Sources

The Sources report provides complete analysis of traffic sources using channel grouping, UTM parameters, and referrers.

Accessing the Report

1. Select a site from the site selector
2. Click Sources in the sidebar

URL pattern: /sites/{site_id}/sources

Tabs

The report has 7 tabs for different levels of analysis. Channels is the first tab and is selected by default:

1. Channels Tab

The default tab. Shows traffic grouped into high-level channels (GA4-style channel grouping). Instead of looking at raw source/medium values one by one, traffic is bucketed into marketing channels such as Paid Search, Organic Social, or Email.

Column	Description
Channel	Channel name (e.g., "Paid Search"). Unmatched traffic shows as Unassigned
Entrances	Sessions assigned to this channel
Page Views	Total page views
Bounce Rate	Single-page session percentage
Events	Microconversions
Conv.	Completed conversions
Conv. Rate	Conversion rate
Revenue	Total revenue

Charts included:

• Stacked Bar Chart: Traffic volume by channel
• Pie Chart: Channel distribution (top 4 + "Other")
• Dual Axis Chart: Conversion Rate (bars) vs Bounce Rate (line)

How channel grouping works

Each session is assigned to a channel by matching its utm_source, utm_medium, and utm_campaign values against a set of channel grouping rules (channel_group_rules). Each rule defines:

• A channel name (e.g., "Paid Search")
• Optional regex patterns for source, medium, and/or campaign (an empty pattern means "match any value")
• A priority — higher-priority rules are evaluated first

Rules are checked in priority order and the first matching rule wins. Rules can be global (apply to every account) or account-specific; account rules are always evaluated before global rules, so a custom rule can override the defaults. Traffic that matches no rule is reported as Unassigned.

You can view and customize these rules per account from the Channel Grouping settings (draft → test → publish flow, CSV import/export, and MCP tools). The API exposes them under /channel-groups. The built-in default rules cannot be deleted, but they can be overridden.

Default channels

SealMetrics ships with the following default channels, listed here from highest to lowest priority (the order in which they are matched):

Channel	Matches (simplified)
Paid Search	Search engines (google, bing, yahoo, etc.) with a paid medium (cpc, ppc, paid, sem)
Paid Social	Social networks (facebook, instagram, x, linkedin, tiktok, etc.) with a paid medium
Paid Video	Video platforms (youtube, vimeo, twitch, dailymotion) with a paid/video medium
Display	Display mediums (display, banner, cpm, interstitial, rich media)
Paid Shopping	google/bing with a shopping medium (shopping, pla, product listing)
Organic Search	Search engines with organic medium
Organic Social	Social networks with a social/organic-social medium
Organic Video	Video platforms with a video/organic medium
Organic Shopping	Shopping comparison sites (google shopping, idealo, kelkoo, etc.)
AI	Traffic from AI assistants (ChatGPT, Gemini, Claude, Perplexity, Copilot, etc.) — medium ai
Email	Email mediums (email, newsletter, mailchimp, sendgrid, klaviyo)
Affiliates	Affiliate mediums (affiliate, partner, aff, cpa)
SMS	SMS mediums (sms, text, mms)
Push	Push mediums (push, notification, web push, mobile push)
Audio	Audio sources (spotify, apple podcasts, soundcloud, audible, etc.)
Referral	medium matches referral or referrer
Direct	direct source and medium
Unassigned	Catch-all for traffic that matches no other rule

2. Sources Tab

Shows traffic grouped by UTM Source and Medium combination.

Referral traffic appears here as domains (July 2026)

Since July 21, 2026, visits arriving from an untagged external link are shown in this tab as their referring domain with medium referrer (e.g. reddit.com / referrer), GA4-style — including historical data. To analyze the full referring URLs, use the Referrers tab.

Column	Description
Source / Medium	Combined source and medium (e.g., "google / cpc")
Entrances	Sessions from this source
Page Views	Total page views
Bounce Rate	Single-page session percentage
Events	Microconversions
Conv.	Completed conversions
Conv. Rate	Conversion rate
Revenue	Total revenue

Drill-down: source names in the table are clickable — click a source to see its campaigns, and a campaign to see its terms, with breadcrumbs to navigate back. Each table also has a search box (server-side, works across all pages of results).

Charts included:

• Stacked Bar Chart: Traffic volume by source
• Pie Chart: Distribution of top 4 sources
• Dual Axis Chart: Conversion Rate (bars) vs Bounce Rate (line)

3. Mediums Tab

Shows traffic grouped by UTM Medium only.

Medium	Description
organic	Search engine organic traffic
cpc	Cost-per-click paid traffic
social	Social media organic traffic
email	Email marketing traffic
referral	Links from other websites
(none)	Direct traffic

Same columns and charts as the Sources tab (the first column is Medium instead of Source / Medium).

4. Campaigns Tab

Shows traffic grouped by UTM Campaign.

Column	Description
Campaign	Campaign name (the associated source / medium is shown underneath)
Entrances	Sessions from this campaign
Page Views	Total page views
Bounce Rate	Single-page session percentage
Events	Microconversions
Conv.	Completed conversions
Conv. Rate	Conversion rate
Revenue	Total revenue

Includes the same three charts as the Sources tab. Useful for:

• Comparing ad campaigns
• Tracking email campaigns
• Measuring promotional campaigns

5. Terms Tab

Shows traffic grouped by UTM Term (typically search keywords).

Column	Description
Term	Search term or keyword (the associated source / campaign is shown underneath)
Entrances	Sessions from this term
Page Views	Total page views
Bounce Rate	Single-page session percentage
Events	Microconversions
Conv.	Completed conversions
Conv. Rate	Conversion rate
Revenue	Total revenue

This tab shows a table only (no charts). Useful for:

• Paid search keyword analysis
• Understanding search intent
• Identifying high-value keywords

6. Content Tab

Shows traffic grouped by UTM Content (for A/B testing ads).

Column	Description
Content	Ad variant identifier (the associated source / campaign is shown underneath)
Entrances	Sessions from this variant
Page Views	Total page views
Bounce Rate	Single-page session percentage
Events	Microconversions
Conv.	Completed conversions
Conv. Rate	Conversion rate
Revenue	Total revenue

This tab shows a table only (no charts). Useful for:

• A/B testing ad creatives
• Differentiating links pointing to same URL
• Tracking banner variations

7. Referrers Tab

Shows traffic from referring websites (not UTM-based), one row per full referring URL — this is where you see exactly which page linked to you. (The domain-level view lives in the Sources tab, where referral traffic is grouped as domain / referrer.)

Column	Description
Referrer Domain	The full referring URL (the column groups by URL; e.g. reddit.com/r/analytics/comments/...)
Entrances	Sessions from this referrer
Page Views	Page views from this referrer
Bounce Rate	Bounce rate
Events	Microconversions
Conv.	Conversions
Conv. Rate	Conversion rate
Revenue	Revenue

This tab shows a table only (no charts). Useful for:

• Identifying backlink traffic
• Finding partnership opportunities
• Monitoring press mentions

Charts

The Channels, Sources, Mediums, and Campaigns tabs each include three charts (the Terms, Content, and Referrers tabs show a table only):

Stacked Bar Chart

Shows volume comparison:

• Horizontal bars per source/medium
• Stacked: Entrances (blue) + Conversions (green)
• Quick visual of volume vs conversion balance

Pie Chart

Shows distribution:

• Top 4 sources/mediums
• Remaining grouped as "Other"
• Percentage labels

Dual Axis Chart

Shows efficiency comparison:

• Bars: Conversion Rate (left axis)
• Line: Bounce Rate (right axis)
• Identifies sources with good conversion but high bounce

Filtering

Each tab has its own filter builder. Filters in the Sources report are dimension-only — you filter by what the traffic is (channel, source, medium, campaign, domain), not by metric values:

Field	Use Case
Channel is "Paid Search"	One channel only
Source contains "google"	All Google traffic
Medium equals "cpc"	Paid traffic only
Campaign contains "spring"	One campaign family

To spot high- or low-performing rows by metric (conversions, bounce rate…), sort by the metric column instead — every numeric column is sortable.

Combining Filters

Example: isolate paid Google traffic for one campaign

1. Source contains "google"
2. AND Medium equals "cpc"
3. AND Campaign contains "spring-sale"

UTM Parameter Reference

Parameter	URL Format	Example
Source	utm_source=	google, facebook, newsletter
Medium	utm_medium=	cpc, organic, email
Campaign	utm_campaign=	spring-sale, brand-2025
Term	utm_term=	running+shoes
Content	utm_content=	banner-a, text-link

Example URL

https://example.com/landing?utm_source=google&utm_medium=cpc&utm_campaign=spring-sale&utm_term=running+shoes&utm_content=banner-a

Use Cases

Evaluating Ad Spend

1. Go to Sources tab
2. Filter: Medium equals "cpc"
3. Compare:
   • Google vs Facebook vs LinkedIn
   • Cost per conversion (external data + Revenue)
   • Conversion rates

Comparing Campaigns

1. Go to Campaigns tab
2. Sort by Revenue (descending)
3. Identify:
   • Best performing campaigns
   • Campaigns to scale
   • Campaigns to pause

Finding High-Value Referrers

1. Go to Referrers tab
2. Sort by Conversions (descending)
3. Look for:
   • Unexpected high-performing referrers
   • Partnership opportunities
   • Guest posting targets

Analyzing Email Performance

1. Go to Mediums tab
2. Filter: Medium equals "email"
3. Review:
   • Open → Click → Conversion funnel
   • Compare campaigns in Campaigns tab

Keyword Analysis

1. Go to Terms tab
2. Sort by Conversions
3. Identify:
   • Converting keywords
   • High-traffic low-conversion keywords (optimize landing pages)
   • Long-tail opportunities

Export

Each tab has its own export:

• Exports current tab data only
• Respects active filters
• Includes all visible columns
• CSV or PDF format

Related documentation

• Referral vs Direct Traffic — How each session's source is classified
• How Sealmetrics Calculates SEO Traffic — How organic search is detected
• How to Track Google Ads Campaigns — UTM templates for paid campaigns
• What Is a TERM in Sealmetrics? — What the Terms tab measures
• Overview Report — The high-level dashboard for all reports