Tracking email campaigns links with Google Analytics
I was searching for a way to track links posted in an email campaign or a newsletter and I saw that Google Analytics provide us with a great tool for this issue.
You can define your own custom email campaigns to track the efficiency of your emails and improve the ones that fail to get you the desired results based on real reports not on personal opinions.
Now I’ll show you how to edit your links so that they can be tracked by your Google Analytics account:
Normal link example:
http://www.example.com/landing-page.php
Link that will be tracked by Google Analytics:
http://www.example.com/landing-page.php?utm_source=email_campaign&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=My_Email_Campaign
The variables passed in the URL:
- Campaign Source (utm_source).
- Campaign Medium (utm_medium). This identifies the campaign instrument used(email, pay-per-click etc.). In the case of email marketing, your medium is ‘email’.
- Campaign Name (utm_campaign). This identifies the name of your campaign. The Campaign Name helps you differentiate between various campaigns or unique messages within each campaign.
This will definitely help you make better decisions regarding your email marketing system and will provide you with detailed reports on each e-marketing campaign you launch.
