Tracking URLs

For those of you who are not familiar with the phrase "tracking URLs" let me explain. Tracking URLs are web addresses that contain information that allows the site owner to see how that particular visitor came to his site providing he came through some advertising channel that has used a tracking URL. For example, if I placed a tracking URL in a print ad like http://www.somedomain.com/ad1 and people entered that entire URL to visit my site I would know that they came as a result of that specific ad.

Forms of Tracking URLs
The most common form of a tracking URL is the use of the "?" character in the URL. These are used most effectively for online links to your site. Http://www.mydomain.com?source=manufacturersdirectory, for instance, would track people who click on a link at the manufacturers directory. These URLs are used commonly with LookSmart, Overture and even Google AdWords programs. The plus side of these tracking URLs is that the site owner doesn't have to do anything to his site to create them. The problem is that some site statistic software will not record referrer information after the "?" thus leaving the site owner in the dark.

An alternative tracking URL is the use of a directory and a redirect script. You create a directory for the source you want to track (LookSmart, for example) and place in that directory a file named index.html or index.htm or default.htm, depending on your server. The index.htm file contains nothing more than a redirect script to send visitors to your home page - but their visit has been recorded as viewing that page in that specific directory. So all page views in the directory named LookSmart at your site would now be recorded in your site statistics. Thus you can now track how much traffic actually comes to your site via your LookSmart listing.

The directory form of tracking is also better for print or broadcast advertising. It's much easier to show a URL as www.mydomain.com/tv than www.mydomain.com?source=TV knowing full well the visitor isn't likely to put in the "?" or anything after it. Why would they put in the TV in the directory form of tracking URL? They may think that the specific directory has the offer that's being advertised while entering at the home page would rob them of that special deal.

Redirect Scripts
Okay, it's obvious that you will need to create a page with the redirect script on it to get the tracking URL to work if you select the directory style of tracking URL. The redirect script that I've found to work quite well can be downloaded for free at http://www.dynamicdrive.com/dynamicindex9/bredirect.htm. While it is designed to send your site visitor to four different pages, depending on their browser, you can set all the pages to your home page and it will work just fine.

Accuracy
The accuracy of using a tracking URL is not 100%. There will be people who don't enter the directory information, for whatever reason. Your site's statistic software may cutoff information after a certain amount of characters or even not pickup anything after the "?" character. But given that information, it is as accurate or better than typical ad tracking using bogus names or departments (those who invest in special phone numbers may have the most accurate solution - and that's a solution that can be used on your web site - one special toll-free number just for web site visitors - great way to track web site inquiries for those who don't fill out online forms or send Email).

Site Statistics
Naturally a tracking URL is useless if you don't have site statistics. If your hosting company doesn't provide you with access to your site statistics, or they are just way to complicated, consider a third-party solution like SiteTracker.com. For a nominal fee, they will provide you with all kinds of useful information about your site visitors. They will produce a small bit of code for you to copy and paste into your web pages. You will need to be able to upload your site's pages with the new code on them to be able to use this service or hire someone to do it for you (your site designer may be willing to provide you with this service).

Understand that SiteTracker is going to instruct you to put the code at the top of the body content of your page - don't do it. This will slow down the loadtime of your page as the browser goes out to the SiteTracker site to register the code. It may be more accurate, but it's a real nuisance. You can actually place the code anywhere between the <body> and </body> tags, so I usually place it just before the </body> tag so it's the last to load on the page.

So there you have it, a way to track your site's visitors to determine the effectiveness of your advertising efforts. If you use SiteTracker for site statistics, you can use the "?" for tracking since that program does keep the "?" information intact. Other programs may do so as well.