Facebook advertising is an integral part of driving traffic and generating sales on your website. However, looking at Google Analytics, it’s not always clear which Facebook ads lead to clicks and sales. By simply adding UTM parameters to your URL, you can gain valuable context about your website visitors, ultimately helping you create better and more profitable advertising campaigns for your brand.
In this blog, we’ll take a closer look at what UTM parameters are and how you can improve your Facebook ads.
What are UTM parameters?
Urchin Tracking Module (UTM) parameters, also known as UTM tags or UTM codes, are small pieces of code that can be added to the end of regular URLs to track traffic that clicks on specific links.
The UTM code allows us to see the effectiveness of our advertising efforts (so-called “campaigns”) and how visitors interact with her website.
A typical URL looks like this:
But if you add the UTM tag to your email newsletter, for example, the URL will look like this:
UTM parameters are tags that may appear at the end of a URL. Provides information about which ads, posts, CTA buttons, etc., were clicked to direct visitors to specific pages on her website. You can also see how much traffic is coming from the same exit points by using Google Analytics.
An example URL with UTM parameters, created with Google’s Campaign URL Builder.
Why should I use UTM parameters?
Without tagging your URLs with UTM parameters, you would not be able to distinguish the traffic sources feeding your website, all of which would be grouped into one bucket. will be Failure to add UTM parameters to URLs makes it impossible to track campaign effectiveness, making it even more difficult to understand what ad content resonates with your audience. Using UTM parameters, you can see that one of your Facebook carousel ads is driving more traffic to your site than the others. You must ensure that the URLs of all ads you create or share are tagged with his UTM code.
These are the best options for gathering more information about how users interact with your content. In this context, you can evaluate which ads are most appealing to potential customers and create better ads. You can use this data to optimize your overall advertising strategy and ultimately drive more valuable traffic to your website. How to create UTM parameters
We recommend building your UTM code with Google’s Campaign URL Builder. This handy tool automatically generates full URLs with parameters appended. There are five different types of parameters, each building on the previous parameter and providing more context about the link you’re trying to follow. Google provides a quick breakdown of the technical specifications for each type on the Campaign URL Builder page.
5 types of UTM parameters
Here are the steps to create a URL for a company called Dog Social Club. This company runs Facebook ads to get people to visit dog daycares. This example shows how to use each parameter in your own marketing efforts.
Three tags are required: source, medium and name.
Campaign Source – utm_source – Identifies the source of traffic. In this example, it’s paid Facebook. When someone clicks on your Facebook ad, they will be redirected to the following page with the source defined as Paid Facebook.
Campaign Medium – utm_medium – Identifies the marketing medium the link was shared with. For us, it’s cost-per-click, expressed as CPC.
Campaign Name – utm_campaign – Identifies the specific campaign associated with this link. In our case, it is a factory tour, but there is also the possibility of product launches, sales, and giveaways.
Campaign Content – utm_content – Allows you to add explicit information to your URL string. Use this for A/B testing, various his CTAs, or buttons. This is where tagging can really be analyzed and specific.You could say that this campaign is testing several new image types for social assets. I tested two different images and the second image was clicked.
Write UTM parameters
- Enter each parameter individually using Google’s Campaign URL Builder.
- Check Facebook Ads with Google Analytics
- Go to the Acquisition tab and select All Traffic.
You can then access the UTM code from Channel, Source/Medium, Social or All Campaigns. These tabs give you a better picture of where your website traffic is coming from, including the Facebook parameters you’ve set.
For more in-depth Facebook analytics, click the Social tab to get data on targeting and conversions, plugins, sources and pages, and user flows. UTM code best practices to remember -There are many best practices to follow when working with UTM code, but here are a few to get you started with the basics.
- Keep names brief, short, and lowercase.
- Be consistent in your style instead of repeating yourself.
- Use hyphens instead of underscores to separate words.
- Shorten links and clean up the page.
- UTM Code is a great tool for both novice and advanced Facebook marketers.
- Tracking your advertising success can give you a better idea of where your efforts are paying off.
- UTM code makes it quick and easy.
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