Advocate Referral Widget Source Tracking

Samantha Brown Updated by Samantha Brown

Overview

Friendbuy's source tracking feature lets you see exactly how advocates are finding and accessing your Advocate Landing Page. By reading UTM parameters in the landing page URL, Friendbuy attributes each widget view, share, click, and purchase to its originating traffic source - no duplicate widgets or pages required.

This is useful if you're driving advocates to your referral landing page from multiple channels (email, paid search, affiliate, etc.) and want to understand which sources are generating the most referral activity and revenue.

How It Works

When an advocate visits your Advocate Landing Page, Friendbuy reads the utm_source parameter or Friendbuy provided utm_raf_placement parameter present in the URL and associates them with all downstream activity from that session - including widget views, shares, referral link clicks, and purchases made through those links.

Source data is broken out in your Analytics Dashboard under the Placements tab, within the Advocate Landing Page row.

Supported UTM Parameters

Friendbuy supports two approaches to source tracking:

Parameter

Priority

Description

utm_raf_placement

Recommended

Friendbuy-specific parameter. Purpose-built for referral placement tracking. Won't conflict with other analytics tools.

utm_source

Fallback

Standard UTM parameter. Used when utm_raf_placement is not present.

If your marketing team already uses utm_source for other analytics tools (Google Analytics, etc.), sharing that parameter with Friendbuy can create noise or conflicts in your reporting. utm_raf_placement is a Friendbuy-specific parameter that keeps your referral tracking clean and isolated from other channel reporting.

To track a traffic source, append the appropriate UTM parameter to any URL that points to your Advocate Landing Page.

Use this parameter to tag links specifically for Friendbuy referral tracking. The value you set will appear as the source label in your dashboard.

Format:

https://yoursite.com/refer-a-friend?utm_raf_placement=YOUR_VALUE

Examples:

https://yoursite.com/refer-a-friend?utm_raf_placement=email_footer

https://yoursite.com/refer-a-friend?utm_raf_placement=homepage_banner

https://yoursite.com/refer-a-friend?utm_raf_placement=post_purchase_email

https://yoursite.com/refer-a-friend?utm_raf_placement=sms_winback

Option 2: utm_source (Fallback)

If utm_raf_placement is not present, Friendbuy will fall back to reading utm_source. This is useful if you're already appending standard UTMs to your links and don't want to add a separate parameter.

Example:

https://yoursite.com/refer-a-friend?utm_source=google&utm_medium=cpc&utm_campaign=brand

⚠️ Important: Friendbuy does not normalize UTM values. Whatever value you pass in will be displayed exactly as-is in your dashboard. "Google", "google", and "GOOGLE" will appear as three separate sources. Establish a consistent naming convention across your team before launching.

Viewing Source Data in Your Dashboard

Source tracking data is visible in the Analytics Dashboard under the Placements tab.

How to Navigate There

  1. In the left sidebar, click Analytics → Dashboard
  2. Select the Placements tab at the top of the dashboard.

  1. Click on the Advocate Landing Page row to expand the source breakdown.

  1. A drawer will open showing performance broken out by UTM source.

What You'll See

The source breakdown table shows the following KPIs for each UTM value detected:

  • Widget Views - Number of times the landing page widget was viewed from this source
  • Shares - Number of referral shares initiated
  • Share Rate - Shares divided by widget views
  • Clicks - Referral link clicks by friends
  • Purchases - Completed purchases attributed to referrals from this source
  • Conversion Rate - Purchases divided by clicks
  • Revenue - Total revenue attributed to referral purchases from this source

Frequently Asked Questions

What if I have multiple Advocate Landing Pages?

Source tracking applies to each Advocate Landing Page widget independently. The UTM value captures how an advocate found a specific landing page - not which page they landed on. If you use multiple landing pages, you can differentiate between them using distinct UTM values in the links pointing to each page.

Can Friendbuy clean up inconsistent UTM values?

No. Friendbuy stores and reports raw UTM values exactly as provided. If advocates arrive via links tagged differently (e.g., "Google" vs. "google"), these will appear as separate rows. We recommend establishing a naming convention before distributing links.

Can I use utm_raf_placement and utm_source on the same URL?

Yes. If both are present, Friendbuy will use utm_raf_placement as the primary source value and ignore utm_source for Friendbuy reporting purposes. Your other analytics tools will still read utm_source normally.

Need Help?

If you have questions about setting up source tracking for your referral program, reach out to your Customer Success Manager or contact enterprise@friendbuy.com

How did we do?

Referral Performance Analytics Dashboard

Referral Analytics Dashboard Overview Metrics

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