Landing page tagging guide

This is for:

Developer

In this article, we’ll outline our specification for tagging landing pages in the Coveo Experimentation Hub.

Intro

If you adopt the specification detailed in this article, we guarantee that traffic sources will be assigned accurately in the Experimentation Hub.

This guide describes both the required and the recommended parameters that should be included in landing URLs for the main traffic sources.

UTM parameters

These parameters are commonly used to tag landing pages and are the recommended parameters from Google for doing this. We support overlap with these parameters and encourage their use as they are often convenient and familiar.

We require the use of utm_medium to identify the broad referrer type for each traffic source. Getting the referrer type right is essential to use the Experimentation Hub.

Warning

The correct utm_medium is the absolute minimum requirement. Without it, we will need to set up alternative processing which will entail chargeable custom development work.

We do not encourage the use of utm_source as it is often used in misleading ways. The exception is for display traffic, where the display network can be identified with utm_source.

If you wish to use Google Analytics’s breakdown of source and medium for your traffic you should retain utm_source parameters alongside the recommended ones.

Note

All other parameters are optional but are highly recommended. As much information as possible should be provided about traffic sources. Providing more details creates the potential for far deeper analysis in the Experimentation Hub.

General structure

After the URL, add ? before the first parameter and its value:

http://www.qubit.com/?utm_medium=paid_search

Add the & symbol before each further parameter:

http://www.qubit.com/?utm_medium=paid_search&network=bing&utm_campaign=good_tagging
Note

The order of the parameters is unimportant. They can be added before or after any others you use, as long as each new one is prefixed by an &.

Summary of referrer types

These are the referrer types that we use to categorize referral traffic. They are described in detail in Parameter specification. All of these referrer types should be set with the utm_medium parameter as shown.

Warning

The use of utm_medium is critical, as explained above.
Referrer type Required Parameter

Paid Search

utm_medium=paid_search

Vertical Search

utm_medium=vertical_search

Email

utm_medium=email

Affiliate

utm_medium=affiliate

Social

utm_medium=social

Display

utm_medium=display

Offline

utm_medium=offline

There are also two referrer types which are detected automatically and do not need to be manually tagged: Organic Search and Referral:

  • Organic Search traffic is traffic from search engines that is not paid for

  • A Referral describes traffic that does not fall into any of the other types. An example is an independent site linking to a page without any payment for the traffic

  • Direct traffic has no immediate source with a URL. It typically comes from the user entering the URL directly or using a bookmark

Parameter specification

Paid search traffic is that which is driven from a search engine’s results page and has been paid for.

Specifically, paid search traffic comes from sponsored search results. Google Adwords is the largest provider of this service.

We recommend the use of the following descriptive parameters rather than using only gclid to identify a paid search referral.

Example:

http://www.qubit.com/support?utm_medium=cpc&network=google&utm_campaign=tagging_spec&utm_content=v3&adgroup=void&matchtype=broad&keywords=tag&gclid=CPzB25zw6bACFVMdtAodWjUnIQ

Required parameter

Referral detail Parameter and description Example

Referrer type

Use utm_medium=paid_search or utm_medium=sem or utm_medium=cpc or utm_medium=ppc to identify the referrer type as paid search

utm_medium=paid_searchOr the rather less descriptive utm_medium=cpc to retain full compatibility with Google Analytic’s Adwords features
Referral detail Parameter and description Example

Network

Use network to identify a network such as bing or google

network=bing

Campaign

Use utm_campaign to identify a specific product promotion or strategic campaign

utm_campaign=spring_sale

Content

Use utm_content to identify ads or links that point to the same url

utm_content=textlink

Ad Group

Use adgroup to identify the specific ad group to which a given referring ad belongs

adgroup=brand

Match Type

Use matchtype to identify whether the impression was triggered by a broad, exact, or phrase match

matchtype=broad

Keywords

Use keywords, or search_keywords, or utm_term to identify the keywords that were responsible for the match. This is not the search query itself but the matching keywords

utm_term=hats

Autotagging

Use gclid to capture the gclid associated with this click through

gclid=CPzB25zw6bACFVMdtAodWjUnIQ

Vertical search traffic is traffic from a sector-specific search engine. Broadly speaking, vertical search engines are search engines that perform a specific type of search, such as google shopping, which searches products and serves product listing adverts or travelsupermarket, which searches for flights and holidays.

This separates vertical search traffic from paid or organic search traffic, in that paid and organic searches are considered to operate over web pages whereas vertical search operates over products and services.

Example:

http://www.qubit.com/support?utm_medium=vertical_search&network=bing&utm_campaign=black_shoes&adgroup=SS15&keywords=black%20shoes

Required parameter

Referrer detail Parameter and description Example

Referrer type

Use utm_medium=vertical_search, utm_medium=cse, utm_medium=comparateurs, or utm_medium=comparatori to identify the referrer type as vertical search

utm_medium=vertical_search
Referral detail Parameter and description Example

Network

Use network to identify a network such as bing or google

network=bing

Campaign

Use utm_campaign to identify a specific product promotion or strategic campaign

utm_campaign=spring_sale

Content

Use utm_content to identify ads or links that point to the same url

utm_content=textlink

Ad Group

Use adgroup to identify the specific ad group to which a given referring ad belongs

adgroup=brand

Match Type

Use matchtype to identify whether the impression was triggered by a broad, exact, or phrase match

matchtype=broad

Keywords

Use keywords, search_keywords, or utm_term to identify the keywords that were responsible for the match. This is not the search query itself but the matching keywords

utm_term=hats

Autotagging

Use gclid to capture the gclid associated with this click through

gclid=CPzB25zw6bACFVMdtAodWjUnIQ

Email

Email traffic represents any traffic that comes from an email. This email may be opened in a browser based email client or a specific email application.

The media type is used to understand what kind of email this is:

  • Owned email traffic - comes from a mailout sent out to customers

  • Bought email traffic - comes from an advert in an email sent by another organization

  • Earned email traffic - generated spontaneously from communication between customers, perhaps recommending a product to a friend

Example:

http://www.qubit.com/support?utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=june2016&media_type=earned&network=mailmonkey&utm_content=bananas

Required parameter

Referrer detail Parameter and description Example

Referrer type

Use utm_medium=email to identify the referrer type as email

utm_medium=email
Referrer detail Parameter and description Example

Campaign

Use utm_campaign to identify a specific product promotion or strategic campaign

utm_campaign=august_mailshot

Media Type

Use media_type to identify whether the traffic is owned, bought, or earned

media_type=earned

Network

Use network to identify a network such as mailmonkey or pure36

network=pure36

Content

Use utm_content to identify ads or links that point to the same url

utm_content=textlink

Affiliate

Affiliate traffic is traffic that comes specifically from a marketing affiliate.

Example:

http://www.qubit.com/support?utm_medium=affiliate&network=link_junction&affiliate_id=mse1&utm_content=textlink&publisher=mse

Required parameter

Referrer detail Parameter and description Example

Referrer type

Use utm_medium=affiliate to identify the referrer type as an affiliate

utm_medium=affiliate
Referrer detail Parameter and description Example

Network

Use network to identify a network such as Commission Junction or LinkShare

network=commission_junction

Affiliate ID

Use affiliate_id to identify a specific affiliate as specified by the affiliate network’s setup

affiliate_id=mse

Content

Use utm_content to identify ads or links that point to the same url

utm_content=textlink

Publisher

Use publisher to identify the publisher of the affiliate link, that is, the affiliate itself

publisher=mse

Campaign

Use utm_campaign to identify a specific promotion or campaign

utm_campaign=white_summer

Social

Social traffic is traffic from sites that are considered to be social networking sites. Examples are Facebook, Twitter, and Pinterest. We consider all traffic from these sites to be social traffic, even if it comes from advertising on a social site. The media type describes the different kinds of traffic that can be expected from social media:

  • Bought social traffic - traffic from social media advertising. Earned social traffic is traffic from the usual exchanges of customers between themselves

  • Owned social traffic - driven from a corporate social media profile like facebook page or twitter feed which serves as an advertising platform

Example:

http://www.qubit.com/support?utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=june_sale&media_type=bought&network=facebook&utm_content=best_service

Display

Display traffic is traffic from display advertising. Display advertising can be either graphical or text based and includes Google’s adsense platform.

Display advertising includes Placement advertising as well as retargeting advertisements.

Example:

http://www.qubit.com/support?utm_medium=display&utm_campaign=june16&network=criteo&retargeting_or_placement=retargeting&utm_content=textlink

Required parameter

Referrer detail Parameter and description Example

Referrer type

Use utm_medium=display to identify the referrer type as a display advertisement

utm_medium=display
Referrer detail Parameter and description Example

Network

Use network or utm_source to identify the add network

network=critero

Retargeting or Placement

Use retargeting_or_placement to identify whether the display advert was from a retargeting network

retargeting_or_placement=retargeting

Campaign

Use utm_campaign to identify a specific product promotion or strategic campaign

utm_campaign=display1

Content

Use utm_content to identify ads or links that point to the same url

utm_content=textlink

Offline

Offline traffic is traffic driven by offline advertising campaigns such as catalogs, billboards, or postal campaigns. The parameters could be included in a QR code.

Example:

http://www.qubit.com/support?utm_medium=offline&utm_content=best_service

Required parameter

Referrer detail Parameter and description Example

Referrer type

Use utm_medium=offline to identify the referrer type as offline

utm_medium=offline
Referrer detail Parameter and description Example

Channel

Use channel to identify the specific medium through which the campaign was run

channel=magazine

Campaign

Use utm_campaign to identify a specific product promotion or strategic campaign

utm_campaign=tube1&utm_content=best_service

Content

Use utm_content to identify ads or links that point to the same url

utm_content=textlink