Using Query Strings and Anchor Tags to Track Click-throughs

A lot of clients use Eloqua to send newsletters to subscribers every month. Oftentimes those newsletters have links to articles on a landing page that the contact might be interested in. However if the links to those articles all point to the same page, how do you ensure that the landing page opens to the correct section of the page where the article they are interested in is located, and how do you track which article they were interested in? Anchor Tags and Query Strings can be used to do this.

Let’s say our newsletter this month has 3 different article summaries and the full versions are all hosted on our landing page: www.landingpage.com/content/MonthlyNewsletter

If the contact were to click through to Article 1, we want to make sure that the start of that Article is at the top of the page. Similar for Article 2 and Article 3 we want to make sure the user doesn’t have to scroll through the landing page to make sure they can find the article they’re interested in. We can use anchor tags to do this.

On the landing page we need to add the following HTML code just above the position of each article on the page:

<A name=”Article1”></A>

In this case I have tagged the section with the name “Article1” however you could use any identifier here to denote the section on the page. Similarly I would add in front of each respective article on my landing page:

<A name=”Article2”></A>

<A name=”Article3”></A>

Once we have tagged the section on the page we then have to update our links in our email as well. First we have to setup the query string parameter.

In Eloqua navigate to Automate > Web Profiling > Query Strings Tab. Create a new Query String Parameter that we will use to define which link the contact has clicked on. Below I have created the parameter “LinkID” however you can name it whatever you feel is best. I would recommend keeping the name short and it can’t include any spaces.

After creating the parameter we need to add this to the link in our email.

NOTE: This method can only be used when linking to a webpage that has Eloqua tracking scripts on it.

We can then add the new query string and anchor tags to our email links. In your email we need to add the following code to the end of each link in our email that navigates to our landing page:

?LinkID=Article1#Article1

?LinkID=Article2#Article2

?LinkID=Article3#Article3

If you are adding this code to an Eloqua hosted landing page your link might look something like this:

www.landingpage.com/content/MonthlyNewsletter?elq=<span>recipientid</span>&LinkID=Article1#Article1

After updating all of your links you’re ready to send your email and start tracking your click-throughs.

The Email Click-Through Link Breakdown Report will now have each link to the page listed separately and you can identify it by the LinkID query string value:

You can also use the Visitor Count for Specific Query String report to get a high-level overview if you’re using this link across multiple emails:

The Visitors by Query String Value will also give you a breakdown of all the visitors that have clicked a link with a specific Query String Parameter Value.

Now you’re ready to track the interest of your Newsletter Subscribers and determine which articles are catching their interest the most!