Why do my analytics numbers look different from Shopify's?
The main reasons Upsell Master's Analytics and Shopify's reports show different figures, and how to compare them fairly.
Upsell Master and Shopify measure different things, on different clocks. A gap between them doesn't usually mean data is missing. These are the common causes, roughly from most to least likely.
1. Different days: UTC vs your store's time zone
Shopify reports by your store's time zone. Upsell Master's days run from midnight UTC to midnight UTC. Every range uses these UTC days: Today, Last 7 days, Last 30 days, monthly bars and custom ranges.
For a UK store in summer, Upsell Master's day starts at 1am local time. For a US store, it starts in the previous evening. Orders near midnight can land on different days in the two reports. See What does 'Today' mean?
2. Upsell revenue is not sales
Shopify's sales reports show whole orders. Upsell Master's revenue is only the upsell items: the products buyers added from your offers, after discounts on those lines. A $120 order with a $15 checkout upsell adds $15 to Upsell Master's revenue, not $120.
The one card that uses whole orders is Average Revenue per Order on the Checkout tab. It averages the full order total of orders placed while you had an active funnel. It's also averaged day by day, so it won't match Shopify's average order value for the same period. See How do I read the Checkout and Funnel tabs?
3. Views are checkouts, not sessions or page views
Shopify counts sessions and visitors. Upsell Master counts a view once per checkout that saw an offer, however many products the offer showed. Checkout (pre-purchase) views also only include checkouts that became orders. Abandoned checkouts are left out. So Upsell Master's views will be lower than Shopify's checkout or session counts.
4. "Last 7 days" and "Last 30 days" include today
Last 7 days runs from midnight UTC seven days ago up to now. That's today plus the seven full days before it. Last 30 days works the same way. Shopify's "Last 7 days" may cover a slightly different set of days, so line up the dates before you compare. A custom From/To range is the easiest way to match a period exactly. See How do I choose a date range?
5. Monthly ranges use calendar months
Last 3 months and Last 6 months start on the 1st of a month: this month plus the two (or five) before it. They aren't the last 90 or 180 days.
6. The numbers are a few minutes behind
Analytics figures are cached for about five minutes. Some events also take a moment to arrive:
- a checkout offer counts once Shopify tells the app the order was created;
- post-purchase revenue counts once Shopify's order confirms the line.
Click the refresh button, and if a fresh order is still missing, wait a minute and refresh again. Today's hourly charts can take up to five minutes to catch up even after a refresh.
7. Revenue comes from the order, not the screen
Post-purchase and Thank You page revenue are taken from Shopify's net line total on the order, not from the price shown on the offer. For post-purchase offers, that total is in your store's currency. If a discount or a replacement changed what the buyer actually paid, Upsell Master records what Shopify recorded. For a replacement offer, it counts only the difference between the new item and the one it replaced.
8. Different conversion rates on different tabs
The Summary tab's Conversion Rate counts acceptances at every step, but divides only by checkout and first-upsell views. The Funnel tab's rate divides by the views of whichever steps are ticked. Neither is meant to match Shopify's store conversion rate, which measures sessions that end in an order.
Comparing fairly
- Pick a custom range in Analytics that matches the days in your Shopify report.
- Allow for the time zone offset at each end of the range.
- Compare Upsell Master's revenue with the upsell line items in Shopify, not order totals.
- Click refresh before you read the numbers.