits a day, 3 extra visits is not an issue - it's only 0.1%. Not every site is as big as that. My site is small and got tested twice today (15th Nov) for some reason. If you use Google Analytics you can exclude these visits from the report. I do not trust Google with my data as I have caught them doing things with my data before, and these visits are messing with the analytics in Shopify.

So if this feature is negatively affecting you, make sure to reach out to Shopify and ask them to turn it off.

Better yet ask them to give you, the store owner, the choice of when or if your site is tested. Manually, Daily, Weekly, Monthly or Annually.

[Karen_Brewer]

Thank you for all the great research on this topic. We did reach out to Shopify support and they told they would not turn it off at this time. We also do not have the option of changing how frequently it hits our site.

[pixidaisy]

Fantastic research. Thank you

[Joechsle]

Yes, I found out the same thing just yesterday, I asked them to remove the Testing from my store and they said that was not possible at this time . So I guess I’m stuck with it.

[TheDigitalYeti]

I have raised this issue with Shopify support on live chat a few weeks ago, they did some testing and managed to replicate my results. They agreed that this is an issue and have put it on the development list.

If more people reach out to Shopify about this then it will become a higher priority for them to fix. Make sure you reach out to Shopify and let them know if this affects you and how you would like the speed test to work for you in the future.

My preference would be a setting that lets you choose when your site is tested. eg. manually, daily, weekly, monthly, or annually.

[MindMade80]

I had 27 visits from Council Bluffs in one week. What the?

[RolandP]

It’s Google, as part of Google’s internet indexing activity. Google has a data center in Council Bluffs.

https://www.google.com/search?q=does+google+have+a+data+center+in+Council+Bluffs&rlz=1CDGOYI_enUS632...

[Apocketofrocks]

Thank you for this! I couldn’t figure it out and it was making me crazy! 🙂

[TheDigitalYeti]

Is anyone still getting the visits from Council Bluffs?

Since my posts about these I haven't had any visits from Council Bluffs, but I am getting hundreds of visits per month from Ashburn and Boardman.

Today, 75% of the traffic to my site was from them.

Again, I've done my research and I believe these are Amazon web bots. They seem to be mostly harmless but all these visits essential make my analytics usesless.

Come on @Shopify, please do something about this.

[ShopSugar]

I had over 200 visits from here Iowa and was extremely confused and a little nervous so this makes me feel a lot safer! Thanks! 

[Joechsle]

I have been getting fake orders on my site, which do not go through all the way, they stay in my abandoned cart and it is only for the same item over and over again. I got do annoyed that I adjusted the stock of that item to 0 so that they cannot add it to their cart. So annoyed! The credit card they use is declined and their email say fake something at fake.com it seems that bese orders are from a bot.
Does anyone have this issue?

[PNWOurAdventure]

Thanks Yeti!

[Dinafit]

Hello Shopify, this isn’t an acceptable solution as 3 may not be a lot but we’re getting thousands of visits from Iowa, we’re a Canadian brand, we’ve reached out to your customer support and they said you filter bots. But it doesn’t make sense getting thousands of visits from one state and no particular conversion, this makes it hard for companies to know where to focus our campaigns on! We sent proof we get thousands of visits weekly from Iowa state to your customer service people and they didn’t give us a definite answer, we’re a Canadian yoga mat company, we just want to get to the bottom of this. Thank you 

[ZES]

Well then something is really wrong with my website, since it was visited 119 times in 1 day. Im not sure if i should be concerned. Especially since our site went public yesterday night! 

[Yumchatea]

Google has a data center in Council Bluffs Iowa. I didnt get these before i integrated, analytics, google ads, merchant center etc etc to the site. Its likely their system crawling websites using their services for listing etc purposes. Not fact or anything just a best guess. Could just be a lady living in a boot, surfing the web all day long 😉 

[TheMirth]

I wonder if EVERYONE using Shopify gets these council Bluff visits, or just certain shops. Do we all sell the same things? Or live in the same place? Just curious....

I sell handmade sterling silver jewelry from Texas. Do any others?

[Karen_Brewer]

Interesting question...We are a small business selling scarves and headwear from the San Francisco Bay Area.

[TheDigitalYeti]

Hi,

It happens to ALL Shopify stores as part of the Site Speed Test Report, regardless of where you are or what you sell.

If you go to Sales Channels > Online Store > Themes - under your live theme is the Online Store Speed.

Click the View Report button then click see how your store is calculated 

This shows you the 3 pages that are tested by the speed report. Your homepage, a popular collection page and a popular product page. If you click View Insights it will show the pages tested which will match the Council Bluffs visits.

[Chakriia]

Selling sterling silver jewelry too. I’m based in New York City.

[NautiSailor]

Did you ever find out who this is? Or why they are doing it? It is also happening on my site as well and I didn’t add anything on my site recently for it to be going on I seem to get at the least 3 visits a day from them up to 9 or more. It’s crazy and makes me feel like someone trying to hack ? 

[TheDigitalYeti]

Hi @NautiSailor,

If you read further up the discussion it's all explained, it's Shopify doing it as part of the Site Speed Test.

I have been doing some research and found out the cause, the Shopify Speed Report. You can find the topic here; https://community.shopify.com/c/Online-Store-Speed/Online-Store-Speed-Report/m-p/908894#M390

Shopify runs the speed report using a Google Developer tool (the Google data centre is based in Council Bluffs, USA) which tests 3 pages, Homepage, a popular collection page and a popular product page. Shopify then compares this result to other similar Shopify sites. This test is run daily!

For some sites this is not a problem, but for some smaller sites this can screw with your analytics and conversion rate metrics. If you get 3000 hits a day, 3 extra visits is not an issue - it's only 0.1%. Not every site is as big as that. My site is small and got tested twice today (15th Nov) for some reason. If you use Google Analytics you can exclude these visits from the report. I do not trust Google with my data as I have caught them doing things with my data before, and these visits are messing with the analytics in Shopify.

So if this feature is negatively affecting you, make sure to reach out to Shopify and ask them to turn it off.

Better yet ask them to give you, the store owner, the choice of when or if your site is tested. Manually, Daily, Weekly, Monthly or Annually.

It's not a hacker or anything like that, just annoying.

[TommyDAQ]

Thank you for posting a legitimate explanation!  Everyone should "Like" your response to get it to the top. 

[Tashina]

Yes same here! Since the first day I use Shopify

[Tedricksplace]

I also am receiving 3 visits a day from council bluffs Iowa. I found online that there is a Google data center located in that city and state I believe since 2007. So I'm wondering if it is Google that is visiting all of the Shopify sites maybe web crawling our pages in order to rank us on search results just a thought.