Introduction

Tracked links allow for the measurement of clicks and downloads from specific campaigns. They will give you an understanding of the impact of different methods of user acquisition, enable the measuring of campaign effectiveness and are an essential component of A/B testing.

Once implemented, you will be able to go into App Store Connect and the Google Play Console and measure how many app downloads are being driven by different sources.

As the two app stores work differently, the process for creating the two sets of links and measuring the results differs.

Creating tracked links

Apple

1. Log in to App Store Connect
2. Click App Analytics
3. If applicable, select your app from the list
4. Navigate to the Acquisition tab, select Campaigns from the sub menu and then click the plus symbol
5. In the Campaign field enter the name of your campaign. If it's specific to a certain time-based campaign then you should identify that here. For example, MarchNewsletter. Likewise if it's a variant in a test you should identify here as well. Try to avoid spaces if possible.
6. A Campaign Link will be generated in the box, this is the link you should use in your marketing material linking through to the iOS store. Copy the link and click Done.

Google Play

In Apple, you need to create the link within App Store Connect but for Google Play you only need to create a link with UTM parameters. The easiest way to get started with this is to use Google's URL builder. Once you've opened the URL builder, input the following:

1. Ad network: custom
2. Application ID: your app's unique ID. You can find this by going to your Google Play listing and looking at the URL, it will start with com or uk.co.. For example, com.pugpigapp
3. Campaign source: the name of the campaign, e.g. apppromo
4. Campaign medium: the traffic source, e.g. email
5. Campaign name: the name of the particular campaign or test variant, e.g. subjectline2

Once complete, click Generate URL.

Measuring downloads

Apple

1. Log in to App Store Connect
2. Click App Analytics
3. If applicable, select your app from the list
4. Click Acquisition, then Campaigns
5. The table shows how many impressions and downloads have come from each campaign. The date can be changed in the top right corner.

Google Play

1. Log in to The Google Play Console
2. Select Grow users, Store performance then Store analysis from the left-hand menu
3. Scroll down to see downloads by UTM sources and UTM campaigns

Please note, it is also possible to look at UTM parameters in GA4.