Understanding How Vector Tracks Your Ad Campaigns

Running ads across places like Google, LinkedIn, Reddit, Bing, and more is great. Knowing whether those ads actually bring people to your site is even better. That’s where Vector’s campaign reporting comes in.

This guide walks through how Vector connects the dots between your ads and your website visitors — and what to check if something isn’t showing up the way you expect.

The Two Ways Vector Tracks Campaigns

Vector has two “paths” for tracking where visitors are coming from.

Path 1: Automatic Tracking (No Setup Required!)

This is the default, always-on tracking that works even if you have zero integrations connected.

If someone clicks one of your ads and lands on your website, Vector looks for standard UTM tags on the URL. As long as your UTMs follow common marketing conventions, we’ll automatically recognize and organize those campaigns in your reporting.

Specifically, Vector looks for:

• UTM Source: Where the click came from
  Examples: google, linkedin, facebook, instagram, reddit, bing, etc.

• UTM Medium: How traffic came in
  Examples: paid, ppc, cpc, display, etc.

• UTM Campaign: The campaign name
  Example: spring_sale, brand_retarg, persona_finance_v1, etc.

If all three are present and set in a recognizable way, Vector will automatically detect that campaign.

Path 2: Integrations (Google + LinkedIn Today)

If you connect Google Ads or LinkedIn Ads inside Vector, tracking becomes even more reliable.

When an integration is connected:

• Vector automatically discovers your campaigns.

• You don’t need to rely on UTMs being perfect.

• Variants + dynamic naming conventions still get tracked cleanly.

This is especially useful if your team uses dynamic UTM naming, templates, or variables.

When a Campaign Appears in Vector Automatically

Vector will automatically show your campaigns when:

• Someone has clicked an ad from that campaign in the last 30 days, and

• The UTM Source + Medium follow standard naming, or

• You have the Google or LinkedIn integration connected.

If a campaign is brand new and hasn’t had any clicks yet, it won’t show up until traffic arrives — which is normal!

When You Might Need Manual Tracking

Most customers never need this. But you can manually track a campaign if:

1. You want to see reporting for a campaign older than 30 days, or

2. You just launched something and haven’t received any clicks yet (though honestly... it's usually easier to just wait for the first click)

Manual tracking is only specifying the UTM Campaign Name you expect, not the Source or Medium.

Why UTMs Matter (Even With Integrations)

UTMs help Vector confirm which campaign drove the visit. With integrations, you get extra reliability and cleaner automatic detection — but if UTMs on the landing page URL are missing or unconventional, some campaigns might not be inferred automatically.

If something isn’t being detected, it’s often because:

• UTM Source isn’t one of the standard platforms

• UTM Medium isn’t one of the common paid mediums

• The UTM Campaign is empty or was removed by a redirect or template

What Vector Adds to Your Campaigns (Integrations Only)

When Google Ads or LinkedIn Ads are connected, Vector adds three tracking parameters to your campaigns. These ensure that even if UTMs change or are inconsistent, Vector can still match traffic correctly.

Vector adds:

• VectorSource (the ad platform, like Google or LinkedIn)

• VectorCampaign (the campaign name)

• VectorID (the unique ID of the campaign)

These behave similarly to UTMs, but they’re guaranteed to be present so your reporting stays reliable.

And don’t worry — Vector updates tracking parameters without overwriting anything you've already set.

Why You Might Not See a Platform Yet (e.g. Reddit, Bing)

Vector can detect traffic from any platform as long as UTMs match standard naming.
Platforms without full native integrations (like Reddit or Bing today) will surface through UTMs automatically.

If you see clicks in Visitor Feed but not in Campaigns:

• The UTMs might be slightly different than expected

• The campaign hasn’t had recent clicks (past 30 days)

• There's a filtering rules mismatch

Quick Checklist if a Campaign Isn’t Showing Up

Use this if something feels missing:

• Does the landing page URL include utm_source, utm_medium, and utm_campaign?

• Are the values pretty standard (paid/cpc/ppc + google/linkedin/reddit/bing)?

• Did this campaign get any clicks in the last 30 days?

• If you use Google or LinkedIn — is the integration connected?

• Is the campaign too new to have traffic yet?

If you’re unsure, contact our support team (support@vector.co) a link and we can look in your Visitor Feed to confirm.

Good News: Vector Is Fully Compatible With…

• Google Ads

• LinkedIn Ads

• Any paid ads platform that supports standard UTMs

• Campaigns with dynamic or programmatic naming (as long as UTMs are readable)

Meta campaign reporting is coming soon and will follow the same behavior.