Append utm parameteres to e-mail links

Anonymous
Not applicable

Append utm parameteres to e-mail links

Hi,

From what I understand, Marketo does not have an automated way to append utm parameters to links in an e-mail.

Has any out there figured out a way around this?

We have a news letter e-mail (alongside other e-mails) with at least 45 links and it would be really tedious to append utm parameters to every link.

The last option for me would be to build a stand alone PHP application that takes the utm paratmeters as input, parses the e-mail html code and spits out the same appending the utm parameters to every link.

I'd really appreciate any inputs.

8 REPLIES 8
SanfordWhiteman
Level 10 - Community Moderator

Re: Append utm parameteres to e-mail links

The last option for me would be to build a stand alone PHP application that takes the utm paratmeters as input, parses the e-mail html code and spits out the same appending the utm parameters to every link.

I'm glad you said that would be the last option!

It's actually something you can do with a bookmarklet.

Josh_Hill13
Level 10 - Champion Alumni

Re: Append utm parameteres to e-mail links

Or you can just use excel to output the needed links. There's a sheet on my website for this.

I like automation and it'd be nice if this were in Marketo, but it's not.

But you can also setup My Tokens to do this as well and just make sure your links have the appropriate tokens and let it run automatically.

Andy_Varshneya1
Level 9

Re: Append utm parameteres to e-mail links

To add to the chain of options, I've created a program in Marketo with a single field form and an LP that adds the tracking parameters and spits out all the different possible combos.

Happy to walk you through it if you'd like.

Anonymous
Not applicable

Re: Append utm parameteres to e-mail links

Hi Andy,

Appreciate your time.

Using a single field form sounds interesting. Could you please provide some more info.

Thanks,

Vishal

Andy_Varshneya1
Level 9

Re: Append utm parameteres to e-mail links

Hey Vishal,

It's actually pretty straight forward. I created a new form for a program I called URL Builder. The program has a form page where you enter the URL you want the tracking parameters for, and then a follow up page that has a list of all the different possible tracking parameters appended to the URL via tokens. For example,

{{lead.Tracking URL}}?utm_medium=MEDIUM&utm_source=SOURCE

{{lead.Tracking URL}}?utm_medium=MEDIUM2&utm_source=SOURCE2

{{lead.Tracking URL}}?utm_medium=MEDIUM3&utm_source=SOURCE3

and so on.

That way, whenever someone fills out the form, they're presented with all the various options they could use in an easy to copy+paste format.

SanfordWhiteman
Level 10 - Community Moderator

Re: Append utm parameteres to e-mail links

Problem is -- and, don't get me wrong, my bookmarklet suffers from the exact same problem! -- if someone is using tokenized URLs it's not possible to know whether the actual value of the token already has a query string. You'll corrupt the original URL, for example, if the token value is www.example.com/pageloader.aspx?pageid=10 and you turn it into www.example.com/pageloader.aspx?pageid=10?utm_medium=email.

And if you assume the token does have a query string you'll corrupt any URL that doesn't have one.

This is why this ultimately needs to be solved by Marketo at the time the email is rendered and the tokens are all dereferenced.

Andy_Varshneya1
Level 9

Re: Append utm parameteres to e-mail links

110% correct.

We could always just set up a filter or field validation to only work when the input URL doesn't contain a query string already. I just went the route of educating the team to never include query parameters in the input URL, but you're right, it could still cause it to break if they don't follow directions.

Grégoire_Miche2
Level 10

Re: Append utm parameteres to e-mail links

Hi Vishal,

Vote :

-Greg