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Why Is My ExactMetrics Data Wrong? Troubleshooting Common Tracking Issues

30 threads Sep 16, 2025 Plugin → Exactmetrics – google analytics dashboard for wordpress (website stats plugin)

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If you're using the ExactMetrics plugin (formerly GADWP) and your Google Analytics data looks off, you're not alone. Discrepancies between what you see in your WordPress dashboard and what's in your Google Analytics account are a common frustration. This guide will walk you through the most frequent causes and how to fix them.

Why Your ExactMetrics Data Might Be Inaccurate

Analytics data can be inconsistent for several reasons. Based on common community reports, the issues typically fall into a few key categories.

Common Causes and Their Solutions

1. Duplicate Tracking Codes (The Most Common Culprit)

This is, by far, the most frequent cause of inflated pageviews, low bounce rates, and general data chaos. It happens when the ExactMetrics tracking code is inserted alongside another tracking code from your theme, another plugin, or a manual snippet you added years ago.

How to Fix It:

  • Use your browser's "View Page Source" feature to search for "UA-" or "G-" (for GA4) codes. If you find more than one unique tracking ID, you have a duplicate.
  • Thoroughly check your theme settings for any built-in Google Analytics options and disable them.
  • Deactivate any other analytics or tracking plugins that might be injecting a second code.
  • Remove any manual tracking code snippets you may have pasted into your theme's header.php or footer.php files.

2. Incorrect Google Tag Manager Setup

Switching to Tag Manager in the plugin's settings but not seeing any data in the dashboard is a known issue. The plugin may not output the full Tag Manager code, specifically the <noscript> portion that is required for a complete installation.

How to Fix It:

  • You may need to manually add the <noscript> iframe snippet as the first element inside your site's <body> tag.
  • Alternatively, consider using the standard Analytics tracking code method within ExactMetrics if manual code editing is not feasible.

3. Caching and Plugin Conflicts

Sometimes, a recent update to your theme, another plugin, or WordPress itself can create a conflict that breaks tracking.

How to Fix It:

  • Clear all your caching: this includes your WordPress caching plugin, server-level cache, and CDN cache (like Cloudflare).
  • Perform a conflict test by temporarily switching to a default WordPress theme (like Twenty Twenty-Four) and disabling all other plugins. If tracking works, reactivate them one-by-one to find the culprit.

4. Data Sampling and Processing Delays

It's important to understand that the data in your WordPress dashboard is pulled from the Google Analytics API. For larger sites, this data is often sampled, which can lead to small discrepancies when compared to the unsampled data in your Google Analytics account. There is also typically a 24-48 hour delay before data fully processes and appears in reports.

5. Ad Blockers and Browser Privacy Settings

Browser extensions like uBlock Origin and privacy features that block scripts will prevent the analytics tracking code from loading and sending data. This means visits from users with these enabled are completely invisible to Google Analytics, which can contribute to differences when compared to server-side stats plugins.

How to Fix It:

  • There is no client-side workaround for ad blockers. This is a limitation of how browser-based tracking works.
  • You can configure how ExactMetrics handles the "Do Not Track" browser signal under ExactMetrics > Settings > Engagement > Privacy.

Final Checklist

  1. Check for and remove duplicate tracking codes.
  2. Clear all forms of cache on your site.
  3. Confirm your property and view are correctly selected in ExactMetrics settings.
  4. Allow 24-48 hours for data to populate after making changes.
  5. Understand that some data loss from ad blockers is inevitable.

By methodically working through these steps, you should be able to identify and resolve most common data accuracy issues with the ExactMetrics plugin.

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