How to create a Convention?
Conventions are a powerful feature in Terminus. You can use them to configure your URL builder to define how your UTM (or custom) parameters are created. You can even configure the URL builder differently for different teams.
Let’s say you have two email types, newsletter, and leads. You send emails to each newsletter every week and some specific emails to leads. For the URLs in these emails, the UTM parameters might look something like this:
utm_campaign = weekly-2017_05_28 or monthly-2018_06_14
utm_medium = email
utm_source = newsletter or leads
Step 1: Identify the underlying fields
The above requirements can be generalized as:
utm_campaign = <Interval>-<Send Date>
utm_medium = <Email Medium>
utm_source = <Email Source>
This gives us the following fields:
- Interval – A dropdown field with options for weekly and monthly
- Send Date – Date field with format YYYY_MM_DD
- Email Medium – Constant field with a value of email.
- Email Source – A dropdown field with options newsletter and leads
Step 2: Create the fields
Navigate to Tools > Conventions > Fields. Click the Create a New Field button.
a. Create Interval Field
Fill in all the values and click Save.
b. Create Send Date Field
Click Create a new Field button, fill in the data, and Save
c. Create Email Medium Field
Click Create a new Field button, fill in the data, and Save
d. Create Email Source Field
Click Create a new Field button, fill in the data, and Save
Once these are created, you’ll have four fields.
Step 3: Create the formats
To assemble these fields, we can imagine the structure of each UTM parameter like this:
utm_campaign = Main Campaign Format = <Interval>-<Date>
utm_medium = Email Medium Format = <Email Medium>
utm_source = Email Source Format = <Email Source>
Defining such Formats (or Patterns) can help us reuse them in multiple conventions. For example, a new Social Convention can reuse Main Campaign Format.
Navigate to Parameter Formats. Click the Create a New Format button.
a. Create a Main Campaign Format
Fill the Name with Main Campaign Format and Separator with – (dash) or any other character (optional). Click Next.
Drag the Interval and Send Date fields to Configured Fields section and click Save. They should be in this order.
You can Preview how it will look like and behave in a URL builder.
b. Create Email Medium Format
Repeat a similar process by clicking Create a New Format.
Fill in the Name in Email Medium Format. There’s no need to specify the Separator since this format has only one field. Click Next.
Drag Email Medium to Configured Fields and Save.
c. Create Email Source Format
Follow the same process.
After this, all the formats are ready. Now it’s possible to assemble the convention.
Step 4: Create the Convention
Navigate to Conventions. Click the Create a New Convention button.
Fill in the convention information as follows:
- Specify the name as Email Convention
- For Campaign, select Enforce Format and then Main Campaign Format
- For Medium, select Enforce Format and then Email Medium Format
- For Source, select Enforce Format and then Email Source Format
- For Content, we will leave it at Default which uses the default dropdown
- For Term, select Disable to prevent it from being used for email campaigns.
- Click Save
Your Email Convention is now completely configured. You can now use it in your UTM URL Builder.
Optionally, you can configure these values
- Check the default convention to load it by default in URL builders.
- Check Shared to make it available in other projects. (NOTE: If you configure Custom parameters with a convention, it’s better to share the individual formats and configure the convention in another project.)
- Check Field mode. You can learn more about this feature here.
- Configure Custom Parameters or Info Fields the same as UTM parameters.
Step 5 (Optional): Force using a convention
If you would like all URLs to be built using one of your conventions, it’s possible to enforce this using Force conventions setting
1. Go to project Settings > Advanced Settings (show)
2. Check Force conventions
3. Save
This will
- Remove the No Convention option from the selection of the convention
- Disable any URL builders that don’t support conventions
- Disable URL import
Forcing conventions is a great way to make sure that everyone on your team follows your UTM strategy more closely.