Tracking your ad clicks with dynamic destination URLs

Today, we're announcing an update to ValueTrack, a feature for those of you who use third-party tracking software or have access to your web logs. Using the features previously announced, we made it easy to track your search and content campaigns separately by adding special parameters to your destination URLs. With the additional ValueTrack enhancements available today, you can track even more detail including the keyword matching option for your ad clicks.

Starting now, your destination URL can include the {matchtype} and {network} parameters. Here's a quick example of how you might use these parameters:

Let's say you have a keyword-targeted campaign running on Google search, search partners, and the Google Display Network. If your website is www.yoursite.com, you can use the new and existing ValueTrack parameters in your AdWords campaign to set the destination URL to: http://www.yoursite.com/?keyword={keyword}&matchtype={matchtype}&source={network}.

If an ad click comes from a search partner, and the keyword that triggered the ad, used cars, is a broad match keyword, in your web logs you will find that the ValueTrack parameters in the URL have been replaced with the following:

{keyword} = used cars

{matchtype} = b

{network} = s

In your web logs you will see: http://www.yoursite.com/?keyword=used%20cars&matchtype=b&source=s

To learn more about all of the ValueTrack parameters and see additional examples, visit the AdWords Help Center.

Posted by Jason Shafton, Inside AdWords crew