Yesterday I noticed that my unique visitors and page views had skyrocketed over the past few days. Great, right? Well, no, not exactly. The numbers were falsely inflated due to some double counting. It also meant a big influx of spam. It looks like the heart of the matter was the Facebook “Send” button at the bottom of my posts.
It created a little bug/loophole on my page. This bug would lead visitors using Internet Explorer 7 to a separate page that ended in a “fb_xd_fragment” or possibly a blank page. I apologize if anyone experienced any issues. If you look at the bottom of the page, you’ll notice the “Send” button is no more. A separate “Like” button that is bug-free (fingers crossed) has replaced it.
And so my numbers have returned to a more normal level. It’s sad to see a drop, but I’m glad the numbers are more accurate. As long as the numbers keep creeping upward, I know I’ll return to those high numbers eventually.
Oh, and if you have a Facebook button on your website, be sure to look up “fb_xd_fragment bug” and ways to fix it. Act now and save yourself a future headache.