This article describes the basics of UTM parameters and how to build a UTM link. learn more about how to track UTM data in Funraise.
UTM parameters enable you to answer important fundraising questions:
Where are donations coming from? Facebook, Twitter, Email?
What campaign has raised the most online?
We spent $1000 on Facebook Ads, how much did we raise from those ads?
Did email version A or version B raise more?
What are UTMs?
Urchin Tracking Module (UTM) parameters are five variants of URL parameters used by marketers to track the effectiveness of online marketing campaigns across traffic sources and publishing media.
The UTM parameters in a URL identify the campaign that refers traffic to a specific website, and attributes it to the browser's website session and the sessions after that until the campaign attribution window expires. The parameters can be parsed by analytics tools and used to populate reports.
There are 5 different UTM parameters, which may be used in any order:
utm_source
Identifies which site or platform that sent the traffic
Example: google, facebook, email
utm_medium
Identifies what type of link was used
Examples: cpc, banner, email_newsletter
utm_campaign
Identifies a specific promotion or strategic campaign
Examples: giving_tuesday, monthly_donors, december_2020
utm_content
Identifies what specifically was clicked to bring the user to the site. It is often used for A/B testing and content-targeted ads.
Examples: green_banner_ad, blue_banner_ad, email_version_a
utm_term
Identifies search terms and can be populated by the search engine.
You should not include
utm_termin your links unless you are running paid ads on keywords.
How to create a link with UTM paramters?
UTM parameters are added to the end of your link. For example, a link with UTMs looks like this:
UTM link generator
Creating a properly formatted UTM link is easy, but it’s a good idea to use a link generator. There are many free tools available - we suggest using this free UTM link generator from Google.
Use a UTM library for consistency
Tracking UTMs is an exact science. It’s important that you use consistent values for your UTM parameters. We suggest using a single shared document that contains all your approved UTMs for use when promoting links publicly.
Each time you create a new link, you'll want to ensure you're using the correct values. Take a look at the example UTM library tracking sheet and feel free to copy and customize for your team.