16% to under 4% of "(not set)" traffic reduction for a customized sweets retail brand | Stape Care

A retail brand that specializes in customized sweets recently requested the Stape Care team to audit their server-side tracking setup and fix the reporting inconsistencies that affected the client's business decisions. Their website operates across multiple countries using subdomains (e.g., en.example.com, bg.example.com, it.example.com), and relies on a retail model that requires precise attribution for effective marketing and inventory management.

Although the client implemented server-side tracking earlier, their analytics showed a persistently high percentage of unusual traffic, specifically:

These issues distorted attribution and weakened confidence in performance metrics, leading to several operational and marketing problems:

Our Care team performed a technical audit of the tracking architecture focused on retail operations and identified several structural issues.

1. Consent banner misalignment across subdomains.

Consent cookies were not shared across multiple country-based subdomains, which caused:

2. Hybrid data flow causing fragmented sessions.

Part of the traffic still bypassed the server container due to a legacy integration. This created:

3. Bot-like traffic from non-relevant regions.

During the audit, Stape Care team noticed a large volume of very short sessions (under 3 seconds) originating from China, a region irrelevant for this retail brand, as products were not available there.

A deeper analysis revealed consistent patterns in this traffic:

To restore reliable analytics and attribution, Stape Care applied a series of structural updates along with traffic filters.

The consent setup was reconfigured to set cookies at the root domain level (.example.com). This update aimed to establish consistent behavior across all subdomains and resolve the permission mismatches identified during the audit.

All traffic was routed through the server container, removing the split created by the legacy integration. Consolidating the data flow would stabilize session reporting.

The team decided to block irrelevant and bot-like traffic at the server level using pattern-based rules. These rules targeted sessions that:

To set up these precise filters, the Care team implemented two Stape power-ups that supply the needed signals:

Finally, our Care team enabled Cookie Keeper to improve cookie persistence under browser restrictions, e.g., Safari's Intelligent Tracking Prevention (ITP). This reduced artificial session resets and strengthened attribution stability.

After implementing all improvements, the tracking system began reflecting only genuine customer activity, creating a clear view of performance and exposing the effects of the earlier issues. This shift allowed the client to rely on stable, consistent reporting, reflected in the following outcomes:

For a large-scale retail brand with international operations, keeping the (not set) figure under 4% provides the level of clarity needed to evaluate channels accurately, adjust budgets with confidence, and align stock planning with real customer demand.

By setting up server-side tracking with Stape, you can: