How do I know where the taker of a survey, calendar event, or TeamRaiser registration came from?

Anonymous Blackbaud User

If you would like to know where the taker of a survey came from, you can follow the steps below. This also works in TeamRaiser and Events. This is very useful in determining where Internet advertising is the most effective.

1. Give your advertisers a URL to your homepage in the form of:

Where "xxxx" is whatever unique identifier you would like to use. This unique identifier allows you to identify which site the constituent came from. All sources of traffic should be given unique identification. You can use "s_anythingyouwant", not just "s_track", as long as it starts with "s_".

2. Configure your survey. One of the questions should be a "Hidden Text Update" type of question. In the "Set this value" box, put "\\\\]" or replace "track" with "anythingyouwant". Note that "s_" is no longer part of the variable name.

For this to work properly with a variable chosen by the user, such as "track", you must choose to update the constituent record for this data to be stored and later appear in reports for the survey. If you would like to record the source as a Hidden Text Update and not record the data in the constituent record, you will need to use the variable src. To match the URL in the example above:

Then in the Set this value box, place \\\\] which will record the value represented by xxxx without updating the constituent record.

At this point, you are done with the tracking portion. When you run the survey reports, this value will appear along side the other answers provided by takers, although the user will not see the data on the screen.

This also works for ticket purchases and RSVPs in events, and for TeamRaiser registrations.