Whether you like it or not enhanced campaigns are going to have an impact on your ability to segment, structure, and optimize your campaigns. The impact, whether positive or negative, is debatable. However, it is recommended that you research and get to know how the transition will affect your business and campaign management. There is a lot of content available, but little is known how enhanced campaign will affect analytics. Here is a short account that you need to take note of.
The dividing line
Your platform and the nature of integration will decide how enhanced campaign will affect your analytics. In case you use aGoogle Analytics account linked with AdWords nothing will change as far as data acquisition goes. There won’t be any major impact and your analytics will work as before. The reason is because auto-tagged URLs are used in linking GA and AdWords accounts. Gclid, a dynamic parameter, is present in auto-tagged URLs attached to all AdWords URLs and passes all the info between the two systems.
Other options
In case you do not use Google Analytics with auto-tagged URLS, it is time you did so or begin a process to update URL and campaign structure to be on the right side of enhanced campaigns.
And if you do not fit this category you may be using UTM parameters and unlinked Google Analytics account for internal tracking or something other explicit for your package.
Having unlinked GA account and using UTM for internal tracking, you can still leverage auto-tagging and other parameters to influence Google analytics or other tracking solutions.
Import of incremental in Google Analytics with linked account is precious:
- Ad Group (associated with keywords and click)
- Match type (Phrase, Broad, Exact)
- Destination URL (adword destination url)
- Ad Format (display, video, text)
- Matched search query
- Content targeting option (Manual Vs Automatic placements)
- Ad distribution network (Google Search)
- Placement domain i.e. the domain your ads are displayed on
To get a grasp of what needs changing, you should first know the nature of changes in the enhanced campaign and leverage ValueTrack parameters to efficiently capture all related data.
The only compulsory change to the campaign structure is the consolidation of all devices into one single campaign. Different campaigns for different devices is not an option.
Your URL will look different from the standard tracking URL. You will need to incorporate the device parameter.
Enhanced campaign will not change much in analytics and reporting except how you collect user device. However, understanding user device is essential if ValueTrack parameters can’t work in your situation, there will be tremendous add-value in setting up GA and linking your AdWord account.
In case you have been procrastinating migrating to enhanced campaigns, it should now become your number one priority to stay ahead and learn especially if you run a integrated non-Google Analytics based system.