Is cross-domain tracking broken within the default Luminate Online/Google Analytics integration?

Adam Kaye

Hi Analytics People.


I noticed recently that cross-domain tracking is not behaving properly for a couple sites that use the built-in integration between Luminate Online and Google Analytics.


For example, when the user moves from a TeamRaiser participant's personal page to the donation form, the GA session restarts. The same thing happens when the user moves from an insecure greeting page to the secure TeamRaiser registration process.


Has anybody else noticed the same? Was a change made (relatively) recently that broke this functionality or did it never work properly?


We've been moving a bunch of clients off the old default LO/GA integration and implementing custom page and ecommerce tracking using the Universal GA Library, but for clients who aren't interested in making that switch, are they just out of luck?


Thanks for any insight you can offer.


Adam

Ami Defesche

Hey Adam! I'm going to leave this open for other customer feedback, but I would also highly recommend creating a support ticket too if you haven't already. They may be able to dig into this further for you.

Adam Kaye

Thank you for your response, Ami.


I did begin my investigation by contacting Blackbaud Support and creating a case, but when that didn't lead to a quick resolution, I thought it couldn't hurt to ask the Community since I know there are some rockstar GA gurus here.


I also believe that the old GA functionality is not supported in the same manner as the rest of the LO platform.


Hope you're well.


Adam

Robert Pegg 2

Hi Adam or anyone with GA integration knowlege,


Adam, did you ever get anywhere on this issue?


We have a similar issue (not using integrated LO GA but just adding the client calls to GA) where a new session is being dropped when begining the registration flow (after coming from any of the non-secured pages). The behaviour is inconsistent (works for some clients and not others) and therefore difficult to debug. Essentially the utm parameters exists for all unsecured pages and then once a constituent is asked to login or "start as new" (first secured page) the utm values are lost and a new session begins.


Thanks for any insights you can offer.


Robert

Adam Kaye

Hi Robert.


I do still believe the the built-in GA/LO integration does not handle cross-domain tracking as it should, but if you're not using that integration, then you have a whole lot more flexibility available to you.


One thing to keep an eye out for is the LO platform pushing your users from one domain to another on the server since that would interrupt their GA session. In the past, I've revised some link URLs so that GA cross-domain tracking (if properly implemented) will maintain the session for you, but that can cause issues with the LO session like dropping LO source codes stored within the session.


If you'd like to provide a URL and what you're clicking on when you see the issue, I'd be happy to take a real quick look in case I can offer any additional insight.


Adam

Robert Pegg 2

Hi Adam,


I have not been 100% successful in recreating this issue, however, this method often fails for others (although not me).


Steps:

1. Click link (http://convio.cancer.ca/site/PageServer?fr_id=23652&pagename=RFL_CAN_NATL_homepage&s_locale=en_CA&s_src=facebooknw-ad_social&s_subsrc=linkad1a_relayforlife2018&utm_source=facebooknw-ad&utm_medium=social&utm_content=linkad1a&utm_campaign=relayforlife2018#locator-target)
2. Scroll down until you see a orange "Select Event" button (in a box labelled "Relay For Life in Calgary & Area")
3. Click orange "Register today" button on next page
4. Click on "Take part on your own" button on next page
5. Click on "Join as new participant" (this is where session will drop for some)

Any insights would be helpful.


Thanks!


Robert

Adam Kaye

Hi Robert.


I'm not seeing a "Relay For Life in Calgary & Area" box when I click the link in Step 1, but I was able to replicate the issue by navigating to that event's greeting page on my own.


I do think the issue that you're running into is that the "Take part on your own" button links to an insecure address (convio.cancer.ca) for the first step of the registration process, and then the platform redirects the user to the secure address (secure2.convio.net) for that page, breaking the GA session.


You can avoid this by revising the URLs that the registration buttons are linking to so that they use the secure domain, but there's a chance that will have a negative impact on the user's LO session, like losing track of the LO src and subsrc codes. (Test that last part to be sure.)


Hope that's helpful. Please let us know what you find out.


Adam

Robert Pegg 2

Thanks Adam,


I gave the above a try but still faced the session change. We are going to move this older GA into Tag Manager and see if we can get this resolved that way. Thanks for the responses.


Robert