Why are more countries listed than included in segment?

[Mickey_Hawk]

I created a segment that was composed of the 28 EU member countries.  When I look at a 'Countries' report and apply that segment, there are a handful of other countries in addition to those 28. I think the total was 43.  I've also noticed this with similar segments that are just two or three countries.  I'll look at traffic to the home page, then apply that segment (say Australia and New Zealand), and I'll see the US and Canada creep in.  Any ideas why that would happen?  Segment seems pretty straightforward.

[jorisdebeer · Accepted solution]

Hi Mickey,

Is your segment a Hit, Visit, or Visitor based segment?

If it is a visit, and especially if it is a Visitor based segment, then I could see how other countries might creep into your reporting. Some workplace networks will use a bank of IP routers and as staff browse their gateway IP can occasionally change. The Geosegmentation reports depend on accurate location information for the visitor's IP address.

If your segment is Visitor based, then the creep could be due to your visitors moving location between sessions.

You can find more information about the Geosegment, including details about Report Accuracy at:

https://marketing.adobe.com/resources/help/en_US/reference/reports_geosegmentation.html

[Mickey_Hawk]

Thanks!  It is a visitor-based segment.  Haven't looked at the reference link you provided yet.  So, if a person visited the site from one of my segment countries, then traveled to another country and visited the site again, it would include both of those countries in the reporting?  Given what I'm trying to do, would you recommend keeping it as Visitor-based or changing to Hit or Visit?

[jorisdebeer]

Yeah, I think a Hit based segment will work better to limit your report data to just the EU countries you've defined.

[Mickey_Hawk]

Super, thanks!