25.10.2020

UTM Codes: Where Do Your Sales Come From?

You probably know that your strategy determines the channels for running campaigns that generate traffic and direct it to your website, but do you know which channel and which part works best? After a call, can you track which posts from your social channels generated the call? These special codes can be added to the end of any URL to track different activities. In this post, I will help you understand UTM codes and show you how to use them to track your marketing results. What are UTM codes? A UTM code is a snippet of simple code that...

A UTM code is a snippet of simple code that you can add to the end of any URL to track the performance of campaigns and content. There are 5 URL parameter variants you can track - source, medium, campaign, term, and content. UTM stands for "Urchin Traffic Monitor." The name comes from Urchin Tracker, web analytics software that served as the basis for Google Analytics.The UTM code looks like this: http://yourwebsite.com/your-post-title/?utm_source=googleThe part in red, starting after "?", is the UTM code. As you may have guessed, this particular code tracks which channel generated traffic to the page (i.e. source). The UTM code itself has two components: UTM parameter - which starts with utm_. There are 5 separate options you can track: utm_source, utm_campaign, utm_content, utm_term (more on these below). Tracking variable - a unique variable used to identify the value being tracked (such as the name of the traffic source). This variable is preceded by the "=" sign. In the variable, you can use only numbers, letters, hyphens, the "+" sign, and dots. UTM codes can be long and complex. Adding the UTM code does not affect the actual page. You can delete the UTM code from the URL and the page will continue to load normally. The code serves only one purpose: to help your analytics tool track the source of your visitor. For marketing purposes, this means you can use these codes to calculate the impact of your campaigns. If you collect data on each visitor's path to conversion, UTM codes will be extremely useful.

What can you track with UTM codes?

1. Traffic source

The "source" parameter allows you to track where the traffic originates. The parameter added to your URL is utm_source. Sources you can track can be facebook, google, bing, inbound.org, or the name of an email list, and others. Example: & utm_source = twitter

2. Medium

The "medium" parameter tracks what type of traffic the visitor came from - cpc, email, social, referral, display, etc. The parameter is utm_medium_ Example: & utm_medium = cpc

3. Campaign (campaign name)

The "campaign" parameter allows you to track the performance of a specific campaign. For example, you can use the campaign parameter to distinguish traffic between different Facebook ad campaigns or email campaigns. The parameter is utm_campaign. Example: & utm_campaign = example-campaign

4. Content

If you have multiple links pointing to the same URL (such as an email with two CTA buttons), this code will help you track which link was clicked. The parameter is utm_content. Example: & utm_content = navlink

5. Term (keyword)

The keyword parameter allows you to track which keyword term a website visitor came from. This parameter is used specifically for paid search ads. The parameter is utm_term. Example: ** & utm_term = growth + hacking + tactics

How to use UTM codes

You can use these codes in any combination, separating each parameter with the "&" sign. In this way, you can have a simple URL that just tracks visitor actions from an email campaign. yoursite.com/your-page/?utm_campaign=spring-sale2018 By adding the utm_campaign parameter, we can track the performance of our "Fall Sale 2020" email campaign in Google Analytics. Want to know how many sales were generated by a given email campaign? UTM links are your answer. You can also choose to have a more complex code that tracks multiple parameters. Here is an example of tracking the source, medium, campaign name, medium, and content: yoursite.com/your-page/?utm_source=facebook&utm_medium=cpc & utm_campaign = spring_sale & utm_content = shoe_ad After adding the UTM code to your campaign URL, you can track performance in Google Analytics across several different reports. Create a custom report under "Customization" > "Custom Reports." Add medium, campaign, or source as the dimension and the metrics you want to see. Go to Acquisition -> Overview -> All Traffic -> Source / Medium to view traffic. Go to Acquisition -> Campaigns -> All Campaigns to see traffic based on your custom campaign names.

How do I create UTM codes?

We have created this tool for you, completely free, which, in addition to creating UTM codes, also offers link shortening: www.2rich.eu

Ways to use UTM tracking

Now you know what UTM codes are, what you can track, and how to create them, but the most important question remains: how should you actually use UTM codes to track your marketing campaigns? There are essentially three ways you will want to use these codes:

1. Find out where your traffic comes from

The main reason to use UTM tracking is to know exactly where the traffic to your website is coming from. You can achieve this by using the campaign, source, and medium parameters. Google Analytics shows default channel grouping in its interface. However, by using UTM parameters, you can track sources more accurately. UTM tracking is especially useful for understanding your referral and direct traffic in Google Analytics. In Google Analytics, you can go to Acquisition -> All Traffic -> Referrals to see which sites are generating traffic. Direct traffic is often another mysterious traffic source in Google Analytics. It mainly includes visitors who type your URL directly into their browser or have bookmarked your page. But direct traffic also includes visitors who clicked links in emails, ebooks, and other offline marketing materials. Add UTM links that indicate the traffic source that would otherwise be categorized as “direct.” For example, if you write an ebook that includes links to your website, add UTM codes to those links like this:* mywebsite.com? utm_source = ebooks & utm_campaign = agency_playbook In Google Analytics, you can filter your traffic by source to see how your ebook is performing in generating traffic and new leads.

2. Find out which links people click in a given campaign

Let’s say you run a newsletter. Every week you send half a dozen links to interesting stories from around the web. Among them, you also include a few CTAs to a given site. You probably already know the newsletter’s open and click-through rates. But do you know which links in your newsletter get the most clicks and which are ignored? This is another situation where UTM codes are useful. By adding the utm_content parameter to different links in the newsletter, you can track the number of clicks they receive: In this way, a shopping newsletter might have two separate codes for shoes and jackets, like this: utm_source = mailchimp & utm_campaign = newsletter1 & utm_content = shoes utm_source = mailchimp & utmp_campaign = newsletter1 & utm_content = jackets There are countless ways to use this UTM parameter. For example, you can create separate utm_content codes for different banners in a banner ad campaign. Or you can add a custom code to your email signature link to track the total number of clicks.

3. Group traffic by Medium

Let’s say you are running a social media marketing campaign for a client. As part of your marketing activities, you share your content on popular social networks - Facebook, Twitter, etc. They appear under the “Social” channel in Google Analytics. What if you promote content on social networks that Google does not recognize as “social” in GA, such as imgur.com? In that case, you would have no way to show your results from working with that channel. That is where you can use utm_medium. By adding utm_medium = social to all links you share in each social channel, you can track your performance across all social networks. You will find that the utm_medium parameter is especially useful for conducting macro-level analysis of traffic patterns. You can group all links into a few broad media categories - social, CPC, search, email, referral, etc. - to measure their traffic over time. The utm_medium parameter is especially useful for distinguishing paid traffic. For example, all your traffic from Facebook will appear by default as “social” in Google Analytics. If you are running paid campaigns in Facebook Ads, you do not want that traffic grouped with your organic social traffic! By adding utm_medium = cpc or utm_medium = cpm to your Facebook Ads URL, you can group all paid traffic in one report.

4. Track traffic for different campaigns

If you have launched a new product, can you say for sure that the traffic came from the launch campaign? How many of your holiday marketing campaigns led to successful conversions? Tracking these metrics is one of the hardest things for marketers. GA’s core data makes it almost impossible to understand which marketing campaigns are driving your current results. The utm_campaign parameter solves this problem. For example, if you are running a new 20% discount campaign, you can organize all your links like this: utm_campaign = 20off & utm_source = facebook utm_campaign = 20off & utm_source = googleplus & utm_content = first-link Here is another example: suppose you wanted to track marketing results for different clients. You can organize each one into different campaigns, like this: utm_campaign = persona1 utm_campaign = persona2 These are just a few ways to use utm_campaign. Very soon, you will find that this parameter is indispensable.

Best practices for UTM tracking

Before you start adding UTM codes to your campaign links, there are a few things you should keep in mind:

1. Create a UTM naming policy from the start

It is important to establish naming policies that your whole team will use. If half of your team uses “facebook.com” and the other half uses “facebook” under “utm_source,” you will just end up with two sets of data. Before you start a campaign, define the naming rules for common parameters. This should include the names of different mediums (“social” instead of “social media,” “search” instead of “paid search,” etc.) and traffic sources (“facebook” instead of “facebook.com” or “reddit” instead of “reddit.com”). Even capitalization or spaces will make your analytics messy, splitting the same campaigns into two if you follow different rules. Decide on them from the start. Will you use underscores or hyphens in campaign names? Will all links use lowercase only? In general, the best practice is to use lowercase only in all links.

2. Use easy-to-understand names

Your campaign, content, and source links should be easy to understand. Anyone looking at the code should be able to tell at a glance what it means. Based on the campaign name alone, you can see that it is aimed at users worldwide who had logged in during the last 30 days. Anyone can understand this UTM code, even without a detailed presentation. In contrast, consider this UTM code: https://www.goibibo.com/offers/?utm_source=Mailers&utm_medium=_ ret_harvest_130117 & utm_term = ret_harvest_130117 & utm_campaign = _ret_harvest_130117This code not only uses the same name for multiple parameters (term, medium, and campaign), but the name itself is meaningless. Without context, it is impossible to understand what this code is actually tracking. Of course, you can create a naming rule that links a campaign to a numeric code. That makes analysis much more difficult.

3. Use link shortening for convenience

The complexity of a UTM code is directly related to its length. When you start creating more complex campaigns, your URLs will get longer. The solution: link shortening. With the help of www.2rich.eu, completely free of charge, you can shorten and generate your UTM codes in the same place. This is especially useful for your social media posts.