Can I use UTM urls in Google Analytics to track the performance of different *sections* of my site?

Question

If I start using the UTM links in Google Analytics to try and track the conversion rate on for instance, search results, or product recommendations, will I be getting an accurate representation of those section's performance or will it be skewed because it is tracking the user's behavior all the time after they click one of those links?

In other words, if Page A links to Page B, with UTM info baked into the url, will Analytics give credit only for what they do on Page B, or if they continue to browse around will Analytics give credit for Page C, Page D, and so on?

I want to find out how much we are making with product Recommendations, and I want to start tracking some other parts of the site too, like our Top 10 list in our sidebar, or stuff like that.

Answer 1

This is a bad idea. UTM tags are for tracking external traffic sources, not internal ones.

If you set this internally, it'll overwrite itself over and over, and give you unreliable data.

Instead, use Advanced Segmentation to segment your traffic according to particular attributes, and apply those segments to compare performance.

Answer 2

The best way to do this would be to tag your links with all the required utm parameters (source, campaign, medium) and also add utm_content="recommendations" (for example) . In order not to overide the current sources just add utm_nooveride=1

This is how we also implemented the tracking on utm.to

Answer 3

You should be able to create a conversion funnel where the first step in the funnel is visiting the products recommendation page. Also if you have ecommerce enabled you should be able to see the "$index" of those pages.

Here's the adwords help page about $index http://www.google.com/support/analytics/bin/answer.py?hl=en&answer=86205