It lets you track user engagement accurately from external sources within your preferred analytics platforms.UTM parameters is a series of code positioned at the end of an URL to explain the source, medium, campaign, term, and the piece of content that directed the user to your website.UTM parameters start with a “?” symbol and come after the primary URL address.
The series looks something like this:?utm_source=google_medium=display_campaign=winter-collection_term=sweaters_content=guideIn this example, the user clicked on this link that came from a Google Display “Winter Collection” campaign that was triggered by the term “sweaters” and showed off “guide” content.As you might have realized that this kind of information can be extremely useful to track how successful a particular campaign was.How UTM Parameters WorkWhen you make a content piece, whether it is a social media post or an ad copy, containing a link, add the UTM at the end of your URL.
If you are building different pages for every piece of content you publish, you can easily track their effectiveness.So, rather than seeing a source/medium as Twitter/referral for any traffic coming from Twitter, you can see Twitter/Paid-Winter.This also enables you to see the difference in performance from your organic Twitter efforts and paid winter Twitter campaign efforts.In the same way, if you have a winter campaign running on various platforms, you can assign the platform using unique UTMs for each platform.UTM parameters offer more relevant information about how people interact with your content, which helps you gain in-depth insights, allowing you to create better campaigns for your company next time.
These also help you in understanding your site traffic better.There are five UTM Parameters:Source: where the traffic is coming from, e.g., Google, Facebook, etc.Medium: how the traffic is coming, e.g., email, social media, etc.Campaign: why the traffic is comingTerm: which search term or keyword is bringing in the most trafficContent: which link (image, ad, button, text) is working best.Which UTM Parameters Are RequiredThese are the five UTM parameters that you can add to a URL:utm_sourceutm_mediumutm_campaignutm_termutm_contentAs per Google, the first three parameters i.e., source, medium, and campaign are required while the last two i.e., term and content, are optional.How to Add UTM Parameters in a URLUsing a URL builder like Google’s Campaign URL Builder is the best way to add the UTM parameter to a URL.
In fact, the order of the UTM parameters does not matter at all provided that you are starting the tags with a question mark “?” and joining them with an ampersand “&.”Do UTM Parameters Impact SEO?UTM parameters are just used for tracking the results of the URLs you are sharing online.
Neither will they boost your site’s SERPs rankings, nor will they harm them.Best Practices for UTM ParametersWhen making your UTM parameters, follow these best practices –Use lowercase letters in your UTMsUTMs are case sensitive, which is why the majority of people recommend using lowercase letters only.