Why you should use UTM tagging on your campaigns

UTM what?

UTM tagging! UTM stands for “Urchin Traffic Monitor”, Urchin being a web statistic analysis program that Google acquired in 2005. Following this acquisition, Google merged Urchin to its own monitoring/tracking system: Google Analytics. Even if Urchin doesn’t exist anymore, the name stuck.

So, basically, UTM parameters allow you to add some trackable extensions to your URLs. The parameters are:

• medium (mandatory): the medium the link was used upon. Examples: email, social_media...

• source (mandatory): the source or website the link is coming from. Examples: mailjet_UK, newsletter, android_app…

• campaign (mandatory): the way you will identify the links with the same medium and source.

• term (optional): if you are using paid search and/or referral, you will want to add this parameter with relevant keywords for your link to be better identified.

• content (optional): can be of interest if you’re A/B testing your links, so you can tell the versions apart.

To sum this up, UTM tagging is a simple and efficient way to categorize and organize the different sources of traffic coming to your website and identify their origins.

So, why is UTM tagging relevant to email?

As I mentioned in the intro, most ESP’s now provide you with relevant statistics and information about the campaigns you’ve sent. Your tracking stops at the status of the email: sent, opened, clicked, bounced, blocked, set as spam, unsubscribed… You can’t really see what happened after the reader clicked on your CTA. That’s the limitation here but, hey, let’s face it, ESPs are not CRMs.

That’s where using UTM tags can help you. They enable you to spot the source and medium of each of the links directing to your website, you’ll be able to identify who went where, and keep tracking that visitor through their journey on your website.

With this data, you’ll be able to know the preferences of your readers and send them more personalized offers and emails! You’ll (hopefully) get their attention more easily, and grow their engagement towards your brand. In the end, it will help you generate more revenue!

Nice! So, how do I do that with Mailjet?

There is nothing more simple! You just have to copy & paste a UTM tagged link into the CTAs of your newsletter in Passport. You may ask me: how do I create a UTM tagged link? Well, you have multiple options. You can do it manually, adding your source, medium and campaign tags directly when you’re writing your link, and get something like - https://www.mailjet.com/blog/utm-tagging/?utm_source=blog&utm_medium=website&utm_campaign=utm_post.

You can also make life a little easier by using an online link builder, like the Google Analytics URL builder. Or, you can create your own using a simple spreadsheet, adding your tags and links to the document, to get a ready-made UTM tagged URL.

All you have to do is to send your campaign, and wait for a little while to give your recipients time to actually open, read and click your email. And, follow the tracking through Google Analytics! You’ll then have a better understanding of the behavior of your readers, and will know what actually is relevant them.

As you now know, UTM Tagging is not rocket science. Though, making small edits to your links might actually help you grow your revenue and better engage with your prospects and customers. So now, you know what you need to do!

We’d love to hear your experiences with UTM tags, let us know by tweeting us @mailjet using the #mailjetmarketing.