UTMs and Reporting Taxonomy

What This Page Answers

UTMs and reporting taxonomy define how campaigns are named, tracked, and grouped across analytics, dashboards, and business reporting. Without a taxonomy, multi-channel performance becomes hard to trust.

What UTMs Do

UTM parameters pass campaign metadata into analytics tools. Common parameters:

  • utm_source

  • utm_medium

  • utm_campaign

  • utm_content

  • utm_term

Example:

utm_source=meta
utm_medium=paid_social
utm_campaign=us_sales_prospecting_q2
utm_content=ugc_problem_hook_v1
utm_term=broad

Recommended Channel Mediums

Use consistent medium values:

ChannelSuggested Medium
Meta Adspaid_social
TikTok Adspaid_social
Google Searchpaid_search
Performance Maxpaid_google_auto
Demand Genpaid_video or paid_discovery
ChatGPT Adspaid_ai
Influencer paid amplificationpaid_creator

Do not force new surfaces into old categories if it breaks analysis.

Campaign Naming Fields

A durable campaign name should include:

  • Market

  • Platform

  • Objective

  • Funnel role

  • Product or offer

  • Campaign type

  • Date or test ID

Example:

US | Meta | Sales | Prospecting | Advantage+ | Core Catalog | 2026-Q2

Reporting Taxonomy

A strong taxonomy should answer:

  • Which platform drove the traffic?

  • Which objective was used?

  • Was the campaign prospecting or retargeting?

  • Which product, market, or offer was promoted?

  • Which creative angle or asset was used?

  • Which test does this belong to?

Common Mistakes

  • Inconsistent capitalization.

  • Mixing spaces, hyphens, and underscores randomly.

  • Reusing old campaign names.

  • Missing UTMs on some ads.

  • Allowing redirects to strip UTMs.

  • Using cpc for every paid channel.

  • Grouping ChatGPT Ads into paid search without a reason.

Practical Rule

A naming taxonomy is a measurement product. Treat it like infrastructure, not admin work.