Strange URL error

Thanks for reaching out @jcarlosd. These additional URL parameters which you highlighted are as a result of cross domain tracking with Google Analytics, typically used to ensure variations of your site URL are attributed to the same Analytics property. It’s common for users of sites with language variations such as your own, subdomains using the same Analytics property, or AMP users who have a canonical (non AMP) and an AMP version.

You’ll find more information on this below:
https://developers.google.com/tag-platform/devguides/cross-domain.

Note also that these additional parameter may be set up from within your Google Analytics configurations, without using Site Kit. You can also?check for any configurations at Analytics level. It’s not Site Kit itself that is adding these parameters.

If you need further assistance checking your Analytics configurations from analytics.google.com, for any cross domain tracking configurations, you can reach out at the Google Analytics Help Center, where the product experts would have more insights than we have here in Site Kit plugin support.

Let me know if you have any questions with the above.

Thanks for your fast assistance! I still do not know what do I have to change if anything. I read the documentation in your links but can not find how to avoid those parameters to be added.

The real strange thing is that it only happens with the link to the Australian domain. Do I have to make a change in the .org domain I edit or I have to ask to whoever manages the .org.au domain?

Thx.
J. Carlos

Hi Carlos,

The parameters may be added automatically if you’re using the same Google Analytics property for the Australian version of your site. This isn’t an issue, and in most case cases users won’t notice these parameters being added. It’s used to follow user journeys within Analytics from different versions of your site.

Note also that it’s possible that Analytics is adding this parameter based on the standard JavaScript version of the snippet not functioning on visiting the Australian version of your site due to a Firewall configuration. I say this as when I try to access the Australia version of your site it’s not accessible based on my location (screenshot). Analytics may therefore be using this parameter to continue to track Analytics visits between your domains.

In relation to ensuring cross domain tracking is not applied, can you first of all ensure there is no Universal Analytics (UA) property selected on your main site (https://www.acropolis.org/)? I can see there is at present. Once this is done I’ll check your site once more. You can remove the UA property by visiting your Analytics settings within Site Kit for this site.

Thanks again for your help. I was checking that the old UA is not longing connected. I checked the Site Kit configuration and it does not appear at all. And if I see the source code, there is a mention to:
<script> window[“ga-disable-UA-26661687-2”] = true; </script>

That one is the code of the old UA tracking.
By the way, checking Site Kit configuration I selected the “Improved measurement” option, just in case. But the problem still happens.

To me this is a problem in my WordPress site with the Site Kit. It is not in the Australian web site. I have another web site (with Joomla), with almost the same script generating from a MySQL database the list of countries, addresses and their URL and it works normally. (This is at https://www.nueva-acropolis.es/en-el-mundo). I do not have Google Site Kit in this latest web.

To me, it is really strange: there should be some reason that I do not understand.

Thanks for the update @jcarlosd. In relation to the <script> window[“ga-disable-UA-26661687-2”] = true; </script> addition, this only related to the non tracking of users. It doesn’t impact cross domain tracking.

The reason you may not see this on your Joomla or other sites, may be related to not having language variations of those sites. I checked your main site once more and I also noticed you do have alternative versions of your site listed, but not the Australian one. This indicates that it may even be related to your site configurations.

As mentioned above, cross domain tracking is something not specific to Site Kit. If checking for such features on the plugins GitHub repository, you’ll see we don’t have anything specifically added to the plugin to determine if domains are tracked using query parameters, it’s a Google Analytics feature. As I’m not an expert when it comes to cross domain tracking, I would also suggest reaching out to the product experts over at the Analytics Help Center, but do please check your alternative versions of your site first. The ones listed as per this screenshot, and apply the same for your Australian site.

Thanks for your interest! I still don’t see the root cause of this misbehavior and how to fix it.

My site https://www.acropolis.org has WPML for different language versions. That’s the reason of the rel=alternate. I do not control the https://www.acropolis.org.au site, but it seems the problem is not there.

I do have another site https://news.acropolis.org where I just wrote a link to the Australian site at the end of https://news.acropolis.org/2023/international-mother-earth-day-australia/ page. In the News site I have also Google Site Kit and WPML. So It confuses me even more.

As I said, the list of countries+addresses+links at the initial page (https://www.acropolis.org/en/where-we-are/) is created with a PHP script that I reviewed again. But I wonder why the only URL generated with those parameters is the Australian one. Of course I double checked the MySQL to be sure that the link has no parameter.

I do not know how to avoid that bad link. The only way I could was by disabling the Site Kit plugin and that’s the reason I am asking for Site Kit support.

Thanks for the additional insights @jcarlosd. And of course, not problem to ask us here in the forums. I performed some additional checks in the Google Analytics Help Center and official documentation and it looks like these may be able to configured directly from within Analytics, see this guide.

In relation to why this may be occurring only on the Australian version of your site, there may be configurations with this property, configurations within WPML or something else impacting cross domain tracking for this domain. I didn’t see that site specifically when looking at the “alternate” URLs from your main site.

If you do decide to use Site Kit once more, I would suggest checking that linked guide above. Note also that even if you don’t wish to use Site Kit to place your Google Analytics snippet, you can place the snippet manually while also keeping the module within Site Kit enabled so you can view Analytics data within the Site Kit dashboard.

Let me know if you have any questions with the above.

As we didn’t receive a response I’ll mark this as resolved. Feel free to open a new support topic if you continue to encounter issues, or reopen this topic and we’d be happy to assist.

Sorry to do not commenting how I proceeded with this issue. Finally I disabled the connection of Site Kit with Google Analytics and installed “Google Analytics para WordPress por MonsterInsights” instead. ??

Thanks for the update @jcarlosd. If the other plugin is working for you, great! If you do decide to use Site Kit once more, you may wish to reach out to the Google Analytics Help Center with regards configurations for Analytics to remove any cross domain tracking.

Based on your query I’ll also discuss with the team whether we can provide any feature or filter to disable cross domain tracking within the plugin. Thank you.