Set up dynamic URL tracking for a hotel campaign

• How to set up tracking templates and final URL templates (ValueTrack parameters)
• How to set up tracking with custom parameters

1. Sign in to your Google Ads account .
2. On the Campaigns page, click the campaign you want to edit.
3. Click Hotel groupsfrom the page menu.
4. Click the columnsicon .
5. Expand the “Attributes” section, and then check the boxes next to “Final URL suffix” and “Tracking template”.
6. Click Applyto save your changes.
7. If the hotel group that you want to edit has subdivisions, expand it to see those subdivisions.
8. For each subdivision in the "Tracking template" or "Final URL suffix" column, click the pencil icon, to add the final URL suffix and tracking templates.

To leverage new ValueTrackfeatures in Google Ads, a new <LPURL> tag must be defined in the point of sale feed in Hotel Center. Learn more about the LPURL element

Category 1:The URL does not use any redirects to the final landing page.

If the URL is the final landing page, add an <LPURL> tag in the Point of Sale XML with the same URL contents.

<URL> http://partner.com/landing?hid=(PARTNER-HOTEL-ID) </URL>

<LPURL> http://partner.com/landing?hid=(PARTNER-HOTEL-ID) </LPURL>

Category 2:The URL uses redirects that don't modify the landing page.

Since there's a redirect through a third party tracker, add an <LPURL> tag in the Point of Sale XML file that isolates purely the final landing page. Refer to the URL segment marked in bold below.

<URL> https://example.tracker.com?campaign_id=(CAMPAIGN-ID)&t_url= http://partner.com/landing%3Fhid%3D(PARTNER-HOTEL-ID) </URL>

<LPURL> http://partner.com/landing?hid=(PARTNER-HOTEL-ID) </LPURL>

The URL segments solely used for tracking (in red above) would be set in Google Ads' tracking template as follows:

https://example.tracker.com?campaign_id= {campaignid} &t_url= {lpurl}

Category 3:The URL uses redirects to append static or tracking parameters to the landing page.

There's a redirect in the URL, and it will be used to modify the final landing page by adding a static or value track URL parameter at the end of the URL. Using the above example, the landing page URL needs to be modified to something like the following at redirect time:

http://hotelbrandApage.com/landing?hid=12345 &orgin=partnerA&adgroupid=100001

This addition of landing page parameters should be done using the value track template’s final URL suffix field instead of relying on these redirects in the LPURL element or using the tracking template.

<URL> https://partnerpage.com?language_code=(USER-LANGUAGE)&url= http://hotelbrandApage.com/landing%3Fhid%3D(PARTNER-HOTEL-ID) </URL>
<LPURL> http://partner.com/landing?hid=(PARTNER-HOTEL-ID) </LPURL>

The tracking template can be configured to ensure URL tracking is still preserved:

https://partnerpage.com?language_code=(USER-LANGUAGE)&url= {lpurl}

To ensure this additional URL parameter is added to the landing page, set final URL suffix as follows:

&origin=partnerA&adgroupid= {adgroupid}

The following format of tracking template should be avoided:

https://partnerpage.com?language_code=(USER-LANGUAGE)&url= {lpurl} %26orgin%3DpartnerA%26adgroupid%3D {adgroupid}

Instead, leave out landing page URL parameters from the tracking template and use the final URL suffix to configure this as shown above.

Category 4:The URL uses redirects to modify the final landing page significantly.

Although there's a redirect in the URL, the redirect isn't used solely for tracking. The redirect might be used to modify the landing page URL in a complicated manner. For example, if the URL needs to be modified to something like the following during redirecting time:

http://hotelbrandApage.com/ subbrand /landing?hid=12345

The next step in this case is to add an <LPURL> tag in the Point of Sale XML with the same URL contents.

<URL> https://partnerpage.com?language_code=(USER-LANGUAGE)&url= http://hotelbrandApage.com/landing%3Fhid%3D(PARTNER-HOTEL-ID) </URL>

<LPURL> https://partnerpage.com?language_code=(USER-LANGUAGE)&url= http://hotelbrandApage.com/landing%3Fhid%3D(PARTNER-HOTEL-ID) </LPURL>

If your " LPURL" element indicates the following URL:

https://www.partnerdomain.com?checkinDate=(CHECKINDAY)

and you want your URLs to serve as the following:

https://www.partnerdomain.com?checkinDate=2001-01-01 &adgroupid=123456

then you can set your tracking template as empty and your final URL suffix as follows:

adgroupid= {adgroupid}

We recommend placing only URL segments used for third party tracking in the tracking template. Parameters that should be propagated to the final landing page should be configured using the final URL suffix.

Point of Sale parameters will need to be translated to ValueTrack parameters per the table below.