How I track bot vs real traffic on my website for free

One thing I kept running into while building products was this:

Traffic numbers looked “good”…
But conversions, signups, and engagement didn’t match.

Turns out a big chunk of it was bot traffic.

So I wrote down a simple, free way to separate real humans vs bots without paying for expensive tools.

What I cover:

Why GA numbers can be misleading

Common bot patterns (direct traffic spikes, zero engagement, fake referrers)

How to identify real visitors using behavior signals

A lightweight setup that works even for side projects and MVPs

No fluff, no enterprise tooling.

If you’re building in public or validating a product, this really helps you avoid fooling yourself with inflated metrics.

Happy to answer questions or share what’s worked (and failed) for us.