Tracking social media success: UTM tags + Google Analytics.
Want detailed insights into the success of your social media campaign? Once you understand the power of UTM tags and Google Analytics, you will have all the insights you need and more!
We’re sure you’ve heard of or currently use Google Analytics. Without a detailed understanding of the tool or not setting up the UTM tags correctly, you won’t be getting the most out of your data. When set up and used effectively, UTM tags and Google Analytics are extremely useful in tracking your campaign success and understanding referral traffic.
UTMs play a vital role when undergoing a social media audit and assessing the success of your campaigns.
If you have no idea what UTMs are or why you should consider them as part of your paid social strategy, don’t fret – we will explain it all. Let’s go!
So … what are UTM tags?
UTM tags are URL parameters (pieces of information) that can be added to the end of a URL link. They allow specific information to be passed on to Google Analytics, which provides you with useful information about the links’ placement, purpose, and content. This enables easy tracking of clicks and referral traffic.
There are five main pieces of information you can track using UTM tags but you only need the first three if you use Google Analytics, so let’s focus on them.
- Source
This refers to the traffic source. It tells you where a link was clicked before leading to your website. For example, Instagram or Facebook.
- Medium
The marketing channel where the link was placed. For example, if the link was on a social media post, it would be ‘social’ or if it was on paid advertisement, it would be cost-per-click ads (cpc).
- Campaign name
This means the name of the campaign that the link is associated with. For example, this could be ‘Black Friday’ or ‘Christmas’ – it doesn’t matter what the name is, just as long as you understand it.
Once you have the three pieces of information, don’t worry about building the URL yourself, you can use Google URL Builder to do it for you (thanks Google!).
Why you should use UTM tags, explained in four key benefits
By making sure to create UTM tags and build URLs for all your posts, you will be able to effectively track what content and platforms generate the most referral traffic to your site so you can do more of what works!
It is also important to note that, by default, Google can track if users come from paid search/organic or referral but it labels anything else as ‘direct traffic’. That is why using UTM tags is especially important for channels that are not automatically recognised by Google (like email campaigns or paid social media campaigns). Here are some more benefits :
Measure campaign performance
With UTM tags, you can investigate metrics like average time on-site and goal conversions. From this, you can assess how your campaign performed in different areas across different platforms.
Track ROI
As UTM tags allow you to track referral traffic, you can measure the ROI of your campaigns. You can see what content is performing best, and how many sales are attributed to specific content and use this to adjust your paid social budget appropriately.
Segment your audience
Being able to segment your visitors based on source, allows you to analyse which content resonates best with different sources. This means you can create specific content that suits different target audiences.
Reporting
Using all the data the UTM tags provide you with will allow you to understand what content is most effective in generating traffic and sales. You can then use this to justify the choices you make with your paid social strategy.
As our Head of PPC, Callumn Leanord, says “One of the most important values of digital marketing is proving tangible results and justifying the budgets you require. Utilising UTM tracking will allow you to do exactly this, you will be able to produce end-to-end data from ad spend to revenue generated, allowing for seamless and justifiable scaling.”
Two top tips
1. UTM tags and internal links do not mix!
UTM tags are specifically designed to track external sources. Using UTM tags on internal site pages will confuse Google Analytics and lead to tracking errors.
2. Format and style need to be consistent.
By using Google URL builder, styling should always be the same but just in case, here are some general guidelines for your UTM tags.
- Use lowercase (tags are case-sensitive).
- Don’t use spaces.
- Keep UTM tags short and sweet.
You now have all the information you need to create accurate UTM tags and successfully track your traffic!
If you are intrigued and would like to learn more, our team of digital experts can help you measure the success of your campaigns. Get in touch today!
