In this article we’ll discuss how UltraCart collects, stores, and presents UTM parameter information.

What are UTM parameters?

Before we dive into the topic, let’s cover what UTM parameters are and their usage. UTM parameters are attributes you append to hyperlinks (destination URLs) for marketing campaigns sending traffic to your website. When the link is clicked and the visitor arrives on your site, UTM parameters are collected by UltraCart Analytics. UltraCart will collect six different UTM parameters:

• utm_source

• utm_medium

• utm_campaign

• utm_term

• utm_content

• utm_id

How are UTM parameters collected?

The UltraCart Analytics system automatically collects the UTM parameters that it observes. Analytics sessions process asynchronously several minutes after the order is placed. UTM campaign hits across all sessions since customer first visited or their last order. UltraCart Analytics is automatically running on your StoreFront and checkout. If you’re utilizing a website in front of UltraCart, such as a WordPress site for your WWW, a product review site, etc. then you will want to deploy UltraCart Analytics to this external site using the documentation located here.

Where are UTM parameters stored?

The UltraCart Analytics information is processed shortly after the session is finished. If the data contains UTM parameters then the first set of UTM parameters will be stored on the UltraCart order as properties. The names of the properties are:

• ucasource

• ucacampaign

• ucaUtmMedium

• ucaUtmTerm

• ucaUtmContent

• ucaUtmId

How can I access the UTM parameters stored?

There are several different ways to see the UTM data that is collected. Here are the current list of ways:

• Order Management → View All Orders has result columns for “UTM Source” and “UTM campaign”. Adding these columns to your result display is a good way to keep your finger on the pulse when looking at search results.

• Order Management → View All Orders → Individual Order will display the UTM details down below the order as another quick way to see where an individual order came from.

• Order Management > (Tools section) Export Orders has all six of the UTM parameters available to the export mapping.

• REST API / Webhooks for the order object will contain the UTM properties mentioned above within the JSON object.

• Data Warehouse for BigQuery - the order objects will contain the properties. Using BigQuery is a great way to build custom dashboards and match up other marketing information sources for reporting. More and more we are seeing merchants dump ad spend data from various platforms using products like Funnel.io into BigQuery and then matching up their marketing spend with order flow.

• StoreFront Screen Recording - The screen recordings will contain the parameter information within the timeline. It can also be searched on to find sessions that originated from a particular traffic source.

What if a customer encounters multiple UTM parameters on different URLs?

UltraCart is going to consider the original UTM parameters as the definitive ones for the order. If you have intermediate URLs that are also passing UTM parameters, there is one option for unlocking that information. First you need to deploy StoreFront Screen Recording both internally and externally to wherever UTM parameters are on URLs. Once that is done, you’ll want to configure the Data Warehouse for BigQuery solution. UltraCart will drive down all the meta data for screen recording down into BigQuery where you can do analysis and reporting.