How to Track QR Code Campaigns with UTM and GA4

Build a consistent placement URL

Choose a stable source, medium and campaign convention. Lowercase values can prevent accidental fragmentation of your own reports, but lowercase qr is not a special default-channel assignment. Do not put personal customer identifiers in campaign parameters.

For two poster variants, keep source and campaign fixed and vary utm_content. Open each URL and check the address and incoming request before printing. If you use a short redirect, verify the resulting landing URL still contains the intended parameters.

https://example.com/offer?utm_source=store_poster&utm_medium=qr&utm_campaign=winter_2026&utm_content=blue

Distinguish channel groups from source values

A medium such as qr or offline can remain Unassigned in the default channel group. Configure a custom channel group if you want a Print and QR reporting category. That custom definition does not edit Google’s default channel rules.

Inspect source, medium and campaign dimensions appropriate to your report scope. A session dimension, first-user dimension and event attribution dimension answer different questions. A tagged URL is evidence about the link, not proof of a particular report outcome.

Run a controlled measurement check

Decode the final artwork with QR Code Scanner, open its destination from a test phone and inspect the landing request. Where your consent and analytics settings permit, use GA4 debugging tools to verify the received page event and campaign values.

If parameters disappear, trace the first redirect or navigation that removes them and fix that boundary. Merely firing page_view cannot reconstruct missing campaign data. Consent choices, blockers, shared links and repeat visits can make analytics counts differ from scans; document those limits before reporting campaign performance.

References

Use the linked specifications and product documentation to check behavior in your own environment.