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UTM parameters explained, with naming examples

What utm_source, utm_medium and the rest do, a naming scheme that keeps reports clean, and ready-made tags for Instagram, LinkedIn, email and print.

The Liite team5 min read

You post the same link in your Instagram bio, a newsletter and a LinkedIn post. A week later your analytics say most visits came from "direct", which tells you nothing. Apps like Instagram and WhatsApp often don't say where a visit came from, so plain links lose that information on the way.

UTM parameters fix this. They're small tags on the end of a link that tell your analytics where the click came from. Here's what each one means, and a naming scheme you can copy.

What a tagged link looks like

https://example.com/spring-menu?utm_source=instagram&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=spring_menu

The page people see doesn't change. Your analytics tool, whether that's Google Analytics, Plausible or Liite's own stats, reads the tags and files the visit under "instagram / social" and the "spring_menu" campaign.

The five parameters

  • utm_source: who sent the visit. The site, app or list: instagram, newsletter, google, linkedin.
  • utm_medium: what kind of channel it was: social, email, cpc for paid search, print.
  • utm_campaign: the promotion or reason: spring_menu, black_friday, webinar_nov.
  • utm_term (optional): the paid keyword, mostly for search ads.
  • utm_content (optional): which link or version was clicked, when one email or ad has more than one.

Source is the one almost every tool needs. Medium and campaign are strongly recommended. Term and content are there when you need to split things further.

Naming rules that keep reports clean

Most analytics tools treat Instagram, instagram and IG as three different sources. Mix them and your reports split into pieces that are hard to add up. A few rules prevent that:

  1. Lowercase everything. Tags are case-sensitive in most tools.
  2. Use underscores, not spaces. spring_menu, not Spring Menu, which turns into Spring%20Menu.
  3. Name the platform in source and the type of channel in medium. Don't put instagram in medium.
  4. Write the list down somewhere your team can see it, so next month's newsletter uses the same names as this month's.

If you use Google Analytics 4, it sorts visits into channels like Organic Social, Email and Paid Search using your medium. Stick to common values (social, email, cpc, referral) and your visits land in the right channel. Unusual values such as print still work, but they may show up as "Unassigned" in the channel report, so look at source and medium directly for those.

Ready-made tags

Here's a starting set. These match the presets in our UTM builder.

  • Instagram bio: utm_source=instagram&utm_medium=social
  • Facebook post: utm_source=facebook&utm_medium=social
  • LinkedIn post: utm_source=linkedin&utm_medium=social
  • X post: utm_source=x&utm_medium=social
  • TikTok bio: utm_source=tiktok&utm_medium=social
  • Newsletter: utm_source=newsletter&utm_medium=email
  • Google Ads: utm_source=google&utm_medium=cpc
  • WhatsApp message: utm_source=whatsapp&utm_medium=messaging
  • Printed QR code: utm_source=qr&utm_medium=print

Then add a campaign name that says why you shared the link: utm_campaign=spring_menu.

LinkedIn: profile or post

LinkedIn is a good example of where utm_content earns its place. Your profile's Featured section and a post both send "linkedin / social" traffic. Add utm_content=profile to one and utm_content=post to the other, and you'll see which one actually sends people.

Two links in one email

The same trick works in newsletters. If the email has a button at the top and a text link at the bottom, tag them utm_content=button and utm_content=footer_link. Everything else stays the same.

Mistakes to avoid

  • Tagging links between your own pages. A UTM tag starts a new visit source, so a tagged link from your home page to your pricing page overwrites where the visitor really came from. Only tag links you share elsewhere.
  • Leaving old tags on. If you copy a tagged link and add new tags, you can end up with two sources in one link. The UTM builder replaces old tags rather than adding a second set.
  • Breaking the existing query string. If the address already has a ?, the tags go after an &, not a second ?. The builder handles this, and keeps any #section at the end where it belongs.
  • Worrying about SEO. Search engines ignore UTM tags for ranking. They're for your analytics only.

Hide the long link

Tagged links are long and look messy in a bio or on a poster. You don't have to show them:

  • Put the tagged link behind a button on your page, so people tap the label and never see the tags.
  • Turn it into a QR code for print with our QR code generator.
  • Use a short link like liite.co/x/spring that points at the tagged address.

Tag the link to your Liite page

If you have a Liite page, tag the link to it in each place you share it: liite.co/yourname?utm_source=instagram in your Instagram bio, ?utm_source=linkedin on LinkedIn, ?utm_source=qr on your printed code. Liite's stats count visits by utm_source, so you can see which bio or post sends the most people. The stats don't use cookies, so your visitors don't see a cookie banner either.

Build your first tagged link with the UTM builder, or make your free page and start tagging the link in your bio.