How to Build UTM Links and Track Your Campaigns

A UTM link is a normal web address with extra labels on the end. When someone clicks it, your analytics tool reads the labels and records where the visit came from. Without them, many visits show up as plain direct traffic and you can't tell which campaign worked.

The parameters

• utm_source: where the visitor came from, such as newsletter, twitter or google.
• utm_medium: the type of channel, such as email, social or cpc.
• utm_campaign: the name of the campaign, such as spring_sale.
• utm_term: the paid keyword, mainly for search ads. Optional.
• utm_content: tells similar links apart, for example top_banner and footer_link. Optional.

Source, medium and campaign are the three you should always fill in.

An example

https://example.com/offer?utm_source=newsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=spring_sale

Naming rules that save you later

1. Use lowercase only. Analytics treats Email and email as two different values.
2. Use underscores or hyphens instead of spaces, and pick one style.
3. Keep a shared list of the names you use so the whole team spells them the same way.
4. Keep names short but meaningful, so a report is readable a year from now.

Mistakes to avoid

• Don't put UTM tags on links inside your own site. They start a new session and overwrite the real source.
• Don't put personal information, such as an email address, in a UTM value. These addresses are visible and get stored.
• Don't forget the existing question mark. If the page address already has parameters, the new ones join with &. The builder handles this for you.

Putting it to use

Create links with the UTM Link Builder, inspect any link with the URL Parser, and turn a tagged link into a printable code with the QR Code Generator. Use a different utm_content on each printed code to see which poster or flyer is working.