Point of Sales Software

Can anyone explain why Salesforce makes updates to the URL's of my Google ads after the initial connection to Google?

What's happening?
Salesforce applies tracking parameters onto the end of the destination URLs of your text ads or keyword-specific destination URLs.  You may have noticed this if you edit one of the text ads in your AdWords account.

Why does Salesforce do this?
Google dynamically serves one of your advertisements based on broad/phrase/exact keyword match on a search engine or a contextual match from their content network.  The tracking parameters allow salesforce to understand exactly how someone found your website.  which keyword?  which search term? which ad? which ad group? which google campaign?

What do these parameters look like?
Salesforce adds two tracking parameters to the end of your text ads and/or keyword-specific destination URLs.  The parameters are _kk and _kt.  When added to a URL of a standard text ad, they look something like this:

http://www.tatesupplies.com?_kk=equipmentrentals&_kt=3379166f-49a0-431d-a20c-7805d06fa958

How often are these parameters applied?
When you first link an AdWords account to Salesforce, it happens immediately.  On an ongoing basis, Salesforce needs to understand if you have added or changed anything in your account.  Depending on the size of your AdWords account, Salesforce will make this check every few hours and apply tracking parameters as necessary

What if I've got other parameters on my URLs?
That's OK, Salesforce will just add our _kk and _kt parameters onto the end of the string, so we wont muck with any additional tracking you're doing.

What if I go into AdWords and delete the Salesforce tracking parameters?
Not to worry, if you've gone into the AdWords UI and messed with the Salesforce tracking parameters, the next time we check for new changes or additions we will recognize that you've altered  one of the parameters.  In this case, we will automatically fix it.

Does this help Salesforce track organic search as well?
Certainly, when salesforce sees clicks that come from google without tracking codes, we can assume that these clicks did not come from one of your ads, and we can mark them as having come from Google organic search.  Learn more...

Can you track clicks from MSN, Yahoo, or my partner websites?
Yes, earlier this year we expanded the tracking to include organic search from MSN, Yahoo, Ask.com, and many other search engines.  We also included web referral tracking which will show you clicks that come to your website from other sites on the web, such as your business partners.  Learn more...