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Target="_blank" and referral acquisition data
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Hi,
Any assistance would be greatly appreciated!
I have been reading up on this topic but there is some contradictory articles out there and I was hoping someone could clarify the latest practise for me.
Website A links out to four of its partner websites.
These links are using a target="_blank".When i look at the acquisition data for any of the partner websites there is zero referral data from site A.
I tested this wasn't an analytics bug by using the real time feature while clicking the partner links to see what had happened, and to also find the source, but I found that they are all being returned as a source direct. Ideally id like it to show the referrals once more for reporting purposes.Do I need to add extra google analytics parameters/functions to track the outbound links? or should this referral data be appearing correctly and it is something unrelated to the links themselves? or should I throw in the towel and drop the target blanks?
Thank you in advance for your time.
Best Regards. -
Yes, the best article you can read at internet is:
https://support.google.com/analytics/answer/1136920
It will help you a lot!=)
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No I'm not saying that I suggest you to best way to track outbound link. If you want to track outbound link for target=_blank Please check Google document below and modify.
https://support.google.com/analytics/answer/1136920
Thanks
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Hi Alick,
Thanks for your reply.
So just to clarify you are confirming that target blank links are seen as outbound links and are not tracked in acquisitions under referrals?
Thanks again.
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Hi Liam,
IMO best way to track outbound link is event tracking.
If you are using tag manager @ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ABo-Sk1QzrQ
https://support.google.com/analytics/answer/1136920?hl=en
Thanks
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