What goes into utm_source for TikTok and LinkedIn Ads — Google's official list has only 5 rows
GA4 classifies traffic into the Paid Social channel based on exact matches in its official 'social sites regex list,' which includes only five entries for TikTok and LinkedIn combined. Using unofficial utm_source values like 'tiktok-ads' or 'linkedin-ads' causes traffic to be misclassified into (other) instead of Paid Social. Marketers should use only the exact lowercase values 'tiktok' or 'linkedin' to ensure proper tracking and reporting in GA4.
- ▪GA4 uses a fixed list of 819 source entries to determine channel classification, with only five entries covering TikTok and LinkedIn.
- ▪The valid utm_source values for TikTok are 'tiktok' and 'tiktok.com', while for LinkedIn they are 'linkedin', 'linkedin.com', and 'lnkd.in'.
- ▪Using variations like 'tiktok-ads', 'm.tiktok.com', or 'linkedin_ads' results in traffic being classified as (other) instead of Paid Social.
- ▪GA4 evaluates utm_source case-sensitively, so mixed-case values like 'TikTok' fail to match the required lowercase entries.
- ▪Only LinkedIn's shortlink 'lnkd.in' is recognized; other shortlinks like 'vt.tiktok.com' are not registered in the official list.
Opening excerpt (first ~120 words) tap to expand
try { if(localStorage) { let currentUser = localStorage.getItem('current_user'); if (currentUser) { currentUser = JSON.parse(currentUser); if (currentUser.id === 3893127) { document.getElementById('article-show-container').classList.add('current-user-is-article-author'); } } } } catch (e) { console.error(e); } toshihiro shishido Posted on May 17 • Originally published at revenuescope.jp What goes into utm_source for TikTok and LinkedIn Ads — Google's official list has only 5 rows #marketing #analytics #googleanalytics #utm "We tag TikTok Ads with utm_source=tiktok-ads. It's clearly an ad, right?" If that's been your team's convention, GA4 has been silently dropping your TikTok paid clicks into (other) for as long as that tag has been in production.
…
Excerpt limited to ~120 words for fair-use compliance. The full article is at DEV.to (Top).
Discussion
0 commentsMore from DEV.to (Top)
