Links
Learn about short links with UTM parameters and click tracking, and the external links recorded against products and campaigns.
Marketing → Links has two tabs, and they do quite different jobs.
Short links redirect from /l/{slug} to any destination, carry UTM parameters, and count their clicks in your own database.
External links record where a product, variant or campaign is listed somewhere else — Instagram, TikTok, Amazon, YouTube. They are a record rather than a redirect: nothing passes through them.
The two records behind the page are the short link and the external link.
What a short link holds
- A slug
- A destination
- A title
- Five UTM parameters
- An optional campaign, product or collab it belongs to
- An active flag
- An expiry date
The five UTM parameters are:
source
medium
campaign
content
termWhat the redirect does
Every visit to /l/{slug} does five things before the visitor lands:
- Appends the link's UTM parameters, without overwriting any already on the destination.
- Tags the destination so the order can be traced back to this link.
- Sets the affiliate cookie, when the link belongs to a collab.
- Sets the campaign cookie, when the link belongs to a campaign.
- Counts the click.
An unknown, inactive or expired slug sends the visitor to your home page rather than an error. A dead link costs you a mis-landed visitor, not a broken page.
Bot clicks are not counted
The redirect checks the requesting agent before incrementing the count.
This matters because an inflated click count feeds affiliate payout signals. A number that decides what somebody gets paid has to be defended.
Clicks are stored, revenue is calculated
The click count sits on the link itself.
Conversions and revenue per link are not stored. They are worked out when you read the page, from the orders whose recorded source is that link — last touch, net of refunds.
Nothing is kept as a running total, so there is no stored figure that can fall out of step with the orders it came from.
Customer referral links are counted elsewhere
A customer's refer-a-friend link uses /r/{code} and attributes through the
signup, not through the last link clicked. Those rows legitimately show no
link-attributed revenue here; their numbers are on the Referrals page.
Generated campaign and product links
Attaching a product to a campaign can create the tracked link for that pair, already carrying the campaign's UTM parameters.
It is created inactive. It is only switched on if the product is fit to advertise — the generation step gives you the link, not the decision.
External links
An external link records four things:
- The platform
- The address
- A title
- Notes
It is recorded against a product, a variant or a campaign.
Beyond being a record of where you are listed, it does real work in one place: a synced ad whose landing page is one of these addresses resolves to the right product through that record.
Choosing between the two
Use a short link when you want the click counted and the order traced back — anything you are going to judge by its numbers.
Use an external link when the destination is not yours and there is nothing to redirect: a marketplace listing, a social profile, a video.
Set an expiry or clear the active flag when a link should stop working. Neither deletes the link, and both send later visitors to your home page instead of a dead end.
Before you hand out a link, the question is:
Do I need this click counted and this order attributed, or am I just recording where the product is listed?