Use UTM parameters in Google Analytics 4 (GA4) to display Instagram ad campaign metrics on your Geckoboard dashboard.
What are UTM parameters?
UTMs are custom parameters that can be added to destination URLs, like this example:
https://www.yourwebsite.com/?utm_source=instagram&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=ig_spring_sale
If the visitor lands on this website with the parameters in the URL, then GA4 will know the visitor came from that particular Instagram ad campaign.
Example UTM parameters for Instagram
For a full list of UTM parameters to tag your destination URLs, see the GA4 guide to Traffic-source dimensions, manual tagging, and auto-tagging.
UTM parameter | Examples | Explanation |
utm_source | instagram.com | Specifies the traffic source. |
utm_medium | social | Specifies that clicks come from social media, so data is shown in your Social reports. |
utm_campaign | ig_spring_sale | Differentiate between multiple ad campaigns. |
utm_content | 20percent_off | Differentiate between ads in the same campaign. |
Creating a UTM destination URL for your ad campaign
Head over to Google’s Campaign URL Builder.
Complete the required fields: campaign URL, campaign source, campaign medium and campaign name.
Complete any additional optional fields.
Scroll down and Copy the generated URL.
Adding your new destination URL to your Instagram ad
Edit or create your ad campaign on Instagram.
Scroll down to the Destination section.
Paste your UTM destination URL in the Website URL field.
Your Instagram traffic will now get pulled in automatically by GA4. To check, go to Reporting > Acquisition > Traffic Acquisition.
You can now start to visualize the campaign metrics in Geckoboard using our GA4 data source.
Example: Create a number widget showing session numbers from your Instagram ad campaign
We'll use filtering with our GA4 data source to display the number of sessions from your Instagram ad campaign.
In Geckoboard Add a new GA4 widget. If you need to connect GA4 to Geckoboard first, follow the steps in our connection guide.
From the list of preset visualizations select First reply time.
Add a 'Session campaign' Filter.
Select your campaign from the list. Click Apply to create the filter.
Change the timespan for the ticket data if you require anything different to 'Today'.
When ready, click Add to dashboard.
