What is the difference between Amazon Sessions vs Pageviews?
The difference between Amazon sessions vs pageviews is complicated. It’s not just that there are different ways of counting them, but also that the data itself is never exactly the same because it depends on a combination of factors, like what browser someone uses to access your listing and how long they idle before leaving. In this article, we will explain how you can use Amazon sessions and pageviews to get a clearer picture of your listing’s performance and why it matters.
The difference between Amazon sessions vs pageviews is complicated. Amazon pages are counted differently than site pages, and that can be confusing for marketers.
Amazon has a unique way of counting their site traffic: they calculate it using sessions rather than pageviews.
What is a session?
A session is a series of requests from a user to the same website or application within a given time period, usually 30 minutes (as defined by the HTTP specification). In other words, if someone visits your website three times during that 30-minute window and each visit loads different content on your site, you’ve got three sessions.
This might seem like an arbitrary choice on Amazon’s part—why not use page views instead? But there’s actually some logic behind this method: unlike page views which measure only how many times people visited your site in total during any given time period (i.e., every single bit of HTML code), sessions also take into account whether or not users came back again after visiting once before—which means they’re better able to track repeat visitors who may have made multiple purchases or left reviews within those same days/weeks/months/years since first visiting before finally making another purchase somewhere down the line!
Amazon sessions are visits to your listing, not to your webpage.
In other words, Amazon will only count a session as having happened if a user visits the listing page of one of your products. If they go straight to your homepage or another part of the website from there (like searching for another product), then it won’t be counted as a separate session—which means that you’ll have fewer sessions than pageviews.
Another important distinction is that pageviews are counted differently than sessions. A pageview means that a person opened one of the pages in your listing (for example, looking at the listing page itself), whereas Amazon seller central sessions include any activity within that listing (such as scrolling down through reviews or clicking on links). The two metrics are not directly comparable because each refers specifically to different types of user activity in the same context: viewing listings on Amazon’s site vs browsing those listings in more detail by viewing specific pages within those listings themselves (such as individual product pages).
Amazon sessions vs pageviews differ in how they’re counted.
When you’re thinking of Amazon sessions vs pageviews, consider that they differ in how they’re counted. They also have other differences, such as the number of pages viewed and the time on a page.
- An Amazon session can only be active on a mobile device if it’s using a mobile browser or app–an average offer counts amazon if you’re logged into your desktop browser and viewing an item.
- Many people don’t know this, but there is actually more than one way to calculate the number of sessions on Amazon! The two methods are (1) total unique individuals who visit multiple pages over a period of time–what we refer to as “Amazon sessions”–or (2) total unique visitors who have viewed at least one page within a given time frame (sometimes called “pageviews”). If you aren’t sure which metric is right for your campaign goals, contact us!
Amazon sessions are counted differently if they’re on a desktop or mobile device.
On a desktop, a session is defined as a user that views your listing for at least three seconds. If they leave without buying, they’re still considered one session. Conversely, mobile users are not counted as separate sessions when they visit the same listing multiple times in one day (or even over the course of several days). Instead, all of those visits count toward just one session in total.
Amazon pages viewed and time on page are different.
Time on page is not a metric that Amazon calculates for you, but it’s easy to find out. Simply hover over the “View Reports” button in your Seller Central dashboard and select “Product Performance” from the drop-down menu. This will bring up an overview of all of your listings, including their average time spent on page (ATOP) and average product views (APV). The ATOP is calculated by dividing the total number of minutes spent viewing your product page by the number of sessions during that same time period.
Pageviews count each new page on a website as one pageview. Multiple clicks will count as multiple pageviews (e.g., if someone clicks through three pages of your website). However, if they return to a previously viewed page they will be counted as one additional click (e.g., if they click back to the first page of your site).
Amazon accounts for people who idle for long periods.
Amazon pages will be counted as a single session by default, but Amazon accounts for people who idle for long periods of time by counting each session as about three minutes long by default.
So if you spend five minutes on one page and then switch to another page, the first page will count as a session and the second page won’t. This means that your Amazon session percentage bounce rate could be higher.
You can see which browser people used to view your listing, but you can’t see their operating system, device name, or IP address.
You may notice that the total sessions number displayed on a product detail page is higher than the total session figure displayed in Seller Central’s Product Analytics dashboard. This is normal; it means that some customers are switching between browsers during their visits to your site.
You should be careful about thinking of your Amazon listing
like a regular website and don’t think that you have to change the way you count things when you do a comparison with other statistics sources.
While it’s true that there are ways to get Amazon-specific data out of Google Analytics, there are also many reasons why comparing your traffic sources can be misleading. For example, if someone visits one of your product pages both on Google search results and then goes directly to your page on Amazon without clicking through from any other site, only one session will be recorded in Google Analytics (since they didn’t come from an external source).
And even though this person may have been looking at different pages on each site or interacted with them differently, their activity would still show up as “Sessions” in Analytics because everything happened within one browser window/tab:
`There are lots more examples like this where multiple sessions might all show up under “Sessions” when they actually represent different points in time during which different sets of people interact with different parts of your site—and those numbers all need their own separate tracking codes so we can tell them apart!`
Conclusion
Amazon sessions vs pageviews are complicated, and you have to be careful about how you interpret the data from both sources. Counting visitors by session instead of pageview means that someone who clicks around and ends up on several different pages before leaving will count as multiple visits but only one pageview. This can affect your internal metrics if you’re tracking user behavior on your website or app using Google Analytics, making it difficult to compare with Amazon’s numbers.
FAQs
What do sessions mean on Amazon?
When you search for products on Amazon, you’ll see that each product has a sessions counter. This is how many times someone has looked at the product over the past week. The higher the number of sessions, the more people are interested in your item.
How do I increase the number of sessions on Amazon?
You can increase the number of sessions on Amazon by doing the following:
- Adding more products to your product line.
- Adding more keywords to your product listings.
- Writing more detailed, informative descriptions for each product.
What is the difference between users and sessions?
Users and sessions are both used to track the activities of users on your website. However, they have different purposes and are tracked differently.
A session is a single visit to your website by a user. A session ends when they navigate away from your site or close their browser tab, or when log out if they have logged in.
A user is an individual who has logged in to your website at least once.
The difference between these two terms is particularly important when it comes to measuring site performance: sessions can be used to track how many people visited your site during a certain period of time (for example, one day), but users tell you how many people visited your site on more than one occasion (e.g., two days).
With my vast experience in the e-commerce industry, I have successfully helped more than 250 e-commerce businesses worldwide to reduce their operational cost with cutting-edge e-commerce marketing services. My experience includes strategy, addressing daily issues, developing, delivering training, and supervising staff at multiple levels.