The easiest way to capture UTM parameters in ARForms
Learn how to capture UTM parameters (and other lead source data) in ARForms so you can track where your leads actually come from.
Have you ever wondered which marketing channels and campaigns are bringing in most of your leads and customers?
With the help of Attributer, you can easily capture UTM parameters from your marketing campaigns with each submission of your ARForms forms. You can send this information into your CRM (or other tools) and run reports that show how many leads you're getting from your various marketing initiatives.
In this article, we'll show you the 4 simple steps to capturing UTM parameters in ARForms.
4 steps for capturing UTM parameters in ARForms
Using Attributer to capture UTM parameters in ARForms is simple. Here's how to do it in 4 easy steps:
1. Add UTM parameters to your ads
First and foremost, it is essential to ensure that you incorporate UTM parameters in your paid advertising campaigns.
Regardless of whether you are running advertisements on popular social media platforms such as LinkedIn, Instagram, Twitter, and Facebook, or utilizing search engines like Bing and Google, ensuring you have UTM parameters behind all your ads is critical.
2. Add hidden fields to your forms
The next step involves integrating hidden fields into the ARForms forms on your website.
Hidden fields, as their name implies, remain unseen by site visitors but are still part of the form. These fields allow tools like Attributer to write information (such as UTM parameters) into the form without visitors' knowledge.
The hidden fields you need to add to your ARForms are:
- Channel
- Channel Drilldown 1
- Channel Drilldown 2
- Channel Drilldown 3
- Landing Page
- Landing Page Group
3. Attributer automatically completes the hidden fields with UTM data
Once you have set up the hidden fields, Attributer will begin to track where your website visitors are coming from.
Then when a visitor completes a form on your site, Attributer automatically populates the hidden fields with the UTM parameters the visitor arrived with.
Let's delve into an example featuring you as the marketing lead at a company called Olmo Software.
Imagine someone searches for your company name on Google, clicks on one of your ads, explores your site, and proceeds to fill out a demo request form.
Attributer leverages the UTM parameters you added to your ads to populate the hidden fields. Here's an example of how it might appear:
- Channel: Paid search
- Channel Drilldown 1: Google
- Channel Drilldown 2: Brand campaign
- Channel Drilldown 3: Olmo Software
In addition to this, Attributer keeps track of the visitor's initial landing page and includes it in the hidden fields. For Olmo Software, it might appear as follows:
- Landing Page: olmosoftware.com/landing-pages/brand
- Landing Page Group: Landing Pages
4. UTM parameters are captured in ARForms
When a form is submitted, ARForms not only captures the information provided by the lead, such as their name, email, and company, but it also captures the UTM parameters that Attributer passed into the hidden fields.
Finally, when the user submits a form with their details (name, email, number, etc.), the UTM parameters are captured by Gravity Forms.
You can then:
- See the data in ARForms
- Include the data in the new lead notification emails get sent to your inbox
- Send the data to your CRM or other sales & marketing tools
- Sync the data to Google Sheets or Microsoft Excel
- And much more!
What is Attributer?
Attributer is a handy little code snippet that can be placed on your website. It looks at a bunch technical data, such as UTM parameters, HTTP referrer information, and device details, in order to determine the source of each visitor.
Based on this technical data, Attributer then categorizes each visitor into a series of channels. Examples of these channels include Paid Search, Organic Search, and Paid Social (the same one's seen in tools like Google Analytics). The information is then stored as a cookie in the visitor's browser.
Now, when a visitor fills out a form on your website, Attributer automatically writes the UTM parameters (and other attribution information) into the hidden fields within the form. This is then captured in ARForms, alongside the details entered into the form by the lead, like their name, email, phone, and more.
Attributer was created by a marketing consultant who needed a way to track where leads were coming from. I originally built it to use just with my clients, but I soon realised that Attributer could benefit many other businesses as well.
Today, Attributer is trusted by hundreds of websites and successfully tracks UTM parameters and other data for over 7 million monthly visitors. It has become an essential tool for businesses aiming to gain valuable insights into their marketing efforts.
Why You Should Use Attributer to Capture UTM Parameters in ARForms
Attributer is the best way to capture UTM parameters in ARForms. Here's why:
1. Captures the source of all leads
With Attributer, you gain insights into the source of ALL your leads, not just the ones from paid advertising campaigns with UTM parameters.
Regardless of how a user arrives at your website, whether it's from paid channels or organic one's (like Organic Social, Organic Search, Direct, Referral, etc) Attributer captures data about their source and includes it with each form submission.
This enables you to make more informed decisions about how to grow your business.
For example, you might discover that Organic Search generates more leads for you compared to Paid Search. Armed with this knowledge, you can invest more in SEO and scale back on your Google Ads expenditure to maximise the amount of leads you get.
2. Remembers the UTM parameters as visitors browse your site
Unlike other methods for capturing UTM parameters in ARForms, which can only capture them if the user completes the form on the same page they landed on, Attributer remembers the data as a visitor browses your site.
Let's illustrate why this is a problem: Imagine a scenario where someone clicks on one of your Google Ads and lands on a dedicated campaign landing page you created. Once they are convinced of the awesomeness of your product or service, they click the 'Get A Quote' and are directed to a different page where they can submit the quote request form.
In this case, the page they complete the form on is not the same as the page they initially landed on, resulting in the loss of UTM parameters.
Luckily, Attributer resolves this issue. It securely stores the UTM parameters in a cookie within the user's browser. This means that regardless of the page where your form is located, the UTM parameters will always be seamlessly passed through.
3. Provides cleaner data
Attributer not only simplifies the process of capturing UTM parameters, but it also ensures that you have cleaner and more organized data to report on.
One common issue when capturing UTM parameters in their raw form is dealing with messy data. To illustrate this, imagine you have various Twitter campaigns, each tagged with different UTM_Source values. Some campaigns may have UTM_Source=Twitter.com (capital T), others may have UTM_Source=twitter (lowercase, without the domain), and there might be some with UTM_Source=tw.
Now, when you pass this data into your CRM to report on the number of leads generated from your Twitter campaigns, you end up with three different sources that need to be stitched together.
Fortunately, with Attributer, you can bid farewell to this headache. Attributer takes into account variations in capitalization and other inconsistencies, ensuring that these leads would be attributed to the same source, in this case, Paid Social.
4. Captures landing page data data as well
Curious about how many leads you are getting from your blog and other content?
Not only does Attributer capture UTM parameters and channel data, but it also tracks the landing page and landing page category. This means you can easily see how well your the content on your site (like your blog) is performing in terms of generating leads, customers, and revenue.
Wrap up
If you've been wondering which channels and campaigns are bringing in your leads and customers, Attributer is the perfect solution for you!
It's not just about capturing UTM parameters though, it also gives you attribution information on leads that come from organic channels as well.
Ready to see the magic of Attributer in action? Give it a whirl with our 14-day free trial today.
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About the Author
Aaron Beashel is the founder of Attributer and has over 15 years of experience in marketing & analytics. He is a recognized expert in the subject and has written articles for leading websites such as Hubspot, Zapier, Search Engine Journal, Buffer, Unbounce & more. Learn more about Aaron here.