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Better tracking with final URL suffix and more custom parameters

In today’s digital era, consumer expectations of a fast, trustworthy and reliable online experience are at an all-time high. Based on our measurements, even milliseconds of delay can result in leads being lost due to consumers dropping off before advertiser's websites can load after an ad click.

To avoid these delays and create a better experience for both the advertiser and the consumer, in the coming months, we’re rolling out parallel tracking, the final URL suffix, and an expansion of the number of available custom parameters

Parallel tracking

In traditional sequential tracking, when an ad click occurs, the consumer is taken through a series of redirects before landing on the final URL. With parallel tracking, the consumer is taken directly to your final URL while all the click-measurement processing is done in the background. That means a much faster page load time.

View of flow showing faster path to final URL using parallel tracking.
Parallel tracking ensures a faster flow to the Final URL.
 
You can expect to see increased conversions due to reduced load times, bounce rates and other drop-off metrics. Parallel tracking can also increase customer trust, since consumers will land directly on the final URL mentioned in your ad without any interim redirects appearing in their address bar.

Parallel tracking is now available as an optional feature for select advertiser accounts. Please reach out to us if you want to participate in the parallel tracking beta program. We expect to announce details and availability of this feature for all our advertisers shortly.

Final URL suffix

You can use the new Final URL suffix field to specify parameters you want to be attached to the end of your landing page URL. You won’t have to worry about any encoding rules as you would if they were included in your tracking template. If you have parallel tracking enabled, we recommend that you use the Final URL suffix field to define any landing page parameters needed during redirection. This ensures that relevant tracking values are always passed to your website.

Product view of Final URL suffix field in Campaign URL options, to enter landing page parameters.
Landing page parameters are entered in the Final URL suffix field.

Each suffix can contain one of the following types of values: a static URL parameter, values that reference Microsoft Advertising URL parameter values, or any parameters listed in the Help section: Final URL, tracking template, or custom parameter.

Final URL suffix will be available in your account by the end of this month at the account, campaign, ad group and keyword levels, and it can be found in the URL options of each level. Just like with tracking templates, final URL suffixes defined at the lowest level take precedence when applied to your ad. Support for additional levels is coming soon.

Custom parameter expansion

You can now define up to eight pairs of custom parameters in Microsoft Advertising. In addition, we’ve increased the character limit of the value to 250 characters. With this change, you’ll have more space for additional parameters.

Product view of Campaign URL options showing eight Custom parameters fields.
You can now utilize eight pairs of Custom parameters.
 
The custom parameter expansion will be available in your account at the campaign, ad group and keyword levels. Support for additional levels is coming soon.

To learn more about these new capabilities, please visit our Help page. If you use a tool provider or agency to manage your ads, check with them to take advantage of any upgrade support and documentation they might offer specific to their platform and service. If you have any questions or comments, you can connect with us via our feedback forum or on Twitter.