UTM tags in online advertising | Digital Marketing Group

To use UTM tags correctly, you need to understand what they are, what they consist of, and where and how to apply them.

UTM tags are specific link parameters that allow analytics tools to collect information about a given source. Each parameter has its own name and value.

For example:

https://link.com/?utm_source=facebook&utm_medium=cpc&utm_campaign=utm_media

If you look closely at the example above, you will find that it consists of several parts:

Page: this is the page to which the corresponding link leads.

Source: since your campaign will most likely run on multiple media platforms, you need to understand where the traffic is coming from. With the help of this parameter, you can learn from which source a particular visitor came. To build the link for each platform, you need to put its name in the “utm_source” parameter. For example utm_source = linkedin or utm_source = facebook.

You can also put offline media here. For example, if you use QR codes in your printed materials, you can specify as source for example leaflets, etc.

Medium: Since you can run multiple campaigns on the same platform, this parameter will show you how the user reaches the page. The tag identifies the campaign type. For example, you can put your URL in the text of emails or banners, such as utm_medium=email (for email marketing) or utm_medium=cpc.

Campaign: As mentioned earlier, you can run multiple ad campaigns, you should also choose a campaign name that drives traffic. It could be the name of a specific product or campaign strategy, such as utm_campaign = launch-product or utm_campaign = sale.

You can put tags that are optional, but will certainly be helpful.

Term: this parameter is used to transfer the key query for which the ad is being run. The tag specifies keywords for the search network ad. If you are manually tagging paid campaigns based on keywords, you should also use the utm_term parameter to specify a keyword. For example, utm_term = url_shortener.

Content: this is the parameter for additional information, including the subcategory of the product or service, the type of ad itself, the ad IDs, and the campaign launch date. For example utm_content = ad_id.

When should you use UTM?

When you’re running ad campaigns to track the performance of individual channels.
When you’re using other ways to engage users and want to track where they’re coming from.
When you use email marketing to learn how effective a particular email is.

Where to apply UTM parameters

Blog posts

Let’s say you’ve released a blog post to let your audience know about the launch of a new feature. You want to find out which elements on the page users will click more often: a CTA (call-to-action) button in the middle of the article or a banner in the footer. To track this, add UTM tags to both URLs in each individual button to discover which one better engages users. See the URL examples below.

…/?utm_source=blog&utm_medium=url-feature&utm_campaign=button&utm_content=middle
utm_source=blog&utm_medium=url-feature&utm_campaign=banner&utm_content=footer

Online advertising (e.g. Google Ads, Facebook Ads, Programmatic, etc.)

This is the most common use case for UTM tags. If you’re running an ad campaign across multiple platforms (e.g. Facebook and Google), UTM tags are the means by which you can not only track which one is performing better but even track which individual ad has performed better as well.

You can set as many parameters as you need. The number of values depends on the goal of the campaign. Manually adding allows you to define the data that will be displayed in the statistics; you can turn off the content parameter but turn on the term parameter.

When you run an ad from Google Ads, you can estimate sales in a specific city, for example, by splitting ads for different query groups. It all depends on what you want to measure.

…/?utm_source=google&utm_medium=cpc&utm_campaign=group-1&utm_content=sale
…?utm_source=google&utm_medium=cpc&utm_campaign=group-2&utm_content=sale

Email Marketing

Do you add tags to CTA buttons to redirect users to a source? The more complex step is adding UTM tagged links. By applying UTM parameters, you track conversion for the email campaign as a whole and each email element individually.

In the example below, we describe 3 email elements that need to be tracked: the first button, the image, and the second button. The elements contain UTM tagged URLs for further analysis. The parameters utm_source=email-campaign and utm_campaign are included.

…/?utm_source=email-campaign&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=regular-mailing&utm_content=headerbutton
…/?utm_source=email-campaign&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=regular-mailing&utm_content=image
…/?utm_source=email-campaign&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=regular-mailing&utm_content=footerbutton

The source parameter will show you the amount of traffic received from the email campaign. On the other hand, the content parameter allows you to find the amount of traffic received from a specific email element. When the campaign ends, you establish the overall success of the email marketing and the most engaging element.

Organic traffic

How will you know which social channels are the most engaging? Or which article on your site attracts the most visitors to make a purchase. Add UTM tags to the URLs you share on social and to the URLs in your profile or article descriptions.

When posting a link to certain social networks, use different source parameters to track the effectiveness of each channel.

…/?utm_source=twitter&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=post&utm_content=new-feature
…/?utm_source=facebook&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=new-feature
…/?utm_source=linkedin&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=new-feature

A/B Testing

To test the placement of a call-to-action button phrase on a website. The first item to test is a landing page; the second is a custom menu. With the utm_content parameter, you keep things simple and track performance in 2 places separately.

…/?utm_source=website&utm_medium=&utm_campaign=button-test&utm_content=landing
…/?utm_source=website&utm_medium=&utm_campaign=button-test&utm_content=menu

Where can you track how individual UTM tags are performing?

The place most often is Google Analytics, but it could of course be some other platform where you do your site traffic analysis.

To see what data is being reported in the UTM tags, go to Google Analytics/Acquisition/Source*Medium.

If you’re looking to increase your traffic and find out where users are coming to your site from, a good way to start is through UTM tags. We, at Digital Marketing Group, would love to help you create the tags to expand your analytics and increase conversions from your site.