Comments on: Track Vanity URLs Using Redirects

By: Ana

Ana — Fri, 12 Jan 2018 03:21:22 +0000

In reply to Michael.

Sure, that should work. You can have each group use links like http://www.site.com/group1, http://www.site.com/group2, and then set up redirects where each link expands to the full URL with query strings attached.

By: Michael

Michael — Thu, 11 Jan 2018 17:25:35 +0000

I'm a student working on a class project with several competing groups within the class. Can I use this to create a central class hub web page where each group has their own personal redirect link? Ideally, every link would go to the same hub page while allowing the group that sent the reference to get credit for it. Thank you!

By: Ana

Ana — Thu, 04 Jan 2018 08:03:16 +0000

In reply to Pravin. Hey Pravin, sorry, I would need more information. What happens when you click on the link, do you see the "utm" parameters in the URL on the destination page?

By: Pravin

Pravin — Thu, 04 Jan 2018 07:26:37 +0000

can anybody help me out?
I have to track traffic from third party link for my website.
How would it be the code for the same. I have used 301 redirect but not working

By: Ana Kravitz

Ana Kravitz — Mon, 30 Sep 2013 15:19:45 +0000

In reply to Jonathan Berry. Hey Jonathan, there are issues related to latency and not passing on cookie or tag values from prior pages. Also search engines don't like it very much (though that's improved in recent years) so your SEO may suffer. I'm not too familiar with the details as I've always just avoided them - I'm sure you can find more comprehensive info out there if you need it.

By: Jonathan Berry

Jonathan Berry — Sun, 29 Sep 2013 23:55:43 +0000

In reply to Jonathan Berry. Ana, sorry to post again, but my last was intended to be a question: what are the risks of using JS like I had been doing?

By: Jonathan Berry

Jonathan Berry — Sat, 28 Sep 2013 19:15:17 +0000

Thanks Ana. I mean the latter, e.g. I am using a link in an email like http://www.mysite.com/campaign1 that goes to another site. What I was doing was making a page that had some Javascript on it that forwarded the user after the page loads. That way the GA script loaded before it sent the user to the other site. I know there must be some security and other concerns with this. But thank you once more!

By: Ana Kravitz

Ana Kravitz — Fri, 27 Sep 2013 08:16:10 +0000

In reply to Jonathan Berry. Do you mean an outbound link from your site to another site or a link to your site? In the first case you can track it as described, just fire an event when the user clicks. If you mean a link to your site that doesn't actually go to your site (because it redirects) then you can't track it because, as you note, the GA code doesn't load.

By: Jonathan Berry

Jonathan Berry — Fri, 27 Sep 2013 02:48:23 +0000

In reply to Ana Kravitz. Thanks Ana, what about a link like mysite.com/mycampaign that is a 301 to another site? There would be no loading of GA as the redirect is immediate. Possible?

By: Ana Kravitz

Ana Kravitz — Thu, 26 Sep 2013 09:40:01 +0000

In reply to Jonathan Berry.

I'm not sure if you mean a click on an outbound link leading to another site or a redirect that automatically sends someone to another site? But either way you can track it in an event. Here's an article from GA on using the _trackEvent function to track outbound links: https://support.google.com/analytics/answer/1136920?hl=en