UTM Links and Meta/Facebook Ads
I just wanted to spend a moment considering the best way to track Meta Ads on Google Analytics and other Tracking Services. This is a huge bone of contention as many advertisers simply do not attach any importance to this topic at all.
It somewhat astounds me that business or website owners desperate for some sales succumb to a Sales Rep for some digital agency who then provides no data at all on the success of their campaigns.
Not to blow our own trumpet here too much, but if you spend £500 on advertising, then you would surely expect more than £500 in increased revenues. The original concept of Google Ads did exactly this – it allowed you to precisely measure the return on your investment. This was revolutionary and helped crush the traditional way of thinking within the Advertising industry.
I think it was the Economist who originally coined the phrase ‘spend a dollar, get five back’ and this has remained the overall marketing maxim for a lot of advertisers ever since.
Law of Exact Stats
When looking to judge if spending on advertising is worth it, it seems obvious that the better quality your data is, the better you can judge the success of a campaign. If you spend $100 and have no idea what the result is – why should you spend the $100 again?
You need to take Tracking seriously. All the time.
Let’s assume you get 1000 visitors to the website and 10 people buy something. That’s a 1% return, you can safely say 1% of your traffic will convert. However, if you dig into the data and can determine that 200 visitors are from a country you do not sell to and another 100 visitors are yourself, because you have been amending your website, suddenly your rate of return changes dramatically. Now, you have 10 customers, but can safely say you had 700 valid visitors to the website. That’s a return of 1.4% – considerably better.
You can take this as far as you like. But at the end of the day, there are some types of traffic you can discount completely (your own footfall, for example) which will give you a truer picture of your advertising efforts.
So Stats – ultimately your P/L account gives a company it’s position, Money in or out. The next best is your bank account – monies in, monies out. As you collect sales – your bank will fill up. This is your most accurate barometer of a successful advertising campaign.
Failing that, your fulfilment system, should be next. Website platforms like Shopify make this easy, you can get reports of sales and be reasonably reliant on this information. The advantage of using your ERP for reporting is that it will cater for returns, or false sales, for example orders that have not been paid for, And a decent ERP will give information on where sales came from. it is not always easy to work out, but it is worth putting in the time and resources to get meaningful reporting from your order fulfilment system.
Google Analytics
Next on the list is Google Analytics, but two immediate issues arise here, that severely restrict accuracy, the first is privacy, it’s easy for customers to block Google Analytics and prevent tracking, the second is Google itse;f, they have stated that where data cannot be tracked Google will use AI to fill in the gaps. That is quite an astounding statement, but what it really means is watch Google Analytics, but don’t rely on it.
For the purposes of this article of Meta or Facebook Tracking and Advertising, all we want to do is make sure our Google Analytics ties into what we’re doing as best we can.
And tracking Meta is what we really want to do at this point.
Meta Ads
There are two places where you can ‘build URL links’ (utm) within a Meta Advertising Campaign, I suppose the most important aspect of all is that all Destination Links are based per Ad. These are not set at Campaign or Ad Set level. As with Google Ads, the actual destination that people click to land on a website is set per Advert.
The advantage is plainly precision; each image within a carousel can have its own Destination URL. Each Advert can, therefore, have multiple Destination URLs. Meta calls these Website URLs. This field is located about a third of the way down the Ad Setting page when you edit an Advert.
Since this is the vary place where you set the Destination Website URL, it makes sense to also click the ‘Build a URL Parameter’ settings and add tracking parameters immediately. The screen you want to complete as follows:
Now to break it down a little:
- Website URL – This should link to the actual landing page of the website required. It could be the Homepage, but it is often better to link to a page that contains content that is relevant to the Advert. E.g. a sign-up page for sign-ups or a product page for eCommerce and so on.
- Campaign source – There are a variety of choices here and it is also possible to override with your own description of the source. However, we recommend using {{site_source_name}} as the default setting. Site Source Name will be:
- FB for Facebook
- IG for Instagram
- MSG for Messenger
- AN for Audience Network
The real argument for going with {{site_source_name}} is Google Analytics, when exploring Stats on Google Analytics, the terms FB and IG are instantly recognisable within the Google ‘sphere’.
- Campaign Medium – We recommend using the phrase Paid_Social. This is another automatically recognised Google Analytics result. When looking up the default reports on Google Analytics Paid Social is one of them, but for Google to recognise it properly, there is a requirement to add in the Underscore. So Paid_Social.
- Campaign Name – Is self=-explainatary and can be set to the dynamic setting of {{campaign.name}}. Arguments exist for setting this to Ad Name or Ad Set name, but realistically this is the Campaign Name and so should be set as the Campaign Name.
There are more fields that can be filled in, but I would ask why, what value is there in filling in more. The reason for this is the purpose we’re trying to achieve. Tracking Meta/Facebook/Instagram Ads. The two places where we want to track all this is within our ERP or Fulfilment system (Shopify), and on Google Ads. And neither of these really allows you to drill much deeper than Campaign Name.
So unless your ERP/Fulfilment system can report on the additional information, we have filled in enough.
Understanding Destination
The URLs used in conjunction with the Website Destination are the actual URL’s that users will land on when they arrive at the website. Whatever data is in the UTM will be used by the receiving tracking method and over-write any ‘automation’ within the landing page. These UTM’s are definitive.
So, it makes sense if you want accurate tracking, just ensure every website destination field is set correctly with the relevant UTM included.
Tracking
Now we have to ask why Facebook has given us a separate URL parameters section within the Tracking Settings at the bottom of the Ad Setting page. Why is there this extra section? It’s just extra confusion; I have seen advertisers debate hotly over this for years. And it’s there purely as some sort of legacy to a previous incarnation of Meta Ads. Some people fill in it, some don’t.
At least this is optional.
It has all the same settings as the Website Destination URL, but it is not URL-dependent. What actually happens is that the parameters set here will be added to every URL used within the Ad campaign.
The exact situation is that these URL Parameters will override the parameters set on the Website Destination URL.
This is the important part to understand – these ones take precedence over the Website URL Parameters.
Case Use – This is all good stuff as you could in theory, set the Campaign Source to {{site_source_name}} globally for the URL, but then just vary the Campaign Name per Carousel item, or Video clip etc. In theory, you could be clever and ensure some consistency in the reporting by having some fields fixed at this Tracking level.
The Lazy Advertiser
Apart from doing nothing, the Lazy Advertiser will just use these URL Parameters within tracking to set their UTMs. In theory, this should work; however, it will significantly reduce the accuracy of the data. The key is in the work. Optional. These settings are optional to complete, and therefore, Meta may or may not use them. Also, there is a chance that at some point in the future, this doubling up of UTM settings will be phased out, and my money is on these Tracking URL Parameters being the one to go.
It can be seen as quicker and easier to add URL Parameters, It is also the case that if Website Destination URLs weren’t set properly in the beginning, a quicker option is to apply URL Parameters.
You see where I am going with this.
The Correct Approach
Use both – it cannot hurt, and it’s what they are, therefore. A golden rule with all meta Avdertising is that if there is a setting, set it. The less comprehensive the Ad Campaign set up – the more Meta will run away with accountable spend and results.
The first thing is to decide on your terminology. I want Meta Ads to work with Google Analytics and my Fulfilment system, so I want to use industry-recognised phraseology. Not some made-up words of my own interpretation.
- Campaign Source: {{site_source_name}}
- Campaign Medium: Paid_Social
- Campaign Name: {{campaign_name}}
This just works – out of the box every time.