Tracking campaigns

If you are running University-related digital campaigns, it's very important that you understand the impact these campaigns are having, particularly the amount of traffic they are generating to University websites. The best way to track traffic to our websites coming from digital campaigns is by using UTMs. 

UTMs

UTMs (Urchin Tracking Modules) are a short piece of code that can be attached (appended) to a URL in order to ensure all website visits can be tracked in Google Analytics (GA).  By using UTMs we can examine the behaviour of users attracted by a specific campaign and compare this both to other campaigns and other mediums within the same campaign. 

UTMs look similar to this: 

?utm_source=communigator&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=offerholdersnov23

Everything after the ‘?’ provides information for GA to correctly discern the source of visits from the link. 

A UTM must be made up of the following components: 

• utm_source: This is the referrer of the visits, which could be an ad platform, 3rd party affiliate, email service or publishers. Examples:

• spotler
• facebook
• topunis

• utm_medium: This is the means by which the visitor arrived on our website. It’s important we use the correct medium in UTMs to ensure data is categorised correctly in GA (it’s assigned to the correct channel). Note that some mediums are automatically assigned in GA. 
  
  

  Channel grouping	Medium	How is channel assigned in GA according to medium
  Organic search	organic	Automatically assigned in GA when traffic comes from a search engine, Google, for example. DO NOT USE IN UTMs.
  Direct	(none) or (not set)	Automatically assigned in GA when traffic is created by a user typing a site URL or a saved link (bookmark). DO NOT USE in UTMs.
  Referral	referral	Automatically assigned in GA when traffic is created by a user clicking on a site link on another site. DO NOT USE IN UTMs.
  Organic Social	social or referral (when coming from social media channels)	referral is automatically assigned in GA when traffic comes via social media channels. social should be used for social media campaigns in UTMs.
  Paid Social	paidsocial, paid_social, paid, retargeting	It is assigned manually in UTMs for paid social media campaigns.
  Paid Search	cpc, ppc, retargeting, paid	Automatically assigned in GA but it can be assigned manually in UTMs for paid digital campaigns.
  Paid Other	various	Automatically assigned in GA.
  Email	email	Automatically assigned in GA but it can be assigned manually in UTMs for email campaigns.
  Display	display   or banner	It is assigned manually in UTMs.
  Print	print	It is assigned manually in UTMs [note: paused in GA4]
  Unassigned	n/a	Automatically assigned in GA. This is the value Analytics uses when there are no other channel rules that match the event data.

  See overview of default channel groups in GA4
  
  
• utm_campaign: This is the name of the campaign. If a campaign is used across different channels, the same campaign name should be used to ensure data is organised under a single campaign in GA.
• utm_term: Manly used for tracking keywords during a paid GoolgeAds campaign (optional).
• utm_content: Mainly used if A/B testing ads or to differentiate links that go the same URL (optional). 

Applying a UTM to a URL

To apply a UTM to a URL (for example www.example.com/courses/example-course/) we simply append it to the end of the URL as such: 

• www.example.com/courses/example-course/?utm_source=spotler&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=offerholdersnov23

Any traffic that arrives from this link will be attributed to the offerholdersnov23 campaign in GA.

UTMs should almost always be applied to the end of a URL (regardless of whether or not it ends with a /). The only exception to this rule is cases where the link uses an anchor link to direct visitors to a certain section of a page, in which case the anchor link should be placed after the UTM. Example:

• www.example.com/courses/example-course/?utm_source=spotler&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=offerholdersnov23#anchorname

UTMs for campaigns

When creating UTMs, use the respective medium shown in the tables below depending on the type of digital campaign you're running (this will ensure that the traffic is assigned to the correct GA channel). Please note that UTMs are case sensitive and should always be in lower case.

UTMs for paid social media campaigns

Example: 

• .../example-course/?utm_source=facebook&utm_medium=paidsocial&utm_campaign=offerholdersnov23
• .../example-course/?utm_source=facebook&utm_medium=paid_social&utm_campaign=offerholdersnov23

UTMs for email campaigns

Example: 

• .../example-course/?utm_source=spotler&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=eupdatedec23
• Please note that most email marketing platforms already add parameterers to UTMs.

UTMs for display campaigns

 Example: 

• .../example-course/?utm_source=timemagazine&utm_medium=banner&utm_campaign=offerholdersnov23

UTMs for print campaigns

 Example: 

• .../example-course/?utm_source=pocketguide&utm_medium=print&utm_campaign=UGRecruitment

Note: When you're creating shorter branded URLs for print campaigns using the T2M system, don't forget to include a UTM parameter in the destination URL. 

UTM Best practice

• Ensure UTMs are applied to all traffic you have control over: every link that forms part of a digital campaign - even if it’s not a paid-for element - should be tagged with a UTM.
• Be consistent in your use of tags 

In order to ensure data is easy to find and compare, it’s vital to be consistent in your use of UTMs, especially when referring to periodical campaigns (e.g offerholdersnov23 / offerholdersdec23) or a series of campaigns on the same theme. 

Some quick rules for consistency include: 

• Use short, descriptive names: Abbreviations are fine as long as they’re understandable and be sure to avoid long phrases. You should strive to name a campaign in such a way as to allow someone who was not involved with it to interpret what it was about.
• Use lower-case:UTMs are case-sensitive, so to prevent confusion or duplication,  all UTMs should be completely in lower case
• Include dates: Be sure to include dates at the end of the campaign element. For example, if the campaign was run across - or during - November 2023, we would simply add ‘nov23’ to the campaign parameter.
• Tag paid search traffic with medium  ‘cpc’ if not using GoogleAds autotags; using this tag will make it easier to compare paid-for search channels
• Tag paid social traffic with medium ‘paidsocial’ or 'paid_social'; this will prevent it from getting confused with that of paid search or organic social and allow easy comparison of campaigns. 
• Don’t use spaces or special characters
• Indicate geography if running the same campaign in multiple countries: simply preface the ‘source’ element of your UTM with a signifier for each separate country you’re running the campaign in. For instance the below UTMs would differentiate the same CPC campaign run in Germany and France:
  • ?utm_source=destudyinternational&utm_medium=cpc&utm_campaign=offerholdersnov23
  • ?utm_source=frstudyinternational&utm_medium=cpc&utm_campaign=offerholdersnov23     
  • See list of country abbreviations
• Update UTMs if you’ve made mid-campaign changes to ads - if you’ve made significant changes to assets during the course of campaign, it’s important to update your UTMs to reflect these. 

Using Google’s Campaign URL Builder

One easy way to build a UTM is via Google’s Campaign URL Builder tool. This enables you to simply input the campaign URL and particulars and get a UTM-tagged URL that is ready for use.

Getting campaign traffic data from Google Analytics

To check traffic data generated from campaigns in Google Analytics (GA4), follow these steps:

• In the left hand side navigation, go to Reports > Acquisition > Campaigns. 
• In the 'Session campaign' column, search for relevant campaign name.

The columns next to the 'Session campaign' will display how many sessions (visits), users and other metricss a specific campaign has generated for the destination page.

• Further information on GA4