There is a new trend on Instagram: using the website Linktree to have multiple links instead of one on your profile. I have very quickly joined the trend since I have many things to promote to my subscribers! My Facebook page, my newsletter, etc… Unfortunately, I soon realized that my Google Analytics acquisition data wasn’t accurate anymore.

Visitors now came from the referral category and then from link.tree. For me, these visitors come from Instagram. I wanted them to appear under “Acquisition > Social > Instagram” as they do by default! Statistics are crucial to know where to put our promotion efforts. I started looking for a way to allow my traffic from Linktree to merge and back into the Social> Instagram category.

The problem

As mentioned in the introduction to the article, the problem is on Google Analytics. If you do not do anything, your visitors coming through Linktree will be in the Acquisition > Referral > Linktree.com category.

These visitors come from Instagram! They should be in Acquisition > Social > Instagram.

The solution

To fix this, we’ll create a filter on a Google Analytics view! The screenshot above was taken in Acquisition > Social.

Good Practices

A good practice when you have an analytics account is to have multiple views in order to do tests:

Your main view One for tests Raw data

Before applying my advice, I suggest you make sure that you have these three views in place. You should create the filter in the “Test” view and when you see that it works for you, put it in your main view!

Steps to create the filter

Login to Google Analytics Select the view where you want to make the change. For me, it’s Master – because I tested the filter before and it works well! Click on “Admin”, then “All filters”, under “Account”

Click on the red button “add a filter” Make the required changes as shown in the screenshot below: Enter the name of the filter. I wrote « link tree ». Type of filter : custom. Choose “search and replace”. Filter field: campaign source Search string: linktr.ee Replace string: Instagram

I used Instagram with a uppercase I because that is what I have at the moment in Acquisition > Social > Instagram. Use a lowercase i if that’s what YOU use.

Select your view. Mine is “Master” .

Click on save, and you’re done!

Conclusion

I hope this guide will help you to keep your data intact and truthful! If you have any problems during the steps on Google Analytics, feel free to leave a comment. It will be my pleasure to help you.