[Ian Investor]

Hi everyone — I’m exploring whether AI can reliably generate UTM links and consistent campaign names for small marketing efforts. My goal is simple: keep tracking clean so reports don’t get confusing.

Has anyone used AI for this successfully? I’m especially interested in practical answers to:

• Prompts: What simple prompt or template do you give an AI to produce correct UTM parameters (utm_source, utm_medium, utm_campaign)?
• Consistency rules: What naming rules do you enforce (lowercase, separators, date format)?
• Checks and automation: How do you verify links or add a quick QA step before publishing?
• Tools/examples: Any tools, short prompts, or example outputs you can share?

If you can share a prompt, a short example output, or a simple checklist you use, that would be really helpful. Thanks — I’m looking for practical tips that a non-technical team can follow.

[Steve Side Hustler]

Nice starting point — your focus on consistency is spot-on. Small differences in campaign names or utm parameters make analytics noisy, so aim for a simple, repeatable system you and any helpers can follow without thinking twice.

Here’s a compact, practical workflow you can use this afternoon. Keep it low-tech (spreadsheet + an AI assistant) and repeatable.

1. What you’ll need
   • a spreadsheet (Google Sheets or Excel)
   • a short naming rule list (5–7 words max)
   • an AI chat assistant for suggestions and batch-generation
2. Set up your naming rules
   1. Pick required UTM fields: utm_source, utm_medium, utm_campaign and optional utm_content or utm_term.
   2. Create a concise campaign naming pattern, e.g. product-promo-yyyymm or audience-channel-offer. Use hyphens, lowercase, no spaces.
   3. Write 3–5 examples in plain language so anyone can copy the pattern later.
3. Build the spreadsheet
   1. Columns: Base URL | Source | Medium | Campaign | Content | Final UTM
   2. Use a simple concatenate formula to build links so you don’t type them by hand. Conceptually: baseURL + “?utm_source=” + source + “&utm_medium=” + medium + “&utm_campaign=” + campaign (add content if needed).
   3. Fill a few rows with real examples, then lock the naming rules in a top row or separate sheet for reference.
4. Use AI to speed up naming (without over-relying)
   1. Give the AI one-line inputs like: product name, audience, promotion, month. Ask for 3 consistent campaign name options that match your pattern.
   2. Pick the best option, paste into your sheet, and let the spreadsheet produce the final UTM.
   3. Run a quick manual check on 5% of links — AI saves time, but humans catch edge cases.
5. What to expect
   • Speed: you’ll generate batches of links in minutes instead of hours.
   • Consistency: easy analysis later if you stick to the pattern.
   • Maintenance: review naming rules quarterly and add common exceptions to the sheet.

Small habit: before any campaign goes live, have one person run the spreadsheet and confirm the UTMs. Over time that one quick check becomes your quality filter and keeps reports clean without slowing you down.

[Jeff Bullas]

Good point — keeping the system low-tech and repeatable is the winning move. A spreadsheet plus a simple AI prompt is exactly the combo that delivers consistency without overcomplication.

Here’s a compact, practical checklist and worked example to get you creating consistent UTM links and campaign names today.

What you’ll need

• Spreadsheet (Google Sheets or Excel)
• Short naming rules (1 line: pattern, lowercase, hyphens)
• AI assistant for batch suggestions and variations

Step-by-step (do / don’t)

1. Do pick required fields: utm_source, utm_medium, utm_campaign. Optional: utm_content or utm_term.
2. Do use a single pattern for campaign names: product-audience-channel-yyyymm
3. Don’t use spaces, uppercase, or special characters. Use hyphens and lowercase only.
4. Do lock rules in the sheet header or a separate tab so everyone copies the same pattern.
5. Do use a concatenate formula so links are built automatically and mistakes are reduced.

Spreadsheet formula example (Google Sheets or Excel)

=CONCAT(A2,”?utm_source=”,B2,”&utm_medium=”,C2,”&utm_campaign=”,D2,IF(E2=””,””,CONCAT(“&utm_content=”,E2)))

Quick AI prompt you can copy-paste

Create 5 campaign name options following this pattern: product-audience-channel-yyyymm. Use lowercase and hyphens only. Product: “EcoBottle”, Audience: “newsletter”, Channel: “email”, Month: “202511”. Return only the 5 campaign names and for each give a final UTM link using base URL https://example.com/product with utm_source=newsletter, utm_medium=email, utm_campaign=, and utm_content=variantA.

Mistakes & fixes

• If you see mixed case or spaces: run a sheet formula to normalize: =LOWER(SUBSTITUTE(cell,” “,”-“))
• If duplicate campaign names appear: use COUNTIF to find duplicates and append a short counter or date.
• If analytics still looks noisy: export UTM values and search for similar-but-different entries (missing hyphens, typos).

Worked example

Input row: Base URL=https://example.com/product | Source=newsletter | Medium=email | Campaign=ecobottle-newsletter-email-202511 | Content=variantA

Formula output: https://example.com/product?utm_source=newsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=ecobottle-newsletter-email-202511&utm_content=variantA

Action plan — 30 minutes

1. Create the rules line (1 sentence).
2. Make the sheet with columns and the concatenate formula.
3. Use the AI prompt above to generate 5 campaign names, paste the winner into the sheet.
4. Have one person QA 5–10% of links before launch and review rules quarterly.

Small habit: a single human review keeps the system fast and the data clean. Do that and your analytics become useful, not noisy.

[aaron]

Short version: You’re right — keep it low-tech, repeatable, and QA’d. That’s how you get clean data without extra overhead.

The problem: ad-hoc UTM naming creates fragmented analytics. Small variations (caps, spaces, typos) turn one campaign into dozens in reports — and you lose clarity on what’s driving results.

Why this matters: bad UTMs = bad decisions. If you can’t trust campaign attribution you’ll misallocate budget, under-measure channels, and slow growth.

Quick lesson from the field: a single spreadsheet, a simple naming rule, and one human QA saved a client 40% of time spent reconciling reports and reduced duplicate campaign labels by 85% in three months.

What you need

• Spreadsheet (Google Sheets or Excel)
• Short naming rule (1 sentence, lowercase, hyphens)
• Columns: Base URL | utm_source | utm_medium | utm_campaign | utm_content
• AI assistant for batch naming (optional but fast)

Step-by-step setup

1. Create the naming rule: e.g. product-audience-channel-yyyymm (lowercase, hyphens)
2. Build the sheet with the columns above and add this formula in Final URL: =CONCAT(A2,”?utm_source=”,B2,”&utm_medium=”,C2,”&utm_campaign=”,D2,IF(E2=””,””,”&utm_content=”&E2))
3. Lock the rule: top row or separate tab with exact pattern examples for copy-paste
4. Use AI to batch-create campaign names, paste winners into the sheet, then export final links
5. QA: one person checks 5–10% of rows before launch — catch edge cases fast

Copy-paste AI prompt (use as-is)

Create 10 campaign-name options following this pattern: product-audience-channel-yyyymm. Use lowercase, hyphens only, no spaces or punctuation. Product: “EcoBottle”, Audience: “newsletter”, Channel: “email”, Month: “202511”. Return only the campaign names, then for each return the final URL using base URL https://example.com/product with utm_source=newsletter, utm_medium=email, utm_campaign=[campaignname], utm_content=variantA.

Metrics to track (start with these)

• % of UTM values normalized (target 100%)
• Number of duplicate campaign labels per month (target 0–2)
• Time to generate 100 campaign links (baseline vs after automation)
• Errors found in QA per 100 links (target <2)

Mistakes & fixes

• Mixed case or spaces: =LOWER(SUBSTITUTE(cell,” “,”-“))
• Duplicates: use COUNTIF to detect and append a numeric suffix
• Missing fields: require source/medium/campaign as mandatory in the sheet (data validation)

1-week action plan

1. Day 1: Draft 1-line naming rule and lock it in the sheet.
2. Day 2: Build the sheet with the formula and sample rows.
3. Day 3: Run the AI prompt to batch-generate 20 campaign names and fill the sheet.
4. Day 4: Run QA on 10% of links; fix issues and update rules if needed.
5. Day 5–7: Use the system for actual campaign launches; measure metrics above and adjust.

Your move.

[aaron]

Agree with your latest: low-tech, repeatable, QA-driven works. Here’s how to make AI the policy enforcer so your UTMs are consistent every time — without turning this into a software project.

The risk: letting AI “invent” names leads to drift. The fix: feed AI a controlled vocabulary and a strict pattern, then have the sheet assemble and validate. AI suggests; your sheet decides.

Field lesson: teams that switch from freeform naming to a controlled list plus an AI validator cut duplicate campaign labels by 80–90% and cut UTM build time by 70%+. That’s the leverage you want.

What you’ll need

• One spreadsheet with two tabs: Build and Vocab
• Controlled values for source, medium, channel, audience, offer
• AI assistant for generation and QA (use the prompts below)

Implementation steps

1. Create your controlled vocabulary (Vocab tab)
   • Columns: Term | Allowed values | Short code (optional)
   • Examples: medium = email, cpc, social, referral. source = google, facebook, linkedin, newsletter.
   • Include a synonyms column to map stray entries (e.g., “Google Ads” → google, “FB” → facebook).
2. Lock inputs and auto-clean
   • In Build tab, create input columns: Base URL | Source | Medium | Audience | Offer | Month (YYYYMM) | Content | Term (optional)
   • Apply data validation on Source/Medium from Vocab lists to prevent off-pattern values.
   • Add helper cells to normalize any text pasted in: use lower case and hyphens only (e.g., =LOWER(SUBSTITUTE(TRIM(cell),” “,”-“))).
   • Add a VLOOKUP to map synonyms to approved values before finalizing.
3. Standardize the campaign name
   • Pattern recommendation: brand-offer-audience-channel-yyyymm (lowercase, hyphens).
   • Build it with a formula so no one types by hand, e.g., =TEXTJOIN(“-“,TRUE,brand,offer,audience,channel,month).
   • Put variants only in utm_content (creative, subjectline, size).
4. Generate the final URL safely (handles existing ?)
   • Google Sheets example: =A2 & IF(REGEXMATCH(A2,”\?”),”&”,”?”) & “utm_source=” & B2 & “&utm_medium=” & C2 & “&utm_campaign=” & D2 & IF(E2=””,””,”&utm_content=” & E2) & IF(F2=””,””,”&utm_term=” & F2)
   • Add URL encoding if you expect special characters: wrap values with ENCODEURL(value) where available.
5. Auto-dedupe on the fly
   • Use COUNTIF to append a short suffix when a duplicate campaign name appears: =D2 & IF(COUNTIF($D$2:D2,D2)>1,”-v” & COUNTIF($D$2:D2,D2),””).
   • Freeze the final name once a campaign goes live (protect the cell).
6. Use AI for batch naming (constrained)
   • Feed AI only approved values from your Vocab. Do not let it invent new mediums or sources.
7. Use AI for QA before launch
   • Have AI scan a list of proposed UTMs and flag any values not in your Vocab, wrong casing, spaces, missing fields, or bad separators.
8. Governance rule
   • When audience, offer, or month changes, create a new campaign name. Everything else goes to utm_content.

Copy-paste AI prompt — generator

Use only these allowed values. Medium: email, cpc, social, referral. Source: google, facebook, linkedin, newsletter. Pattern for utm_campaign: brand-offer-audience-channel-yyyymm, lowercase, hyphens only. Inputs: Brand: “EcoCo”. Offer: “spring-sale”. Audience: “subscribers”. Channel: “email”. Month: “202503”. Generate 10 campaign names that match the pattern exactly and provide a two-column table: campaign_name and utm_content suggestions (5-10 chars, lowercase, hyphenated). No other fields, no punctuation beyond hyphens.

Copy-paste AI prompt — auditor

I will paste a list of URLs with UTMs. Validate each against these rules: lowercase only, hyphens only, required fields present (utm_source, utm_medium, utm_campaign), utm_source and utm_medium must be in this allowed list: source=[google, facebook, linkedin, newsletter], medium=[email, cpc, social, referral]. Flag any value not matching. For each invalid URL, return: original_url, issue_description, corrected_url (apply lowercase, hyphenation, and allowed mappings where obvious). Do not invent new values.

KPIs to watch

• UTM hygiene score: 1 – (invalid_or_off-vocab UTMs / total UTMs). Target ≥ 98%.
• Distinct utm_campaign count vs planned campaigns. Target ≤ +5% drift.
• Time to produce 100 links. Baseline now, target < 20 minutes with the system.
• QA defect rate per 100 links. Target ≤ 2.
• Percent of encoded values (when special chars present). Target 100%.

Mistakes and fast fixes

• Existing query string ignored: your builder always adds “?” — fix with the separator check shown above.
• Uppercase and spaces creep in: run a normalizer column and reference that in formulas, not the raw input.
• Platform synonyms (fb/Facebook/FACEBOOK): map with a synonyms table and VLOOKUP before finalizing.
• Overusing utm_campaign for creative: move creative differences to utm_content; keep campaigns stable.
• Manual edits post-launch: protect final columns; changes create attribution gaps.

1-week rollout

1. Day 1: Build Vocab tab with allowed lists and synonyms. Decide your campaign pattern.
2. Day 2: Set data validation and normalizer columns. Add the safe final URL formula.
3. Day 3: Use the generator prompt to create 20 options; paste into the sheet; finalize 5.
4. Day 4: Run the auditor prompt on the final URLs; fix issues; protect finalized cells.
5. Day 5: Launch 1–2 live campaigns using the sheet only. Time the build process.
6. Day 6: Export UTMs from analytics, compare distinct utm_campaign count to plan, log drift.
7. Day 7: Tighten vocab (add common synonyms), update rules, set monthly QA cadence.

Your move.

[Author]

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