Google Campaign URL Builder or a UTM builder for teams

Almost everyone who builds a UTM link for the first time ends up at Google's Campaign URL Builder. It is free, needs no sign-up and gives you a correct link in a minute. For a single link that is exactly right. It gets hard when many people build links over months and the reports still have to fit together.

The free way: Google's Campaign URL Builder

You enter the target address, source, medium and campaign, plus term and content if you like. The tool turns this into the address with the utm_ parameters, which you copy and use.

What it does well:

• Fast and without hurdles: no account, no setup, a valid link at once.
• Instructive: once you have filled in the fields, you understand how a campaign link is built.

What it cannot do:

• It does not know your convention. Nobody checks whether someone enters newsletter, Newsletter or nl.
• It stores nothing. Which links exist, who built them and where they are in use is written down nowhere.
• It does not check the target. Whether the landing page answers and the parameters survive a redirect only shows in the report.

The spreadsheet as a stopgap

Many teams therefore set up a spreadsheet: one column per parameter, allowed values as a drop-down, a formula builds the link. That is real progress, because the values now live in one place.

Over time the limits show. Copies of the sheet appear, agencies work with an older version, and whoever needs a new value simply types it in. The sheet also does not know whether a link works at all, and it does not show what a link has achieved.

What a UTM builder for teams should do

As soon as several teams or agencies build links, a tool that enforces the rules itself pays off. Check these points:

1. Shared value lists: source, medium and campaign come from a list that one person maintains. New values are requested and approved.
2. Checks while building: every field shows at once whether the value fits, instead of errors showing up in the report.
3. One place for all links: every link is stored with campaign, creator and history, and can be found again.
4. Target checks: reachability, redirects and lost parameters are checked before the budget is spent.
5. Rights for agencies: each agency works by your convention and sees only its own campaigns.
6. Adopting existing links: links that are already printed or live can be added without changing them.

A note for Matomo

Matomo has its own campaign parameters, such as mtm_campaign, mtm_source and mtm_medium, and understands the utm_ parameters just as well. Because UTM is the better known term and almost every advertising tool knows it, we speak of UTM links. What matters is to stick to one style within a link.

Signs that the free builder is no longer enough

• The campaign report shows several spellings for the same channel.
• Nobody can say which links are currently in use or who built them.
• An agency has changed, and its links can only be found in old e-mails.
• A link pointed to an error page for days, and it only showed in the monthly report.

Feinwerk Campaigns

Feinwerk Campaigns is a UTM builder for teams and agencies: the naming convention is part of the link builder, new values are requested and approved, every landing page is checked at once, and every link gets a static QR code for print. Short links and dynamic QR codes follow Coming soon . How to create a link is in the docs under Create a tracking link, how to add existing links under Adopt existing links. If you want to try this with your team, get in touch via the pilot page.