UTM and click ID tracking that survives the journey, not one page view.

A UTM parameter is text you add to a link yourself (utm_source=newsletter, utm_campaign=spring), and it describes one visit. Click ID tracking is the layer under it: LeadJourney gives every visitor its own click ID on their first visit, keeps it in their browser for months, and files every session that browser starts under it. That is what turns four separate visits into one journey, and it is why a tool that only reads UTMs loses the March paid click when the April newsletter arrives. The ad platforms' own click IDs (gclid, fbclid, msclkid, li_fat_id) are a different thing again: they point at one ad click, they are what the platform accepts when a conversion is sent back, and LeadJourney holds them on the visitor alongside everything else. UTM parameters explained covers the five parameters in detail.

Because they only exist in the URL of one page view, and most tools keep only the last set they saw. A redirect that rebuilds the address drops them, a form tool on its own domain never saw them, a bookmark or a typed URL never had them, and the next visit overwrites whatever was left. LeadJourney reads them on the first page view and files them under that visitor's click ID, so the URL can do what it likes afterwards and a later visit adds a session rather than replacing one.

For months. The LeadJourney click ID sits in the visitor's own browser, in localStorage and a first-party cookie, and everything filed under it lives in our database. Long enough that a lead who clicked in March and books in May is still one journey with the March click at the front of it, and long enough that the conversion sent back to Google Ads, Meta, LinkedIn or Microsoft Ads arrives with a platform click ID that is still inside their window. If the visitor clears their browser storage the next visit starts a new ID, which is the honest limit of any first-party method.

A return visit through a bookmark, a typed URL or a link with no parameters joins the same journey, because the join is the click ID in that browser rather than anything in the URL. A different device is a different browser and so a second click ID; the two are joined where the identifiers allow it, typically once the email or a login ties them together. The cross-device journeys use case shows what that looks like on a real lead.

First and last touch channel, source and campaign, the ad and creative, every UTM parameter, the click ID from each platform, the landing page and the referrer, and a link to the full journey in LeadJourney. You choose which of those are in scope before anything is written, and existing source fields stay untouched. HubSpot, Pipedrive, Close and Attio connect natively, Salesforce and 100+ others through a webhook, Zapier, Make or n8n.

For paid clicks, less than you think: the platform's own click ID identifies the campaign, ad set and ad, so a Google, Meta, LinkedIn or Microsoft Ads click is credited even without a UTM. For everything you control that has no click ID of its own (newsletters, podcasts, partner and affiliate links, print QR codes) tagging is still the way to name the channel, and the free UTM builders keep the spelling consistent so one campaign stays one row. Either way the visit is filed under the same LeadJourney click ID, so an untagged one is a session with an unnamed source rather than a lost lead.

It replaces GA4 as the place you read where leads came from. GA4 reports sessions and attributes the converting session's URL; LeadJourney reports named people, every session they ever had under one click ID, and the deal that followed in the CRM. Many teams keep GA4 for site analytics and use LeadJourney for the lead and revenue side. The ranked UTM tools guide compares the two kinds of tool.

Writing an identifier to a visitor's device needs consent, and that is exactly how it runs: the script stays silent until your consent management platform says otherwise, so it works with your banner rather than around it. LeadJourney is hosted in Frankfurt, identifiers sent to the ad platforms are hashed before they leave, and a data processing agreement is part of every plan. Tracking models sets out the three ways to run this and what each one costs you; the GDPR and security pages list the controls in detail.