The UR Guide to UTM Tracking


In the digital age, data-driven decision-making is at the heart of successful marketing campaigns. At the University of Minnesota, we use UTM (Urchin Tracking Module) parameters to measure the effectiveness of our marketing efforts, from paid advertising to digital content.  This blog post dives into the world of UTMs, explaining why they're crucial and outlining the University's specific guidelines for using them.

What are UTMs and Why are They Important?

UTMs are snippets of characters (or words) added to URLs that provide valuable data on how users reach your website. They tell you where the traffic originated (source), how they found the link (medium), and the specific campaign driving them (campaign). With this information, you can measure the effectiveness of various marketing efforts and optimize your strategies for better results.

The UTM Structure: Building Your Tracking Code

There are five main UTM parameters used:

  • Source: Identifies the platform where the link appears (e.g., email, facebook, google).
  • Medium: Captures the way the link is presented (e.g., email, paid-social, organic_social).
  • Campaign: Groups related promotions under a single umbrella (e.g., ur_blog_24 for a blog post campaign).
  • Term: Primarily used for paid ads, it identifies specific keywords used in search campaigns (optional).
  • Content: Helps differentiate segments within a campaign (e.g., ad size, headline, etc.) (optional).

Best Practices for Effective UTM Tracking

Following these guidelines ensures consistency across all University marketing initiatives, leading to cleaner, more actionable data:

  • Consistency is Key: Use UTMs only for external traffic sources, not internal links. This prevents skewing metrics.
  • Case Matters: Stick to lowercase letters throughout your UTM string. A capital "F" in "facebook" is different from a lowercase one! Google Analytics 4 (GA4) would consider both a lowercase and uppercase different UTMs because it is case sensitive.
  • Order Matters: List your UTM parameters in the recommended order (source, medium, campaign, term, content). Truncated URLs will prioritize data at the beginning.
  • Vanity URLs: For print, QR codes, and text messages, utilize short vanity URLs (z-links) that redirect to the final URL with UTM parameters. But be careful as a shortened URL will only hold one UTM. This means multiple shortened URLs will need to be created across channels.
  • Unique Trackers: As noted above, assign a unique UTM (and corresponding vanity URL) to each marketing piece for individual tracking.
  • Testing with "test": When testing URLs, include "test" in the UTM string to easily identify and exclude those test hits from your data.
  • The Power of Spreadsheets: A dedicated spreadsheet helps generate UTM-tagged URLs, maintain a historical reference, and ensure consistent unit-wide practices. The University Relations Measurement & Analytics team has templates that are provided at the end of this article.
  • Finding Your UTMs in GA4: Access the Traffic Acquisition Reports within GA4. Here, you can explore data by adding secondary dimensions for each UTM parameter. Looker Studio provides even greater flexibility for visualizing UTM data across multiple dimensions.

Additional Resources

Below are more helpful resources to help your team create your own UTM parameters. And, as always, you can reach out to the University Relations Measurement and Analytics team for additional guidance.

UTM Tracking Guidelines: Guidelines for UTM building for University of Minnesota units found on the University Relations Resources website.

UTM Builder Tracking Sheet: This is our handy guide for UTM building. The first sheet highlights common terms for channels with additional examples. The second sheet provides a list of partner abbreviations that help identify which partner unit to contact regarding the UTM. The third sheet provides example scenarios for building out your own custom UTMs. As a user, you will need to fill out the necessary parameters and a final URL with UTMs will be generated under the green column header.

Be sure to make a copy for your team as this is shared across the U.

UTM Tracking Guidelines: Neil Patel wrote a great blog article on How to Use UTM Parameters to Track Everything, which gives a detailed tutorial on the how and why of Google Analytics 4 tracking.

Google’s UTM Builder: Google has a great UTM builder (especially for those getting started) that allows you to add in your parameters and outputs the final link.

And, as always, you can reach out to the University Relations Measurement and Analytics team (meye3817@umn.edu) for additional guidance. Happy analyzing!

Topics: Brand and Campaign Media Relations Tips and Tricks Web Internal Communications