What is a tracked link?

This article is part of the Link Tracking Manual. If you'd like to know more about what to do with a tracked link then the Link Tracking Manual is a good place to start.

So, what is a tracked link?

A tracked links is a 'normal' website link (URL), such as www.hud.ac.uk, that has extra information added to the end. This extra information is known as UTM data and can be recorded by analytics tools (such as Google Analytics) to identify how a user arrived at our website.

I'll explain more about the UTM data, how to define them and what you should include later.

But first,

What does a tracked link look like?

The below image shows what a tracked link looks like. It is made up of different parts and the 5 sections below are the minimum needed to track a digital campaign:

What does it look like?

1, The URI or web address

This is the page on the University of Huddersfield website that you would like the student to visit. 

2,Question Mark

A question mark when used in a URL is the start of a query string. This must be used straight after the web address as it signals the start of the tracking. 

3, utm_source

This lets us know where the traffic has come from. In other words this is the specific place where you are advertising such as Facebook, Twitter, UCAS, The Student Room etc. 

Common sources include:

facebook	studential
twitter	applytouni
instagram	universitycompare
pinterest	ucas
snapchat	bing
youtube	yahoo
google	linkedin
studentroom	findamasters

 

Important note: For email campaigns email is not the source. Email is a medium. The source is the email list you are sending the campaign to. For example, it might be applicant, ucas, international etc. This is important to remember otherwise any reports you request will be incorrect.

 

4, utm_medium

This tells us the type of campaign for example email, social, display etc. Here are examples of the different medium we use:

 

Medium	Description
email	email marketing, both internal and external.
ppc	pay per click such as Google Adwords or other paid campaigns.
display	banner ads, Google display network etc.
social	organic social only - please use ad for paid campaigns.
sms	text message campaigns
vod	video on demand - paid youtube ads etc.
retarg	retargeting campaign
canvas	facebook canvas ad type

Please stick to these medium types. If there is a different medium that you need to use but isn’t listed, please speak with the Web Content Officer in the Central Marketing Team. 

5, utm_campaign

The campaign field identifies the specific campaign you are running and is the main way results are separated between different campaigns in Google Analytics and the CRM. So it’s important you create a unique campaign name when running different campaigns. 

A preference is to use modifiers in the campaign name to help identify groups of campaigns. This is especially useful in Google Analytics. Here are a few campaign examples: 

• opendays-june17-whatuni-profile
• clearing17-tsr-email-architect
• studyfair17-20nov-current-int

If you are creating an email then the campaign should be the same as the email’s name. Please see the Email Comms and MaxEmail guides for more information on tracked links for email. 

Other Fields

There is also a utm_content field that can be used if needed but it is optional.

Case Sensitivity

Because Google Analytics is case sensitive all tracking fields should use lower case. By using lower case it removes an opportunity for confusion or duplicate campaigns inside Google Analytics.

Example: Google Analytics will see OpenDays, Opendays and opendays as 3 separate campaign names. Whereas we would want to report them all as 1 campaign.

The CRM system is not case sensitive.