Сheck and analyze site traffic with UTM tags. They allow you to find out which social network post, email marketing campaign, or advertisement campaign brought the most benefits.

Data from UTM tagged links are sent to analytical services, such as Google Analytics. In Google Analytics, you will find statistics reports with all the necessary information: where and how people got to your site.

Note: UTM tags are used to track external traffic.
Every time a tagged link is clicked, Google records this action as a new visit.

To track the success of short links with UTM paramenters, you need to create Short.cm and Google Analytics integration.

3 useful tips for creating UTM-tags:

1. Use lowercase letters.

Google Analytics is a case-sensitive service. Therefore, use lowercase letters for UTM parameters. For example, “Cpc” and “CPC” have different meanings. If using both of them, one can bring confusion and contradictions. It complicates the analytics of channels and campaigns.

2. Don’t use UTM tags for different types of traffic on a single source.

For example:

  • "utmsource = twitter+ad" for ads on Twitter;
  • "utmsource = twitter+post" for tweets.

Such usage of tags is misleading and useless. The Source and Medium labels are intended to provide various types of necessary information. Follow the standard Google model. Use Source to determine the source of traffic, and Medium to determine the type of traffic.

For example:

  • "utm_source = twitter" (for both advertisements and publications);
  • "utm_medium = cpc" (for advertising on twitter);
  • "utm_medium = social" (for posts on twitter).

This way of tags allocation lets you correctly compare paid and free traffic from Twitter.

3. Source and Medium duplications in one link.

There are cases when the same values of Source and Medium are used in one link.

For example:

  • "utm_source=email&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=products"

If you are going to use email as a medium, do not use it in as a source. Determine the type of email. Make sure that you will get relevant information through UTM-tags.

Where to use UTM-tags?

• Email marketing. To track each call to action (CTA) in emails, use a unique UTM parameter. For example, an email gives you a choice of two targeted actions. Name UTM parameters as CTA buttons. For example, “buy” and “visit". Compare the traffic, gotten from each of these two buttons, and make a coclusion, which one is more effective.

• Offline materials. The correct usage of UTM tags allows you to find out which banner brought more traffic.

• Social networks. UTM tags help to understand, which post brought the highest traffic.

• Advertising. You can find out, which ad and which keywords bring the best traffic and conversions. Imagine that you have a landing page with thousands of key phrases and ads. How to determine which ones work beneficially, and which ones don't? You need to add UTM tags.

Conclusion

UTM tagged URL is too long. This is inconvenient and unattractive. If you want your link to look short, bright and memorable, you can use Short.cm. Insert the link with UTM into the service, and Short.cm answers you with a short version. Moreover, you can add UTM tags straight in Short.cm.

What did you learn?

  • How to track success of short links?
  • Main nistakes while creating UTM tags.
  • Google Analytics displays statistics of UTM coded links.
  • Why do you need to shorten UTM tagged links?
  • How to use UTM tags?

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