If you aren’t already doing so, I highly recommend that you make sure all of your pay per click traffic is properly tagged with query string tracking parameters. Although I'm not going to get into the finer points of this in today's post, here is a quick example of what a destination URL might look like with tracking parameters:

[www.yoursite.com/landingpage.asp?source=google&adgroup=widgets]

Of course, the main benefit is that you can clearly segment and analyze your paid traffic on different levels depending on how many parameters you use. However, there is also another aspect of your online marketing efforts that will benefit - your organic search traffic! If you see a visitor coming from a search engine without your tracking parameters, then you know it was a click from an organic search listing.

Properly segmenting out organic search traffic provides a great way to validate your search engine optimization (SEO) efforts. Forget about ranking reports, find out what kind of impact your organic search traffic is having on your bottom line! And if you're outsourcing any SEO efforts remember that you're ultimately paying them to help you make money, not just to get you good rankings.

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About The Author

Andres Galdames is a business analyst at Lyris. He is an expert in integrated online marketing and pay-per-click campaigns.

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