Attribution
Campaign
Also called marketing campaign.
Campaign is a named marketing effort that groups tagged traffic and spend, such as a spring sale or a product launch. It gives reports a label for a push with a start and end.
How it is measured
A campaign is identified by the campaign tag on inbound links. Sessions landing with the same tag are grouped. Costs and creative can be linked by the same name.
Use a naming standard with date, region, and offer. Check that every channel in the push uses the same tag value, since a spelling difference creates two campaigns.
Worked example
A craft brewery runs a 'Winter Stout 2026' push across email, two social posts, and a flyer QR code. All links share the same campaign tag. Total tagged sessions are 3,640 and 188 orders.
A look at the report shows the QR code link was tagged 'winter-stout' without the year, splitting 370 sessions into a second row. Merging brings the campaign total to the correct 4,010 and 205 orders.
How it differs
A campaign is the named effort. A UTM campaign is the tag value that labels it. The campaign exists in your plan; the tag makes it visible to reports.
Common errors
Inconsistent names. Tagging some channels and not others. Reusing a name for a different push. Not recording the start and end date. Ending a campaign in the plan but not in links.
In practice
Keep a sheet of campaign names, dates, and tags. Use a naming rule and a single owner. Review the report for near-duplicate names after each push.